Copenhagen: Ahmadinejad meets with Danish Muslims

Copenhagen: Ahmadinejad meets with Danish Muslims

Update: The Danish People's Party wants to cut subsidies to the Muslim Joint Council for participating in the meeting and not condemning Ahmadinejad and the Iranian regime. (DA)

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Iranian president Mahmoud Ahmadinejad uploaded pictures of his trip to Copenhagen, and these include pictures of a meeting with Danish Muslims, in which imam Abdul Wahid Pedersen and the spokesperson for the Muslim Joint Council (Muslimernes Fællesråd), Zubair Butt Hussein, participated.

Zubair Butt Hussein says that he debated whether to participate "because you can't just say that I agree with the man - for example, regarding the Holocaust, or the treatment of the students who demonstrate in Tehran." but he's a debater and has also sat with everybody in Denmark whether from the Danish People's Party or the Red-Green Alliance. He wanted to hear from Ahmadinejad how he really sees Denmark.

Zubair Butt Hussein didn't get to speak in the meeting, which he says was very short, and couldn't communicate directly with Ahmadinejad, who only speaks Farsi. He says he spoke with a staff member who spoke English and told him that although the Danish debate is stormy, Danish Muslims really have it good. He's not picked up by the police for being a spokesperson for Muslims. He says that other Danish Muslims who were there gave a similar picture.

Asked why it was relevant to meet with a man like Ahmadinejad, Zubair Butt Hussein answers that he can't speak for everybody but he wanted to hear things from the people involved. He also wanted to shake hands with Mugabe (Zimbabwe's dictator), as did prime minister Lars Løkke Rasmussen.

He says that both Danish Sunni and Shia Muslims were at the meeting. The two denominations are fighting in Iraq, among other places.

He says he thinks there was an interest in how Sunni and Shia Muslims deal with each other here. The problems of mosque buildings and minarets were also discussed. And the meeting at the Bella Center during COP15 also dealt with the environment. He says he was glad to hear it being debated that a green lifestyle is part of Islam.

Source: Politiken (Danish)