A Danish right-wing extremist organization posted a video on Facebook in which a Koran and an Iraqi flag are apparently set on fire. Protesters in Baghdad tried to contact the Danish embassy.
After an alleged desecration of the Koran in Denmark, hundreds of people have returned to protest, some violently, in the Iraqi capital Baghdad. In the early hours of Saturday morning, supporters of influential Shiite leader Moktada Sadr tried to invade the city’s so-called Green Zone, where embassies and government and parliament buildings are located. Security forces repelled the demonstrators.
A video was previously posted on the Facebook page of a Danish far-right organisation, in which a man appeared to be burning a copy of the Koran and an Iraqi flag. As a representative of the Iraqi Interior Ministry told the AFP news agency, demonstrators in Baghdad apparently wanted to storm the Danish embassy. During Thursday night, protesters stormed the Swedish embassy in Stockholm after the Koran was desecrated and partially set on fire.
clashes with security forces
After the video was released from Denmark, hundreds of people, mostly young people, gathered in the center of Tahrir Square on Friday night, according to an AFP photographer. They chanted slogans like “Yes to the Quran” and some of them held up pictures of Shiite leader Sadr.
Protesters later tried to cross a bridge into the Green Zone which was blocked by Iraqi security forces. Then there were clashes. According to the Ministry of the Interior, however, it was possible to dissolve the meeting before dawn.
Danish aid organization attacked
Before that, however, the premises of a Danish humanitarian organization in Iraq had also been attacked. As the German Press Agency learned from Iraqi security circles, protesters attacked the offices of Danish Refugee Aid (Dansk Flygtningehjælp, DRC) in the southern province of Basra on Saturday. The organization confirmed that there was an armed attack against them in the early hours of the morning. Personnel on site remained physically unharmed. But there was damage when the buildings were set on fire, said the DRC’s executive director for the Middle East, Lilu Thapa.
Police later confirmed to Danish media that a book had been burned outside the Iraqi embassy in Copenhagen – but could not say whether it was the Koran.
Iraq’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs on Saturday morning condemned the “desecration of the Holy Qur’an and the Iraqi flag”. At the same time, it ensured the protection of the embassy. The country “will not allow what happened to the Embassy of the Kingdom of Sweden to be repeated”. In recent days, both Sweden and the United States have criticized Baghdad for inadequate protection of the Swedish embassy. (APA/dpa)