Category Archives: Denmark

EDL just can’t help recruiting thugs – now organiser of Aarhus demonstration is jailed for assault

Posted on by Bob Pitt

Kasper MortensenThe Daily Telegraph reports that the English Defence League has sacked Kasper Mortensen (pictured), spokesman for the Danish Defence League, after he was jailed for assaulting a bouncer with a large metal torch and a taser gun.

“For someone in a responsible position such as heading up a Defence League to get himself involved in a brawl is not the best thing to have happened,” Steve Simmons, who is in charge of the EDL’s European organisation, told the Telegraph. “When he comes out, certainly he will no longer be the spokesman for the Danish Defence League.”

The sacking takes place only a few weeks before the EDL’s Danish wing will host a European “counter-jihad” rally in Aarhus. Philip Traulsen, a 34-year-old veteran of Denmark’s far right, is organising the demo in Mortensen’s absence.

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Anti-Islamic groups across Europe to hold far-right rally in Denmark

Posted on by Bob Pitt

The Daily Telegraph reports that far-right anti-Islamic groups from across Europe, led by the English Defence League, will be holding a rally in Aarhus on 31 March under the auspices of the EDL-sponsored European Freedom Initiative. Swedish Defence League spokesman Isak Nygren states: “There will be speeches from every defence league in Europe. I hope we can show that there’s resistance against Islamisation of Europe, that we can inspire each other.”

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How the Danish People’s Party packages its anti-Muslim racism

Posted on by Bob Pitt

DPP video

The far-right Danish People’s Party, which is notorious for its opposition to minority communities of migrant origin and Muslims in particular, has produced a 3-minute English-language video, “I Am Denmark”, extolling the virtues of the Danish nation. It’s worth looking at, if you can stomach it, because it is a good example of how a section of the far right now frames its politics, by distancing itself from cruder forms of racism and packaging its anti-Muslim bigotry in cultural terms, as the defence of progressive national values against the threat of Islam.

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Newspaper editor challenges Danish People’s Party leader over multiculturalism

Posted on by Bob Pitt

A war of words has broken out between Politiken‘s editor-in-chief, Bo Lidegaard, and the leader of the Danish People’s Party, Pia Kjærsgaard, about multiculturalism’s place in Denmark.

The exchange comes in the aftermath of the Norwegian massacre in which right-wing politicians have been accused of creating a negative tone in the debate about multiculturalism.

In an open letter to Kjærsgaard on Thursday, Lidegaard asked her to clearly state what she and her party believes is the future of multiculturalism.

“Do you agree that the multicultural society has come to stay and that the debate now needs to focus on how best to adapt to it? Or do you agree with your party members and other voices who see multiculturalism as a battle that will result in an inevitable showdown?” Lidegaard wrote.

“It’s not about forbidding one point of view or another, but making it clear whether the Danish People’s Party wants to solve the problems related to immigration and integration so we can build a multicultural community in Denmark,” he added.

But in Kjærsgaard’s response to Lidegaard on Tuesday, she accused Politiken of using the debate about the rhetoric used by the right as a cover for attacking the Danish People Party’s political views.

“If you don’t accept the multicultural society or if you try to counteract it you’re automatically stigmatised. In fact you’re not even allowed to criticise it at all,” Kjærsgaard wrote.

Kjærsgaard went on to criticise Politiken for not taking a stance against Muslim extremists in Denmark and for not demanding they tone down their language and rhetoric.

“Do you not accept that it is up to individuals to be responsible for their actions in cases such as Anders Breivik – or is it always ‘other’ people’s fault?”

Copenhagen Post, 9 August 2011

Update:  See “Danish right-wing infiltrated”, Politiken, 10 August 2011

High court overturns acquittal, fines Lars Hedegaard for inciting hatred against Muslims

Posted on by Bob Pitt

Lars HedegaardThe Eastern High Court today fined Lars Hedegaard, the president of the Free Press Society, 5,000 kroner for making racially offensive comments in December 2009.

“Girls in Muslim families are raped by their uncles, their cousins, or their fathers”, and “When a Muslim man rapes a woman, it is in his right to do so”, were among the comments Hedegaard made during a 35-minute interview at a Christmas party with the author of the blog snaphanen.dk, who subsequently published the comments on the blog.

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Attacks on multiculturalism linked to economic crisis, IRR study finds

Posted on by Bob Pitt

The Institute of Race Relations (IRR) publishes today Understanding the European-wide assault on multiculturalism – a detailed analysis by Executive Director, Liz Fekete, of key speeches made over the past six months by leading centre-right politicians from Austria, Belgium, France, Germany, Denmark, the Netherlands, Norway and the United Kingdom.

These speeches attack multiculturalism and immigration and link them to the economic crisis. The IRR finds that:

  • In singling out multiculturalism as a threat to national identity, the leaders of Europe’s centre-right parties are using the same kind of rhetoric and specious arguments as Enoch Powell did forty years ago. Only this time, it is not one rogue European politician carrying the flag, but the leaders of centre-right parties now replacing race and immigration with culture and religion as the watch words.
  • As multiculturalism becomes code for discussing the ‘Muslim problem’, the language, terms and metaphors used by centre-right politicians subtly (and in some cases crudely) convey a sense of national victimhood, of a majority culture under threat from Muslim minorities and new migrants who demand special privileges and group rights and refuse to learn the language.

In Understanding the European-wide assault on multiculturalismthe IRR warns that:

  • The attacks on multiculturalism are taking place at a time of economic crisis and swingeing cuts, when politicians are desperate to deflect public anger and explain societal break down. The centre Right is establishing a narrative, with some centre-left parties following suit, to justify the biggest round of spending cuts since the 1920s, blaming the current economic crisis not on the bankers and global financial crisis, but on immigration, and on Muslims.
  • As the extreme Right increasingly enters national parliaments, sometimes holding the balance of power, there are dangerous signs that the centre Right is preparing for future power-sharing with the extreme Right, as well as nativist anti-immigration parties. The fact that mainstream politicians are now speaking to the fear and hatred promoted by the extremists’ anti-multicultural platform, is giving legitimacy to conspiracy theories about Muslims and to anti-Muslim hatred.

Read the IRR’s research Understanding the European-wide assault on multiculturalism here.

IRR press release, 21 April 2011