News / France

France closes down another mosque, third since last week

Thursday, 03 December 2015 1:16 AM [ Last Update: Thursday, 03 December 2015 1:54 AM ]

French soldiers stand guard in front of the Grande Mosque in Strasbourg, eastern France, during the Friday prayers on November 20, 2015. (AFP)

French authorities have shut down a mosque near Paris as part of their fight against “radicalization.”

In a huge security operation carried out early on Wednesday, French police closed down a mosque in the town of Lagny-sur-Marne in the eastern suburbs of Paris, the third to be shut down since France declared a state of emergency following the last month Paris attacks, AFP reported.

French Interior Minister Bernard Cazeneuve claimed in a Wednesday statement that during the search operation in the mosque, security forces found documents related to Takfiri ideology and a hard drive hidden in a wall, adding that “three pseudo-cultural associations” linked to the mosque were also dissolved.

Police also placed a total of nine people under house arrest and banned another 22 from leaving the country, Cazeneuve went on to say.

Two other mosques were shut down last week in Gennevilliers, a commune in the northwestern suburbs of Paris, and in the small town of L'Arbresle in the vicinity of the central city of Lyon.

“[Police] operations are carried out against hate preachers and self-proclaimed imams. We will be totally firm against all those who preach hate in France,” Cazeneuve further noted. He also said that such measures to close mosques because of “radicalization” had never been implemented by any government in France.

He added that any foreign preacher of hate “will be deported," and that several other mosques were also under investigation for inciting terrorism and would “be shut down” if the accusations were proven to be right.

*French Interior Minister Bernard Cazeneuve*

Speaking about the illegal weapons confiscated after the Paris attacks, Cazeneuve said that “in 15 days, we have seized a third of the weapons of war we would normally recover in a year," adding that out of 334 firearms seized, 145 were rifles and 34 were assault weapons.

On November 13, a series of coordinated terrorist attacks, claimed by the Daesh Takfiri terrorist group, brought shock and horror to the French capital. Some 130 people were killed and over 350 others were injured in the horrendous attacks.

Takfirism is largely influenced by Wahhabism, the radical ideology dominating Saudi Arabia and freely preached by Saudi clerics.

The Daesh Takfiris now control parts of Syria and Iraq. They have been engaged in crimes against humanity in the areas under their control.

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