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BAGHDAD, (MANEND NEWS): Iraqi security forces on Saturday dispersed about 1,000 supporters of cleric Moqtada Sadr who tried to march to Baghdad’s Green Zone housing foreign embassies, believing a Holy Quran had been desecrated in Denmark.
The protesters were reacting to reports of an apparent desecration of the Holy Quran for the third time in a month, with the first two in Sweden already raising diplomatic tensions.
On its Facebook page, the extreme right group Danske Patrioter posted on Friday a video of a man burning what seemed to be a Holy Quran and trampling an Iraqi flag. Copenhagen police deputy chief Trine Fisker told AFP that “not more than a handful” of protesters had gathered Friday across from the Iraqi embassy. “I can also confirm there was a book burnt. We do not know which book it was,” she said. “It was quite peaceful.” Sadr has urged action after Holy Quran desecrations in Sweden. His followers on Saturday reacted to the news from Copenhagen, and gathered in the pre-dawn darkness at Tahrir Square in central Baghdad, some carrying portraits of Sadr. “Yes, yes to the Quran!” shouted the protesters, mostly young men.
Security forces cut two bridges leading to the high-security Green Zone where governmental institutions and foreign embassies are located.
The demonstrators tried to force their way through before officers pushed them back. The protesters eventually dispersed several hours later, after scuffles erupted, an interior ministry official told AFP, speaking anonymously because he was not allowed to brief the media. Protesters were trying to reach the embassy of Denmark, the official said.
Early Saturday, Iraq’s foreign ministry had condemned “the desecration of the holy Holy Quran and the Iraqi flag” in front of the embassy in Denmark. The ministry’s statement said that “these actions provoke reactions and put all the parties in delicate situations”. A separate statement said “we cannot allow to happen again” what occurred at the Swedish embassy. It reaffirmed Baghdad’s “full commitment” to the Vienna Convention on Diplomatic Relations and said it guarantees “the protection and security provided to diplomatic teams”.
The actions of Sweden-based Iraqi refugee Salwan Momika, whose book-burning protest had been permitted by Stockholm on free speech grounds, triggered condemnation across the Muslim world.Iraq also condemned the attack on Sweden’s embassy but expelled Stockholm’s ambassador.Swedish Foreign Minister Tobias Billstrom called Momika’s protest “a clear provocation” that “in no way reflects the Swedish government’s opinions”, while also stressing a “constitutional right to freedom of assembly, freedom of expression and freedom to demonstrate”. Sadr on Saturday said in a vague tweet that “words are no longer enough” in defending religion.