Sweden convicts Koran burner, days after co-protester's murder

AFP , Monday 3 Feb 2025

A Stockholm court on Monday convicted a man of inciting ethnic hatred during four Koran burnings in 2023 that sparked outrage in Muslim countries, a verdict that reignited debate about the limits of freedom of expression.

Sweden
In this file photo, Salwan Momika protests outside a mosque in Stockholm. AFP

 

The verdict came just days after the man's co-defendant Salwan Momika, a 38-year-old Iraqi Christian, was shot dead late Wednesday in an apartment southwest of Stockholm.

The Stockholm district court was to have published its verdict against Momika and 50-year-old Salwan Najem the following day, but after Momika's killing postponed it until Monday.

"There is a wide scope within the framework of freedom of expression to be critical of a religion in a factual and objective debate," judge Goran Lundahl said in a statement.

"At the same time, expressing one's opinion about religion does not give one a free pass to do or say anything and everything without risking offending the group that holds that belief," he said.

The court found Najem, 50, guilty of four counts of "agitation against a national or ethnic group".

He was handed a suspended sentence, which in Sweden means that if he were to commit another crime during a two-year probation period, the court would re-evaluate his sentence.

He was also ordered to pay a fine of 4,000 kronor ($358).

Najem has appealed the verdict.

The two men were accused of desecrating the Koran, including by burning it, while making derogatory remarks about Muslims -- on two occasions outside a Stockholm mosque.

The Swedish government repeatedly criticised the desecrations at the time but said that freedom of expression was guaranteed under the country's constitution.

"Even if the motive was to criticise the religion of Islam, the actions and conduct exceeded by a clear margin what constitutes a factual debate and criticism. On all occasions, the demonstrations expressed contempt for the Muslim group," the judge said.

Relations between Sweden and several Middle Eastern countries were strained by the pair's protests.

Iraqi protesters stormed the Swedish embassy in Baghdad twice in July 2023, starting fires within the compound on the second occasion.

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