Islamophobia: Swiss far right seeks vote on minarets ban

Ian Traynor, Europe editor
The Guardian,
Wednesday July 9, 2008

The minaret of the Mahmud mosque is pictured close to a Christian church in Zurich, Switzerland. Photograph: Christian Hartmann/Reuters

Switzerland braced itself for a troubled campaign of Islamophobia yesterday after the far right drummed up enough support to force a national vote to ban minarets.

In a country that is home to more than 300,000 Muslims but boasts only three minarets, a series of court cases and votes in regional parliaments has recently dismissed attempts to have minarets outlawed.

But a campaign, led by the rightwing populists of the Swiss People's party, to enshrine a ban on minarets in the Swiss constitution yesterday mustered more than enough signatures to warrant a referendum on the sensitive issue.

Disputes over mosque and minaret-building are rife across Europe, with controversies in Germany, Austria, Italy, and the Netherlands. In Switzerland, Christoph Blocher's anti-immigrant Swiss People's party, which won the national elections last year after a campaign branded racist by UN monitors, has repeatedly used the building regulations and zoning laws to try to prevent minarets being built. It has failed, as in Zurich, last month. Last year a Turkish association won a supreme court case authorising it to put a minaret on a mosque in the village of Wangen..

By yesterday People's party activists had gathered 115,000 signatures, more than the 100,000 needed under Switzerland's direct democracy system.

The campaign demands a constitutional amendment, stating: "The building of minarets in Switzerland is forbidden."

The government has already opposed the demand and may try to prevent the referendum, citing reasons of national security and the impact on the country's international relations and interests.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2008/jul/09/religion.islam

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