President of the Republic of Slovenia on coexistence and integration of the Muslim communities in Europe

Oxford, 13.11.2008  |  press release

Today, the President of the Republic of Slovenia, Dr Danilo Türk, as a preliminary to his working visit to Oxford, met with Slovenian students studying at the University of Oxford. President Türk, accompanied by the Slovenian chemistry students, visited the Chemistry Research Laboratory, one of the world’s top academic laboratories, opened by Queen Elizabeth II in 2004. Dr Türk was acquainted with the field of science that the students deal with in their studies and stopped briefly to learn more about their work. The Slovenian President showed great interest in the possibility of commercialisation of scientific discoveries, through which the Department of Chemistry at the University of Oxford has been successful in obtaining considerable funding. Later in the day, Dr Türk visited the Oxford Centre for Islamic Studies, where he visited an exhibition on the Centre’s activities and signed the visitors' book. In addition, the President delivered a lecture at the University of Oxford entitled "Europe and Islam: Coexistence or Integration?”

In the beginning of his lecture, President Türk defined Islam as a global religion within which different responses have evolved for adaptation to the contemporary world and democracy. In this context, according to the President, Islam, among other things, gave rise to extremism and violence, but warned at the same time that when dealing with this issue one should avoid any sort of demonisation of Islam or exaggerated political correctness, but rather initiate a frank and open discussion of the phenomenon. In his introduction, Dr Türk pointed out that Europe lacks experience regarding mass migrations and, consequently, a mindful and reasonable policy approach to issues in this area. Moreover, specific experience from different countries and societies will have to be taken into account in this regard, added the President.

President Türk also made reference to the fact that Europe has always been a place of diversity. As a good example of peaceful co-existence between different cultures, religions and civilisations, Dr Türk mentioned the case of the early medieval Iberian Peninsula, which flourished as a result of the interaction of Christian, Jewish and Muslim cultural and religious traditions. This period contributed considerably to intellectual inquiry, which progressively led to the definition of the European identity and offered a model for the social and political coexistence of Christians, Jews and Muslims, asserted Dr Türk.

President Türk continued his lecture by explaining that Europe has organised itself politically as a system of national states based on territorial integrity as a fundamental organising principle. In the President's words, such development resulted as a logical consequence, giving rise to different religious, ethnic and language minority communities, autochthonous in origin and enjoying special protection by the states.
However, over the past decades, larger immigration communities emerged in Europe, including many Islamic groups. President Türk drew attention to the fact that existing legal mechanisms for the protection of the national and other autochthonous minorities, when used in the management of newly created needs of immigrant populations in Europe, have proved to be insufficient.

According to Dr Türk, an appropriate framework for resolving these issues is human rights, which became the fundamental legal concept in Europe and whose universality may help in working out policies for managing relationships among different cultural and religious traditions. He noted that human rights nowadays do not only address the issue of the individual’s attitude towards the state or universal and very abstract values. As he clarified, they must observe the status of the individual within different social groups and universality in an appropriate context. Existing international legal arrangements in this field are deficient in dealing with the collective aspect of human rights, noted the President, mentioning examples of domestic violence, traditional rituals affecting women and girls, and the relationship between the individual and the traditional authority within an ethnic or religious group or immigrant community. As regards the issue of contextualisation of human rights, he stressed that any implementation of human right standards must consider free judgement, but nevertheless elevate norms from the field of human rights to a higher level than cultural rituals and religious teachings.

President Türk concluded his lecture by elucidating the main policy-making challenges in this field. First, he emphasised that it is only the existence of clear and specific legal standards or appropriate socio-economic indicators that enables the monitoring of progress in the implementation of human rights. As an example of a useful tool in assessing immigration policy he pointed to the Migrant Integration Policy Index, which enables an overview and comparison in this field in 28 European countries. According to the President, the main elements of immigration policy should be the stimulation of entrepreneurship among minorities, access to education at all levels in order to ensure equal opportunities, respect for the religious needs of Moslems at work and an anti-discrimination policy stressing the achievements of individuals from the margins of society. The President closed his lecture by advocating tolerant and, where necessary, prolonged discussion contributing to necessary understanding, and sensible and democratic dialogue on these issues.