Islam in Europe

In the Swiss communes of Wangen and Langenthal, situated in the canton of Berne, the population is questioning the construction of two Islamic minarets. The editorialist Jean-Jacques Roth is in favour of the project which is unleashing the wrath of the far-right party UDC. "Nothing is more precious than secularism, so seriously under threat today from hordes of regressive fundamentalists. But in order to properly defend it and to protect the public space occupied by the religion's inopportune manifestations, the religion should be given the utmost freedom of expression within its natural perimeters: the church and the cemetery. ... By negating the new denominational reality of the country , which Islam participates in quite legitimately, and by turning minarets into an emblem of fanaticism, which they are not, the UDC is not only serving it's own electoral fortune, it is priming fundamentalists ...”.

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