EU presses Muslim states to ensure security

February 7, 2006

In a strongly worded statement issued late on Monday, EU president Austria said it had instructed its embassies in the Middle East, Asian and African countries to demand increased security measures for European citizens and premises after a wave of anti-European violence by angry Muslim protesters.

Austrian Foreign Minister Ursula Plassnik said national authorities must take the necessary steps to ensure security.

“The authorities in Egypt, Algeria, Ethiopia, Iran, Jordan, Indonesia, Kuwait, Lebanon, Libya, Malaysia, Morocco, Oman, Pakistan, Saudi Arabia, Syria, Tunisia, Turkey, United Arab Emirates and the Palestinian Territories were also reminded of their obligations under the Vienna Convention on Diplomatic Relations to protect the diplomatic missions of the EU Member States,” the statement said.

It followed the torching of Danish diplomatic missions in Damascus and Beirut at the weekend, attacks on the EU office in Gaza last week and the petrol bombing of the Danish embassy in Tehran on Monday.

EU ambassadors held emergency talks on Monday to discuss a response to the violence triggered by the republication in several European newspapers of cartoons first published by a local Danish daily last September.

Depicting the Prophet Mohammad is prohibited by Islam. One of the cartoons showed the Prophet with a turban resembling a bomb.

“Following the violence of the last few days, Austria’s diplomatic representatives in Damascus, Ramallah and Beirut have also protested to the governments concerned,” the statement said.

“In the name of the EU, they have demanded that protection for European citizens be ensured and further acts of violence prevented under all circumstances.”

Austria also summoned the representative of the country chairing the Organisation of the Islamic Conference and “the concerns of the EU were once again clearly expressed to the member countries of the OIC”, the Austrian statement added.

An EU official said EU foreign policy chief Javier Solana was in touch with the main international organisations in the Muslim world — the OIC, the Arab League and the Gulf Cooperation Council — to urge them to help restore calm.

The official said EU institutions should focus on trying to get Arab and Muslim states to control their streets and rein in violence rather than engaging in a divisive debate over the limits of freedom of speech and respect for religion.