Tunisia’s Religious Affairs Minister Nourredine al-Khademi on Saturday said the country will take stock of the hundreds of mosques now in the hands of Salafist extremists.
“This is a priority area for my administration,” said the minister, who estimated that about 400 of Tunisia’s more than 5,000 mosques had fallen under the sway of ultra-conservative Salafists.
“Serious problems concern about 50 mosques, no more,” he said, referring to cases where the original imams and worshippers had been forced out.
Khademi said that in the central city of Sidi Bouzid, for example, a major mosque was taken over by Salafists more than a year ago and was now known by locals as the “Kandahar mosque”, after Afghanistan’s Taliban stronghold. [AFP] Read more
