By IRNA,
Berlin : German Education Minister Annette Schavan here Tuesday stressed the need of tackling integration problems in her country in a bid to halt growing Islamophobia.
Meeting with the Berlin-based foreign press, Schavan said ‘the danger (of Islamophobia) will not get bigger,’ if the country’s decision-makers deal with the issue.
German Muslims have expressed mounting concern over an Islamophobic wave stirred by Schavan’s Christian Democratic Union (CDU) and its sister party, the Christian Social Union (CSU).
German Justice Minister Sabine Leutheusser-Schnarrenberger admitted last month that Islamophobia has become a serious problem in the country as a result of deepening popular anti-Muslim sentiments.
Leutheusser-Schnarrenberger said there was a growing tendency among the public to view ‘Muslims and their religion as a threat.’
This was the first time that the German government had openly acknowledged the existence of Islamophobia.
German Muslim leaders have repeatedly urged the center-right government of Chancellor Angela Merkel to take the problem of Islamophobia seriously.
The German government must face up to the fact that Islamophobia does exist in the country, German-Turkish Muslim activist Pinar Cetin told IRNA in a recent interview.