By Al Ahed Staff, Agencies
In blatant remarks, NATO Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg considered that “It is not necessarily a crime to burn the Quran in public.”
Responding to a question about the recent incident in Sweden which caused outrage among Muslims, Stoltenberg said: “I understand the emotion and the depth of feeling this causes.”
He further added that the burning of the Quran is “offensive and objectionable [but] not necessarily illegal.”
Stoltenberg also addressed the anti-NATO protests in Sweden that took place earlier this month. “I do not like them. But I defend the right to disagree. This is part of the freedom of expression,” he claimed.
“What is important for me is that we have to make progress on finalizing the accession of Sweden into the alliance,” the NATO chief explained. “I spoke with [Turkish President Recep Tayyip] Erdogan recently and we agreed to convene a high-level meeting of officials here in Brussels, Thursday, next week.”
On Wednesday, an Iraqi citizen living in Sweden burned a copy of the Holy Quran outside a mosque in Stockholm amid the celebrations of Eid al-Adha, a major Muslim holiday.
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