(Brussels Times) Belgian police have been able to register an increasing trend of forced marriages in Belgium. In 2015, 10 forced marriages were officially recorded, in 2016, the number increased to 15, in 2017 up to 21 and last year, police registered […]
(Brussels Times) Turkish president Recep Tayyip Erdogan will send around forty new imams to Belgium in 2020, a lot more than in previous years. They are being sent in response to the shortage being faced by many Turkish mosques, Het Laatste Nieuws […]
(Deutsche Welle) Since the 2016 terrorist attack in Berlin’s Breitscheidplatz, German authorities have prevented a further nine attacks of a similar nature, the Federal Criminal Police Office (BKA) said Sunday. Indeed, last month alone, two acts of terror were thwarted, the BKA told Germany’s Welt […]
(Yle) Speaking on Yle’s talk show Ykkösaamu on Saturday, Prime Minister Sanna Marin said she was very pleased with the government’s decision to repatriate Finnish children from the al-Hol refugee camp. “It’s up to ministry officials to determine whether Finland will also […]
(Yle) Two Finnish children from the al-Hol refugee camp are in the care of Finnish authorities and en route to Finland on Saturday evening, the Foreign Ministry’s Under Secretary of State Pekka Puustinen said at a press conference on Saturday just after […]
(Deutsche Welle) German police said on Saturday that they had asked visitors to Berlin’s Christmas market at Breitscheidplatz to leave the area after receiving information about suspicious objects. A concert event at the Kaiser Wilhelm Memorial Church had also been broken off as […]
(Swiss Info) A French-Tunisian citizen who used to work as a security guard at Geneva’s main mosque has been banned from Switzerland for ten years due to his alleged links to religious fundamentalists, a Swiss court ruled on Friday, confirming an earlier […]
(Israel Hayom) It seems like the overarching theme of Hanukkah went over Rep. Rashida Tlaib’s head. The congresswoman from Michigan released an early Hanukkah greeting to the far-left Jewish group If Not Now ahead of their holiday party and, in doing so, […]
(Algemeiner) A prominent Canadian Jewish group raised concerns on Thursday about several “extremist” speakers scheduled to appear at an Islamic conference in Toronto this weekend. The event in question — titled “Reviving the Islamic Spirit” — began on Friday at the Metro […]
(Brussels Times) The French inquiry into the attacks perpetrated by Islamic State (IS) in Paris on November 13, 2015, has ended after four years. The final pieces of the puzzle were put together by Belgian investigators, according to the Friday editions of […]
(Yle) The Foreign Ministry announced on Thursday that Finland is preparing to evacuate two Finnish children from the al-Hol refugee camp in Syria, where relatives of Isis combatants are being held. The ministry said that to protect the children’s privacy and ensure […]
(3AW) A couple were left stranded and out of pocket after a rideshare driver refused to pick them up because they had a Christmas ham. The couple had been for dinner at their local RSL in Melbourne’s south-east on Tuesday night, and […]
(AP) Four people will stand trial on French terrorism charges over an attempted Islamic extremist attack on a Paris-bound train that was thwarted by three young Americans. The real-life drama inspired a Clint Eastwood movie, and after four years of investigation the […]
(Swiss Info) Three Swiss nationals who fought for Islamic State and are currently in custody in northern Syria deplore the harsh conditions in Kurdish prisons and want the Swiss government to repatriate them. The jihadists, who all come from the French-speaking part […]
(Yle) Minister for Foreign Affairs Pekka Haavisto received the support of 110 MPs in a confidence vote held in Parliament on Wednesday concerning the repatriation of Finns living in the al-Hol camp in Syria. Out of 200 MPs, 79 MPs voted against […]
(Middle East Eye) The Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR) has called on the moderators of the next Democratic presidential debate to question candidates about a recent executive order that effectively silences criticism on US campuses of Israeli human rights abuses. The order, […]
(BBC) Baroness Warsi has criticised her party’s inquiry into Islamophobia and other forms of prejudice, arguing it does not address past problems. The former Conservative chairwoman said it needed to cover previous cases rather than just complaint handling. And she said the […]
(Yle) Opposition and government MPs clashed during a tense parliamentary debate over the government’s position on repatriating Finnish citizens currently at the al-Hol refugee camp in Syria on Tuesday afternoon. An opposition interpellation tabled last week set its sight on putting the […]
(BBC) A hospital trust believes it is the first in the UK to introduce disposable sterile headscarves for staff to use in operating theatres. Junior doctor Farah Roslan, who is Muslim, had the idea during her training at the Royal Derby Hospital. […]
(BBC) The Conservatives have appointed a psychiatry professor to lead its inquiry into Islamophobia and other forms of prejudice within the party. The party said Prof Swaran Singh would look at how it handles complaints, and tries to clamp down on discrimination. […]
(Dutch News) The man who shot four people dead on a tram in Utrecht has been assigned a lawyer after a court ruled he was mentally unfit to act in his own best interest. Gökmen Tanis was not present at the court […]
(AFP) Austrian authorities have foiled a plot to carry out a series of terror attacks, including bombing one of Vienna’s Christmas markets, local media reported Monday. The plot involved three men, including a 24-year-old ringleader who had been influenced by the ideology of […]
(AP) A man from Kosovo has been charged in Germany with supporting a terrorist organization on allegations he funneled money to the Islamic State in Syria and spread propaganda for the extremist group, federal prosecutors said Monday. The suspect, identified only as […]
(Canadian Press) Two men convicted of plotting to crash a Via Rail train have chosen to be tried by judge alone should their case not proceed to the Supreme Court of Canada. The Ontario Court of Appeal overturned the 2015 convictions of […]
(Yle) Finnish women should not be repatriated from the camp, because they are a security risk. That’s the reasoning of those opposed to bringing back Finnish citizens in the al-Hol camp in northern Syria, which holds refugees from the war in Syria […]
(BBC) Two people have been arrested in Birmingham on suspicion of terror offences. A 25-year-old man and a woman, 23, are being held on suspicion of the commission, preparation or instigation of acts of terrorism, West Midlands Police said. The arrests were […]
(AP) An East African man imprisoned in Texas for terrorism was convicted Friday of trying to recruit fellow prisoners to join the Islamic State group and plan attacks in the United States, federal prosecutors announced. A jury found Mohamed Ibrahim Ahmed, 45, […]
(AFP) A Paris court on Thursday sentenced a jihadist to 30 years in prison over his February 2015 knife attack on three soldiers guarding a Jewish centre in the Mediterranean city of Nice. Moussa Coulibaly, now 35, staged his assault just weeks […]
(Swiss Info) Swiss parliamentarians have supported a plan to oblige people to show their faces during identity checks and visits to social security authorities. The proposal is aimed at countering an outright ban on wearing a burka in public. The House of Representatives on […]
(Local) Prime Minister Mette Frederiksen has praised police after a major anti-terror operation in Denmark on Wednesday. 20 people were arrested in a major anti-terror operation at several locations in the country, with a number of the arrested individuals suspected of terrorism offences. […]
(AP) Eight people will face pre-trial custody hearings later Thursday, after “some 20 people” suspected of involvement in plotting Islamist extremist violence were arrested in a series of raids across Denmark. They are six men and two women, according to Danish media. […]
(Yle) The Foreign Ministry took the lead in planning an operation to repatriate Finnish nationals who wanted to return to Finland from the al-Hol refugee camp in Syria, according to official documents seen by Yle. The material indicated that the draft plan […]
(BBC) A man has been arrested in the West Midlands on suspicion of terrorism offences. The 49-year-old was detained at an address in Solihull on suspicion of funding/supporting terrorism. West Midlands Police said the arrest was pre-planned and intelligence-led and there was […]
(Dutch News) The number of pupils attending Islamic primary schools has soared 60% over the past 10 years, according to education ministry figures obtained by the Volkskrant. In total, 15,000-plus Muslim under-12-year-olds are attending an Islamic faith school, compared with 9,300 in […]
(BBC) A man has been arrested in Bristol on suspicion of Islamist-related terrorism offences, police have said. The 33-year-old was detained at 23:00 GMT on Monday as part of a planned operation at a flat in Tyndale Court, Imperial Road, in Clifton. […]
(AFP) A Bulgarian imam was jailed for eight and a half years on Tuesday for spreading the ideas of the Islamic State group and propagating hatred and war on religious grounds. The regional court in the southern city of Pazardzhik also handed […]
(Dutch News) The national terror threat level has been reduced for the first time in six years in response to the falling number of attacks in Europe. The national counter-terrorism co-ordinator (NCTV) brought the official assessment down from level four (“substantial”) to […]
(Dutch News) The public prosecution department said on Monday that it had found no evidence of political interference in the decision to prosecute anti-Islam campaigner and MP Geert Wilders for discrimination after leading supporters in an anti-Moroccan chant. Wilders has called on […]
(BBC) Conservative chairman James Cleverly has apologised for cases of Islamophobia in his party. Mr Cleverly said he was “sorry” when Tory members and candidates “do or say things that are wrong.” But he added that he was “confident” there was now […]
(BBC) A man and woman have been arrested on suspicion of terror offences relating to Syria, said police. The pair were arrested in Dover on Saturday as part of an “intelligence-led” operation and there was no risk to the public, West Midlands […]
(Expats.cz) A Somali girl who wanted to wear hijab at a Prague secondary nursing school but was banned to do so in 2013 had the right to wear it, the Czech Supreme Court ruled in its verdict that has been released on […]
(Deutsche Welle) Germany has deported 90 “Gefährder” and other “relevant persons” since the 2016 attack on a Berlin Christmas market, according to German newsmagazine Der Spiegel, which cited a government response to a parliamentary inquiry on Friday. In Germany a “Gefährder” (lit. “endangerer”) […]
(Deutsche Welle) Some Iranian journalists living and working abroad have been getting bad news when calling home after discovering that parents and siblings have been interrogated and detained. For years, Iranian authorities have been putting pressure on family members to silence critical journalists […]
(Swiss Info) A Swiss woman who accused the Islamic scholar Tariq Ramadan of rape in 2018 has now launched a new legal case against him, this time for slander. The case centres around Ramadan’s book “Devoir de verité” (“The Responsibility of Truth”), […]
(Swiss Info) Switzerland-based Muslim preacher Abu Ramadan is under investigation for allegedly committing welfare fraud. He has also been investigated over hate speech. The public prosecutor in Bern opened a criminal investigation in early 2019 after the 66-year-old preacher was denounced by […]
(JNS) As many as 1,050 Hezbollah members and supporters reside in Germany, and the organization uses the country as a major hub for its activities, German daily Tagesspiegel reported last week, citing security sources. The Lebanese Shi’ite terrorist group’s operations in Europe […]
(CBC) A Quebec historian has launched a formal complaint against the chief justice of the province’s Court of Appeal over comments she made about the province’s religious symbols law. Frédéric Bastien, who teaches history at Dawson College, said taken together, Justice Nicole Duval […]
(BBC) Boris Johnson has said the “grim reality” is that “some people can’t be rehabilitated” in prison. The PM called for longer sentences and an end to automatic release after convicted terrorist Usman Khan killed two people on London Bridge on Friday. […]
(BBC) Boris Johnson has told the BBC that 74 people jailed for terror offences and released early will have their licence conditions reviewed. The Ministry of Justice launched the urgent review after convicted terrorist Usman Khan, who had served half of his […]
(CBC) Members of a Nigerian family living in Windsor say they fear for their lives as a result of media attention they’ve received after a deportation order previously issued by the Canadian government. Rasheedat Bakare, her husband Afeez, son Faaiq and daughter […]
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