Basel: Parents fined for missed swimming lessons

Via SwissInfo:

Several Muslim families have been fined for keeping their children out of mandatory school swimming lessons, the first time such a punishment has been handed down.

Education authorities in canton Basel-City said on Thursday that seven children from five families had missed the lessons. Five of the children were removed on religious grounds. All of the students were girls under the age of ten.

This article was prepared by the Islam in Europe blog – islamineurope.blogspot.com

A revision of cantonal school policies made the lessons obligatory one year ago and each parent can be fined as much as SFr1,000 ($957) for not sending his or her child to the classes. Fines in these particular cases were set at around SFr350 per child per parent, meaning a two-parent family with two children who missed the classes must pay SFr1,400.

Basel-City schools offer swimming lessons that separate boys and girls past puberty, while younger children take the classes together.

Christoph Eymann, director of the canton’s education department, said it is important for schools to avoid creating parallel societies. There are a total of 1,033 Muslim boys and girls registered in the canton’s primary schools.

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UK: Healthy heart training for imams

Via Manchester Evening News:

The British Heart Foundation and QUIT are working together to encourage the Muslim community to stop smoking and lead a healthier lifestyle this Ramadan.

Statistics suggest that South Asians in the UK are 50 per cent more likely to die from heart disease than those in the general population .

This article was prepared by the Islam in Europe blog – islamineurope.blogspot.com

As part of the Ramadan campaign, the BHF will be training 300 imams in major cities across the UK.

Trainees will receive information they need to help their congregation make positive lifestyle changes including stopping smoking, improving their diet and exercising more. The initiative will take place in Manchester, London, Blackburn and Bradford.

Qaim Zaidi, Ethnic Strategy Manager for the BHF said: “During Ramadan Muslims do not eat, drink or smoke from sunrise to sunset for 30 days. For many it’s the ideal time to kick the smoking habit and lead a healthier lifestyle. Stopping smoking is one of the most important things you can do to benefit your health.

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Austria: Cracking down on benefits abuse by asylum seekers

Via Deutsche Welle:

Austria is cracking down on illegal immigrants and asylum seekers thought to be illegally claiming benefits. Interior Minister Maria Fekter says 500 police officers will be given the task of tracking down those accused of ripping off the state.

The officers are also to receive special training in dealing with foreigners and are to conduct nighttime raids on refugee centers and buildings housing asylum seekers. Neighbors are being asked to tell police about the shopping habits of those seeking asylum.

This article was prepared by the Islam in Europe blog – islamineurope.blogspot.com

Fekter said the aim was to expose those who are ripping off the system.

“Some of them are operating illegal vehicle workshops,” Fekter said. “There are some who have registered dozens of vehicles. And so we are investigating the details to see if these people really require aid.”

Raids over the past week led to six arrests on charges of illegal residence. Over 100 people were given notice that they did not meet the criteria for state aid.

The minister says that the cost of providing food and shelter for Austria’s 19,000 asylum seekers is around 100 million euros ($130 million) a year.

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EU: Islam in Europe now has strong local leadership

Via The National:

There are major changes underway for Muslims in Europe. They go beyond threats to ban the burqa in France or plans to build the largest mosque on the continent in Marseille. They go beyond the Dutch elections last month, which doubled the number of parliamentarians from the anti-Islam Freedom Party.

What is more momentous is the birth of a homegrown form of Islam, an indigenous approach to practising the religion in today’s Europe.

This article was prepared by the Islam in Europe blog – islamineurope.blogspot.com

And a Dutch imam is leading the way. Himself a product of a cultural melange, Mohammed Cheppih was raised in a family of Moroccan immigrants in the Netherlands. Having learnt his faith at the knee of community elders, Imam Cheppih, 33, now believes that it is time for a homegrown form of Islam that is true to the cultural mores of the country that he and many other young Muslims consider their home.

“I personally got fed up with religion promoted by others,” he told me over coffee in downtown Beirut during a recent trip to the region. “Culturally, it is not what I believe.”

He is no stranger to challenging conventional thinking. During his religious training at university in Saudi Arabia, his ideas about Islam’s role in the West rattled more than a few cages. “I was always under threat for being kicked out of school for questioning and debating everything,” he said.

Similarly the religious texts that are available in the Netherlands are usually translated from abroad, with little relevance to everyday life in his home country. It is a deficit that many critics have identified. Muslim communities in Europe often lack well-trained imams with a local connection who can truly engage both the Muslim and European aspects of a community, especially the youth.

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Denmark: DPP demands 28-year-rule

The Danish People’s Party wants to raise the marriage immigration age to 28. At the same time, the party suggests excluding Westerners (DA) from the new requirements.

Kristian Thulesen Dahl of the DPP explained that this is already the case for such things as visa requirements. This way Denmark would get Western immigrants from the same cultural background, and fewer non-Western immigrants and this will mean fewer conflicts in Danish society.

Forced and arranged marriages are most widespread in other cultures, he points out, and mentions that Turkey and Pakistan are problematic countries.

This article was prepared by the Islam in Europe blog – islamineurope.blogspot.com

Via Politiken:

The Danish People’s Party is threatening the government’s educational grant and early pension reforms if it does not increase to 28 the age at which Danes can marry foreign spouses and bring them to Denmark, according to Berlingske Tidende.

The DPP has called for an increase to 28 years of age of current rules stipulating that Danish nationals must be at least 24 before a marriage to a foreign spouse enables a family reunion, but that dispensations should apply for western nationalities.

“It will be one complex (Ed: of reforms). Particularly because we face a lot of tasks this autumn. And an election is looming in which we have to present our views to the electorate,” says DPP Leader Pia Kjærsgaard.

The government, however, appears unwilling to link the issues.

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UK: Prison apologizes for serving pork meat

Via BBC (h/t Al-Kanz):

A prison governor has apologised to Muslim inmates after they were served non-halal burgers.

A number of Muslim inmates at HMP Ford, an open prison in West Sussex, are claiming they were served pork burgers by prison staff on Saturday evening.

This article was prepared by the Islam in Europe blog – islamineurope.blogspot.com

A prison service spokesman said: “On Saturday a problem in the kitchens resulted in Muslim prisoners being mistakenly served non-halal food.”

It is still not clear exactly what meat was used.

The spokesman added: “The governor is apologising to the prisoners affected and an investigation is under way. The prison is working closely with the Muslim chaplain on this matter.”

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UK: ‘Honestly, the burka doesn’t work’

Via Daily Mail:

Jeremy Clarkson has joined the debate on whether burkas should be permitted in Britain in his own inimitable style.

The outspoken presenter provoked a flurry of complaints after telling viewers of Top Gear on Sunday night that he had seen a Muslim woman wearing saucy underwear beneath her gown.

This article was prepared by the Islam in Europe blog – islamineurope.blogspot.com

Clarkson had been discussing the best way to stop drivers being distracted by female pedestrians, along with co-presenters Richard Hammond and James May.

More than six million viewers had tuned in to watch the show, which featured guest appearances from Hollywood stars Tom Cruise and Cameron Diaz.

In front of the studio audience, he said: ‘This is an important bit of news, I really want to bring this up. People imagine that the most dangerous time of the year to drive is November or perhaps February – dark nights, fog, ice.

‘But we were talking about this the other day and we think the most dangerous time to drive a car is round about now. Sunny skies, light breezes, girls wearing short skirts, because the thing is, you can’t not look. You can’t physically not look.’

Hammond interjected, saying: ‘You can physically not use your mobile phone and it’s easy not to drive home when you’ve had 18 pints of lager. But when you’re driving along and a girl walks past, you have to look. Actually, do you not think that here, there is actually a case for the burka? Because then the problem would go away.’

Clarkson then replied: ‘No, no, no. Honestly, the burka doesn’t work. I was in a cab in Piccadilly the other day when a woman in a full burka crossing the road in front of me tripped over the pavement, went head over heels and up it came, red g-string and stockings. I promise that happened. The taxi driver will back me up on that.’

(…)

The Muslim Women’s Network UK last night criticised Top Gear after they joked about using the burka as a way of preventing drivers being distracted by female pedestrians.

Faeeza Vaid, co-ordinator at the organisation, said: ‘The debate surrounding the burka is a serious issue which shouldn’t be publicly joked about. Rather than joking about it, we should be having serious dialogue.’

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Surrey: Muslims pay less for burial

Via Telegraph (h/t NRP):

Christian churchgoers have complained about the “discriminatory price” of burial plots in the Greenlawn Memorial Park cemetery in Warlingham, Surrey.

The cemetery – which is managed by Croydon Council – offers Muslims a graveyard plot for £2,383, but charges non-Muslims £2,927 – a hike of £544.

(…)

This article was prepared by the Islam in Europe blog – islamineurope.blogspot.com

The cemetery has a specially-designated area of land for Muslims, who as part of their religion only allow one body to be buried in any one plot and must be buried apart from non-Muslims and facing Mecca.

(…)

A spokesman for Croydon Council said that the reason for the price difference was that Muslims only allow one person to be buried in a grave, whereas people of other religions can use the plot for more than one person.

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Leicestershire: Increase in report abuse against Muslims

Via BBC:

Muslims in Leicestershire are facing increasing abuse, according to figures from the police.

Between April 2008 and March 2009, officers recorded 25 offences against Muslims but in the following 12 months, the figure rose to 42.

Most incidents involved verbal abuse but there was a small number of cases in which veils were pulled off.

Police said they treated all types of hate crime as a priority and urged victims to report any problems.

This article was prepared by the Islam in Europe blog – islamineurope.blogspot.com

(…)

Rehana Sidat, from Leicester, who wears the niqab, said: “I think there are two things going on. There is more Islamophobia, people are becoming more intolerant.

“But also more people are reporting this sort of thing, having more confidence to bring it to the police.”

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Denmark: Non-Western women having less children than Danes

Update: updated figures for previous years.

A long-time trend of fewer births among immigrants means that their birthrate is now lower than for ethnic Danes. While Danish women have 1.9 children on average, non-Western immigrant women have 1.6. [Ed: 1997: 1.97/1998: 1.94 ]

This according to new data for fertility in 2009, provided by Denmark Statistics for the Integration Ministry, but which hasn’t been published yet. The birthrate among immigrant women has been cut by more than half since 1993, when the average woman had 3.4 children, twice as many as Danish women did.

This article was prepared by the Islam in Europe blog – islamineurope.blogspot.com

Garbi Schmidt, senior researcher and Phd of Islamic Studies at SFI (National Centre for Social Research) sees several explanation for this development.

One is that ethnic minority women are postponing having children in order to further their education. There’s now a lot of emphasis on having more people study, and the educational system is very competitive.

Another reason is that the immigrant way of life is becoming more and more similar to that of Danes. Immigrant are copying Danish norms and values regarding family, marriage and education. This means that ethnic minority women put off creating families, and this also affect the men.

Garbi Schmidt also thinks that the stricter laws for family reunification led to this development. Last year an SFI study she led showed that some youth of ethnic minority background postpone marriage to these laws. This means, she says, that they’ll have children at a later age, and possibly fewer children.

Manu Sareen, integration consultant and member of the Copenhagen city council (Social Liberals), says that this development is ‘totally wild’ and that it is due to a decade of political attention. Throughout the years there’s been a silent revolution among minority women, who are breaking away from the social traditions. The government were super good in supporting this development with projects, mentors etc. There’s no doubt, he says, that this is one of the fruits of this effort and that the integration ministry can be proud of it.

He adds that a change in the migration pattern might also play a role in this development. Today many immigrants from non-Western countries come from the cities and are more educated than those who came in the 1990s.

Karsten Lauritzen, integration spokesperson for the Liberals, agree and is happy about the development. He says it shows that many immigrant women are educated and employed and that integration is advancing.

Source: Kristeligt Dagblad (Danish)