Global Blasphemy Law: UN Adopts Resolution on Qur’an Burning

The United Nations has voted to adopt a resolution on Qur’an burning at an ‘urgent meeting’ convened for Pakistan, a key cheerleader for global blasphemy laws.

United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights Volker Türk called for limits to freedom of speech and expression, castigating “merchants of chaos” and “provocateurs”. The remarks came during a two-day session on “countering religious hatred constituting incitement to discrimination, hostility or violence” – actually an urgent meeting called by the body on behalf of Pakistan over a recent spate of Qur’an burnings in Europe.

The resolution was passed 28-12.

The Human Rights Council characterised Türk’s comments as a “call for respect” when he warned that too much free speech was causing problems and should be curbed.

“Advocacy of hatred that constitutes incitement to violence, discrimination and hostility should be prohibited in every state,” Turk said, claiming that Qur’an burnings “target … deepest values and beliefs”.
Even while advocating for limiting freedom of speech, the UN boss warned that laws limiting speech are “often misused” by authoritarian governments — an ironic enough statement, perhaps, given the clear majority of U.N. Human Rights Council members are dictatorships.

Türk said:

Many societies are struggling with this weaponisation of religious differences for political purposes. We must not allow ourselves to be reeled in and become and become instrumentalised by these merchants of chaos for political gain. These provocateurs who deliberately seek ways to divide us.

I am immensely sympathetic to the millions of people who are offended and outraged by acts that target their deepest values and beliefs… we must commit to advancing greater tolerance, greater respect, and greater recognition of the importance and value of our differences.

Other contributors were less magnanimous. The spokesman for Pakistan, for whom the meeting was convened, said:

…the deliberate desecration of the holy Qur’an has continued under government sanction and with a sense of impunity. Increasingly these acts are designed to maximise provocation. We must see this for what it really is, incitement to religious hatred, discrimination, and attempts to provoke violence.

… the holy Qur’an is a spiritual anchor for two billion Muslims. It is inseparable from their sense of identity and dignity. It is important to understand the deep hurt that a public and premeditated act of the Qur’an’s desecration calls Muslims… our vigour to protect free speech must not lose sight of the imperative to reject hate speech.

Pakistan has been working on establishing global rules on blasphemy for years, and these efforts have often focussed on using the United Nations to further that goal. The plan, then-Pakistani Prime Minister Imran Khan said in 2018, was to “prevent people using freedom of speech as a cover for hurting the religious sentiments of Muslims around the world”.

Pakistan was joined by Saudi Arabia at the U.N. this week, whose representative said:

…we strongly condemn what extremists did, burning copies of the holy Qur’an. These acts cannot be justified as they are incitement for discrimination and hatred… the recurrence of burning the holy Qur’an this year is concerning and we heard international condemnation and international organisations to end these acts which provoke the feelings of people, and that incite to hatred and violence, and effect the freedom of opinion and expression.

While the burning of the book as a form of protest – like the publication of cartoons of the Islamic prophet Mohammad – has occurred in Europe for many years, the act has taken on new significance in recent months after Russia’s invasion of Ukraine. Russia’s surge in aggression towards neighbours prompted traditionally neutral Sweden to apply to join NATO, an application any present member can veto.

This in turn gave Turkey, which has longstanding diplomatic disagreements with Sweden over its giving political refuge to individuals considered terrorists by Ankara, to air grievances and demand changes in exchange for dropping its objections to the NATO bid. One of those demands was Sweden introducing de facto blasphemy laws to prosecute Qur’an burners.

The dividing lines on the vote at the United Nations on Wednesday could be characterised as the West versus the rest: Belgium, Czechia, Finland, France, Germany, Lithuania, Luxembourg, Montenegro, Romania, the UK, and the USA voted against, while most of the rest of the world’s votes were supportive or abstentions.

Qur’an burners themselves claim the – often extremely violent – reaction to their act proves their claim that Islam struggles with intolerance and violence. As previously reported, Qur’an burnings have recently triggered major riots in Sweden, but often the greatest violence is in the Islamic world itself, which has seen fatalities and Western embassies stormed.