EU ready to cooperate with OIC on desecration of Holy Qur’an

Brussels: The EU has a “well-established collaboration with the Organization of Islamic Cooperation” and is “open to their suggestions on concrete engagement” over the repeated desecration of the Hoku Qur’an, an EU spokesperson said.

The EU has also been in contact with the OIC and is ready to collaborate with the Jeddah-based 57-member Islamic body over the burning of the holy book in Europe, Nabila Massrali, EU spokesperson for foreign affairs and security policy, told a news conference in Brussels.

Massrali said: “We have been in contact with OIC’s secretariat and their permanent mission in Brussels to understand their next step on this issue … at this point of time, we have not received any official request for meetings. So, we are waiting for their suggestions on our meeting with them.”

She stressed that “the EU is basically ready to collaborate with the OIC.”

Bombarded with reporters’ questions on the issue, Massrali was asked if Holy Qur’an burning should be made illegal across EU member states. She replied: “That is not for me to say … we don’t believe that everything that is legal is ethical.”

When asked why the EU has not explicitly condemned the repeated Holy Qur’an burning incidents in Sweden and Denmark, Massrali dodged the question, saying: “We have reacted three times … we have formulated the statement as we have, which is extremely clear and extremely strong reaction to the situation and we are totally rejecting the burning of the holy books and the Holy Qur’an.”

On the other hand, she referred to EU High Representative Josep Borrell’s statement on July 26 in which he said: “The desecration of the Holy Qur’an, or of any other book considered holy, is offensive, disrespectful and a clear provocation.”

On Sunday, the OIC’s Council of Foreign Ministers reached a resolution in Jeddah on the repeated desecrating of copies of the Qur’an.

It called on “all the OIC Overseas Missions (New York, Geneva and Brussels) to take the initiative to address, in the respective international organizations, which are accredited to them, these acts of hatred against Islam and its sacred symbols in the interpretation of the relevant conventions as well as the formulation of new international legal texts to this end.”