Germany holds historic high-level talks on integration of Muslims

In Germany, government officials and representatives of Muslim organisations have described this week’s first round of talks on better integration as successful. The dialogue was initiated by Germany’s interior ministry, which called the Islam Conference in an attempt to lessen tensions between the state and Germany’s Muslim community. The talks are to continue for at least two years and are designed to end in a political pact with the Muslims in Germany.

Emerging from the meeting in Berlin’s Charlottenburg Palace, German interior minister Wolfgang Schäuble said the discussion with Muslim representatives had been constructive, albeit not always harmonious. He promised Muslim leaders that measures would be taken to counter any attempts in German society to place a general suspicion on Islamists when analysing and assessing terrorist threats.

chäuble said it was clear “Muslims have become an integral part of German society”. He said the overwhelming majority of Muslims in this country are peace- loving and non-violent citizens.

But Schäuble also called on the Muslims living in Germany “to accept and respect (German) values, including equality between men and women. They must also accept the strict separation between the state and religion.”

Schäuble emphasised that the government would “not tolerate any attempts to make the Sharia have an impact on any legal order here.” “That’s simply out of the question,” he said.

The general secretary of the Central Council of Muslims in Germany, Aiman Mazyek, was positive about the conference. “We welcome the German government’s resolve to talk with us directly rather than just talking about us, as used to be the case in previous decades,“ he said.

Mazyek added, “Muslim life has been developing here for a long time now, and the fact can no longer be ignored is that that millions of us are at home in Germany. This is why improved communication is so vital in the future.”

The next round of talks are intended to deal with more specific issues, such as Islam classes in German schools in the German language, providing more apprenticeships to young Muslims and ensuring that the divided Muslim communities can in future speak with one voice.

All participants in the Islam Conference agreed that a controversial Mozart opera containing a scene with the severed heads of, among others, Jesus and Mohammed, should not have been cancelled because of fears that it might provoke an angry response from Muslims. There was agreement that there must be no interference in this country’s cultural freedom. The opera had been pulled by Deutsche Oper’s programme director after she’d received a vague warning from Berlin’s interior minister that there might be violence. Federal minister Wolfgang Schäuble invited all participants to watch the opera together when it is staged again.

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An in-depth look at the Islamic Conference in Germany with Islam expert, Dr. Frank Peter 

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