*ISLAMABAD Austria said Friday it could expel up to 60 Turkish-funded imamsand their families and shut down seven mosques as part of a crackdown on“political Islam”, triggering fury in Ankara.*
“The circle of people possibly affected by these measures – the pool thatwe’re talking about – comprises around 60 imams,” said Interior MinisterHerbert Kickl of the far-right Freedom Party (FPOe), the junior partner inAustria’s coalition government.
In total 150 people risked losing their right to residence, he said at apress conference in Vienna.
Ankara quickly denounced the move.
“Austria’s decision to close down seven mosques and deport imams with alame excuse is a reflection of the anti-Islam, racist and discriminatorypopulist wave in this country”, presidential spokesman Ibrahim Kalin saidon Twitter.
Seven mosques will also be shut after an investigation by the religiousaffairs authority into images which emerged in April of children in aTurkish-backed mosque playing dead and reenacting the World War I battle ofGallipoli.
“Parallel societies, political Islam and radicalisation have no place inour country,” Chancellor Sebastian Kurz of the ruling centre-right People’sParty said.
In several cases the process of expelling imams connected to theTurkish-Islamic Cultural Associations (ATIB) organisation was underway,Kickl said.
The interior minister added that the government suspects them ofcontravening a ban on foreign funding of religious office holders. ATIB isa branch of Turkey’s religious affairs agency Diyanet.
The photos of children, published by the Falter weekly, showed the youngboys in camouflage uniforms marching, saluting, waving Turkish flags andthen playing dead.
Their “corpses” were then lined up and draped in the flags.
The mosque in question was run by ATIB.
ATIB itself condemned the photos at the time, calling the “highlyregrettable” event and said that “called off before it had even ended”.
Turkey’s relations with Austria have long been strained, with Kurz callingon the European Union to break off negotiations on Ankara joining the bloc.
Last week Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan attacked Kurz, saying:“This immoral chancellor has a problem with us”.
“He’s throwing his weight around and making a scene,” Erdogan went on.
Both Kurz, of the centre-right People’s Party (OeVP) and the FPOe madeimmigration and integration major themes in their election campaigns lastyear.
In Friday’s press conference Kurz was keen to emphasise that the action wasbeing taken under legislation to regulate Islamic associations that hehimself brought in as a minister in the previous government. – APP/AFP