Austria’s right-wing Prime Minister Sebastian Kurz is planning on closing seven mosques and expelling over 40 imams.
“Parallel societies, political Islam and tendencies toward radicalization have no place in our country,” Kurz told reporters in Vienna.
According to Kurz, this is only the beginning of a larger plan to expel islamic ideology, radicalization, and funding of religious groups in Austria.
The Prime Minister was critical of the fact that previous Austrian governments have not made enough use of their authority to interfere in this sector.
Six of the mosques that will be closed are run by a group called Arab Religious Community, whereas the seventh one is a Turkish nationalist mosque in Vienna.
This move was condemned by Turkey, that labelled it “racist,” “discriminatory,” and “anti-islam.”
Turkey’s presidential spokesman Ibrahim Kalin declared that these measures are infringing on human and minority rights.
“It is an attempt to target Muslim communities for the sake of scoring cheap political points,” Kalin said on Twitter.
