While Pakistan’s economy is in shambles, Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif has called for a nationwide protest on July 7, Friday (Jummah) against the recent burning of the Quran in Sweden. Pakistan will observe the upcoming Friday (July 7) as “Yaum-i-Taqaddus Quran” and will convene a joint parliamentary session a day earlier.
The decision was made during a meeting presided over by Pakistan Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif to discuss the problem of desecration of the Holy Quran in Sweden.
In the said meeting it was decided that nationwide protests would be held to condemn the Quran-burning incident. Sharif urged the Pakistani people, including all political parties, to join the protest.
Moreover, in the Joint Parliamentary session to be held on July 6, the MPs will discuss developing a national policy on the subject and represent public opinion through the parliamentary process. In addition, a resolution will also be passed to denounce the burning of the Quran.
Sharif stated that Muslims are united by their belief in the sacredness of the Holy Quran. Errant minds, according to the Prime Minister, were devising a sinister plan to fan the flames of Islamophobia.
The Pakistani Prime Minister also stated that countries and leaders who believe in peace and coexistence must contain violent forces infested with Islamophobia and religious biases.
This comes after a man identified as Salwan Momika burned a copy of the Quran in front of Stockholm’s Central Mosque while under police protection on June 28.
The foreign minister of Turkey, Hakan Fidan, had denounced the incident and said it was wrong to permit anti-Islamic demonstrations in the guise of freedom of expression. “To condone such atrocious acts is to be complicit,” he charged.
Prior to Eid-Al-Adha, on June 28, the Swedish Police gave one Salwan Momika permission to burn the Quran at a demonstration outside the largest mosque in Stockholm after a Swedish court struck down the police’s ban on Quran-burning demonstrations.
Two other requests, one by a private citizen and the other by an organisation, for similar activities that include Quran burning were turned down by police in February outside the Turkish and Iraqi embassies in Stockholm. The appeals court concluded in June that the protests should have been permitted. It ruled, “The order and security problems that the police had cited had not been clearly connected to the planned event or its immediate vicinity.”
Before this, Danish far-right politician Rasmus Paludan burnt a copy of the Quran next to the Turkish embassy in the country’s capital prompting Turkey to halt discussions with Sweden about its NATO membership in late January.
Notably, the Lahore-based ISI-backed Sunni terrorist organisation Lashkar-e-Jhangvi (LeJ) declared on Sunday, July 2 that it would attack Christians and churches in Pakistan in retaliation to the Quran burning in Sweden.
While Pakistan is fuming over the desecration of the Quran in Sweden, in its own land the self-proclaimed ‘Riyasat-e-Medina’ does not even allow the Ahmadis, a minority Islamic sect to practice to celebrate Islamic festivals. Pakistan is quick to stage protests, and issue condemnations over incidents of ‘Islamophobia’, however, it exhibits deliberate incompetence in protecting the rights and dignity of religious minorities, particularly Hindus and Christians, as several cases of non-Muslim girls being abducted and converted to Islam are reported regularly from there.