Islam in Denmark

A Mosque in Hvidovre outside Copenhagen run by the Ahmadiyya Muslim Community. First mosque in the Nordic countries, constructed in 1967

Islam is the largest minority religion in Denmark. According to the U.S. Department of State, approximately 3.7% of the population in Denmark is Muslim. Other sources, including the Royal Danish Ministry of Foreign Affairs, cite lower percentages.

There are 100-150 Muslims in Denmark who convert to Christianity each year (Estimate by an Intercultural Studies Expert). Meanwhile a larger number of Danes are converting to Islam, an estimated 2800 Danish converts.[2]

History and background

Religious freedom is guaranteed by law in Denmark, and as of 2005, nineteen different Muslim religious communities had status as officially recognized religious societies, which gives them certain tax benefits. However, unlike the majority of countries in the West, Denmark lacks separation of church and state, resulting in economic advantages for the Church of Denmark not shared by Muslim or other minority communities. Although they are compensated by tax benefit.

During the 1980s and 1990s a number of Muslim asylum seekers came to Denmark. In the 1980s mostly from Iran, Iraq, Gaza and the West Bank and in the 1990s mostly from Somalia and Bosnia. Some of those who sought asylum had been charged with terrorism in their home countries.

The asylum seekers comprise about 40% of the Danish Muslim population.

Previously, the majority of Muslims who immigrated to Denmark did so as part of family reunification. The Danish parliament has passed a law in 2002 making family reunification harder. It was also implemented to counter forced marriages by ensuring that both parties are at least 24 years old and so considered old enough to enter a marriage without being forced to do so. The new law requires the couple to both be above the age of 24 and requires the resident spouse to show capacity to support both persons of the couple.

Religious issues

In 1967 the Nusrat Jahan Mosque was built in Hvidovre, a Copenhagen suburb. This Mosque is used by adherents of the Muslim Ahmadi sect .

Other mosques exist but are not built for the explicit purpose. It is not forbidden to build mosques or any other religious buildings in Denmark but there are very strict zoning laws. One piece of land has been reserved for a grand mosque at Amager (near Copenhagen), but financing is not settled. Danish Muslims have not succeeded in cooperating on the financing of the project and do not agree on whether it should be financed with outside sources, such as Saudi money. Advertisements by the Danish People's Party, which promote anti-mosque legislation, contend that Iran and Saudi Arabia are sources of funding. These are considered despotic regimes by the DPP.

Seven Danish cemeteries have separate sections for Muslims. Most of the Danish Muslims are buried in those cemeteries, with about 70 being flown abroad for burial in their countries of origin. A separate Muslim cemetery was opened in Brøndby near Copenhagen in September 2006.

In 2009, the U.S. Department of State released a report on religious freedom in Denmark. One finding was that there were a few isolated incidents of discrimination against immigrants, which include desecration of graves:

There were isolated incidents of anti-immigrant sentiment, including graffiti, low-level assaults, denial of service, and employment discrimination on racial grounds. Societal discrimination against religious minorities was difficult to distinguish from discrimination against ethnic minorities. The Government criticized the incidents and investigated several, but it brought few cases to trial specifically on charges of racial discrimination or hate crimes. Reports continued of incidents of desecration of ethnic and religious minority gravesites.

Schools

The first Muslim private school was founded in 1978 - Den Islamisk Arabiske Skole (the Islamic Arabic School) in Helsingør and accepted students from any country. Today there are about 20 Muslim schools, most of which are located in the major cities. The Muslim schools are big enough today to enable catering to students according to their country of origin. In the 1980s, schools for Pakistani, Turkish and Arabic speakers were founded. Furthermore, Somali, Palestinian and Iraqi schools were founded in the 1990s. Today 6 or 7 nationalities dominate the Muslim schools.

The biggest school is Dia Privatskole in Nørrebro with about 410 students. Two Pakistani schools teach in Urdu as mother tongue and several Turkish schools have Turkish instruction. Most other schools cater to Arabic speaking students.

Conflict

As a country with a highly homogeneous population, Denmark, like most nations in the world, is dealing with the presence of a substantial and visible minority.^{[citation needed]} As first and second generation immigrants, many drawn from the ranks of refugees, some Muslim groups in Denmark have failed to achieve the economic and political power proportional to their population.

Some ethnic Danes feel threatened by aspects of Muslim culture, setting the stage for conflict. Partly as a reaction to this situation, recent years have seen the rise of a political party (the Danish People's Party) with nationalistic and anti-immigration policies. This party currently supports the ruling centre-right Liberal-Conservative coalition which has implemented stricter policies to reduce the number of immigrants—particularly by enforcing stricter criteria for residence status to couples where one of the spouses does not have permission to live in Denmark. This is known as the 24 year rule, since it automatically prohibits Danes from living with their foreign spouse in Denmark if either party is younger than 24 years old.

Much media attention has been focused on forced marriages, practiced by some Muslims (as well as Hindus and other cultures), and laws have been implemented trying to prevent this practice. The choice of some Muslim women in Denmark to wear or not to wear various traditional head covering, e.g. in the workplace, has also been the subject of debate and action. The Danish military has refused to allow Muslim women to wear a traditional head covering.^{[citation needed]} In public schools, teaching is conducted in Danish, and the government opposes the use of immigrant children's native language in Danish primary schools. However, Muslim schools where Danish is not the primary teaching language do exist.

A Danish newspaper, Jyllands-Posten printed 12 caricatures of the Islamic prophet Muhammad in September 2005. These cartoons sparked an international controversy, ultimately resulting in the scorching of two Danish diplomatic missions, a boycott of Danish goods in several countries, and a large number of protests around the world. The number of violent protests has caused rising support for the anti-immigration Danish People's Party and, by some accounts, a more critical approach towards Islam in Denmark.

Organizations

• Islam i Danmark (Islam in Denmark [acronym, 'IslamDK']), founded in 2007, based in Copenhagen.
• Foreningen af Demokratiske Muslimer (The organization of democratic Muslims), founded by Naser Khader in 2006. Its current chairman is Moustapha Kassem.
• Islamisk Trossamfund, Sunni Muslim, with strong Salafi tendencies, run by Mostafa Chendid, a Moroccan-born Danish imam.
• Muslimer i Dialog (Muslims in Dialogue), largely Sunni, run by Noman Malik and Abdul Wahid Pedersen. Their spokesman is Zubair Butt Hussain.
• Hizb ut-Tahrir, mainly Sunni.
• Foreningen Salam (Salam Association) is run by Shia Muslim women.
• UngeMuslimer Gruppen, (Young Muslims Group), Shia Muslim, based in Copenhagen.
• Ahmadiyya Muslim Community Denmark

Noted Danish-Muslims

• Ahmad Abu Laban
• Naser Khader
• Asmaa Abdol-Hamid
• Hüseyin Arac

See also

• Religion in Denmark
• Islam by country
• Jyllands-Posten Muhammad cartoons controversy
• Stop the Islamification of Europe - Political group