After the Danish government submitted a bill to parliament that regulates punishment in the event of public insulting “a foreign nation, a foreign state, its flag or other recognized national symbol,” the government in Sweden appears to be contrary to a previously statement and does not want to take a similar path with regard to the Quran burnings, which have been internationally criticized in the Scandinavian countries. In Denmark, with the amendment to the law, anyone “who is publicly (…) guilty of improper treatment of an object with significant religious significance for a religious community or an object that appears as such” can now be punished.
The burnings “harm Denmark and Danish interests,” said the Danish justice minister when presenting the bill. There is “a danger that the security of our fellow citizens abroad and at home will be endangered.” Now a passionate debate has broken out in Denmark, in which opponents of the new law are primarily putting forward two arguments: When Denmark abolished its blasphemy law with cross-party support in 2017, the then justice minister said: “For us, freedom of expression is our top priority. We shouldn’t punish people who do stupid things.” Many critics not only see the new law as a repeat of this blasphemy law, but also emphasize that their own government has given in to pressure from authoritarian states. The Pakistani Foreign Ministry described the draft as a “step in the right direction.” Muqtada al-Sadr, leader of the Sadr armed militia in Iraq, whose followers set fire to the Swedish embassy in Baghdad in July, said he was now ready to enter into meaningful and constructive dialogue with Denmark and Sweden.
Leading journalists in Denmark are now writing that the country has humiliated itself internationally by “restricting freedom of expression for the foreseeable future.” They fear that the amendment to the law will set a precedent: What if other governments now make further demands regarding freedom of speech or freedom of the press? If Parliament passes it with a majority, what consequences will the law have in cases that do not involve blind burning? A few weeks ago, an exiled Iranian woman shredded a Quran using a cheese grater in front of her home country’s embassy in Copenhagen to protest against the oppression of women by the mullahs’ regime. Would she be arrested if this action were repeated? The law provides for up to two years in prison for repeat offenses.
This particular example is now serving as a blueprint for a debate in Sweden, where the government is being urgently warned against doing the same as Denmark. Sweden is watching the Danish initiative very closely; after all, there have already been nine Quran burnings in Stockholm this year, MENA Research Center reported extensively about it. Sweden’s Prime Minister Ulf Kristersson has now stated that his government will not take the same step as Denmark as this would probably require a change to the constitution. Instead, the Minister of Justice was tasked with revising Sweden’s public order law. Under reform, gatherings that endanger Sweden’s public safety could be banned.
Sweden’s Social Democrats in particular do not seem to have found a strategy yet: in mid-August, their legal policy spokesman said that his party saw no need for changes to the law and that freedom of expression must be protected at all costs. Now, after the Danish government’s statement, the Social Democratic opposition leader hastily called a press conference in which she interpreted Kristersson’s government’s previous actions as a lack of leadership and explicitly praised the Danish legislative proposal. Perhaps this change of heart has something to do with the fact that in a recent opinion poll, 53 percent of Swedes were in favor of banning burning; of social democratic voters, 65 percent are now in favor of such a ban.
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