STOCKHOLM, March 17, 2006 (IslamOnline.net & News Agencies) Danish Muslims are planning to take the publication of cartoons lampooning Prophet Muhammad (peace and blessing be upon him) by a Danish newspaper to the United Nations.
"The UN is the natural place for us to file our complaint," Agence France-Presse (AFP) quoted Qassem Said, spokesman for the Danish Islamic Community, as telling the Ritzau national news agency Friday, March 17.
The Islamic Community, an umbrella body grouping 27 Muslim organizations in Denmark, said it will take the cartoon issue to the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights in Geneva.
Said had told IOL in January, that the Muslim minority would take the case to the EU human rights commission if rejected in Denmark.
"Muslims living in the Islamic world have greater confidence in the United Nations than in the European Union," he said.
The move comes after Denmark's State Prosecutor Henning Fode turned down Wednesday, March 15, charges against daily Jyllands-Posten over its publication of the Prophet cartoons.
"The state attorney's ruling was lousy," stressed Said.
Twelve cartoons, including one showing the Prophet with a bomb-shaped turban, were first published by the daily in September and later reprinted by several newspapers worldwide on claims of freedom of expression.
The drawings, considered blasphemous under Islam, have triggered massive and sometimes violent demonstrations across the Muslim world.
Breaching
Danish Muslims have blasted the Danish prosecutor's decision not to press charges against Jyllands-Posten as a breach of UN human rights convention.
"Our point is that in failing to censure Jyllands-Posten, Denmark has committed a breach of its duties as a signatory of UN conventions on human and political rights as well as international agreements on the elimination of all forms of racial discrimination," said Ahmad Akkari, spokesman for the European Committee for Honoring the Prophet.
The Danish prosecutor said that the mass-circulation daily did not violate the Danish freedom of expression laws by commissioning and printing the cartoons.
The Organization of the Islamic Conference (OIC) and the Arab League, the Muslim world's two main political bodies, are seeking a UN resolution, backed by possible sanctions, to protect religions following the publication of the provocative cartoons.
Muslim dignitaries and organizations have also called for the enactment of an international law banning the publication of any insults to religious symbols and values.
EU foreign policy chief Javier Solana and European External Relations Commissioner Benita Ferrero-Waldner recently suggested that the EU and the OIC co-draft a UN resolution promoting religious tolerance.
Danish Muslims are estimated at 180,000 or around three per cent of Denmark's 5.4 million.
Islam is Denmark's second largest religion after the Lutheran Protestant Church, which is actively followed by four-fifths of the country's population.
