PARIS, February 5 (Reuters) – The Minister of the Interior and Religious Affairs, Grald Darmanin, on Saturday supervised the creation of the Forum de l’islam de France (Forif), a body for dialogue between the State and Muslims imagined in replacement of the French Council for Muslim Worship (CFCM).
The minister, who went to the Bussy-Saint-Georges mosque (Seine-et-Marne) on Friday, took part in the first meeting of this Forum at the Economic, Social and Environmental Council in Paris, in the presence of dozens of volunteers – leaders of mosques, imams, members of civil society and association leaders – from all over the country.
Launched as the first round of the presidential election approaches on April 10, the Forum de l’islam de France responds to a request from President Emmanuel Macron to structure the national authorities of Islam, the country’s second religion with some six million of faithful.
The Forum succeeds the CFCM, created in 2003 and plagued by infighting and accusations of interference from foreign countries.
The new body is to address issues such as the training of imams, chaplains, law enforcement against sparatism and the protection of some 2,630 Muslim places of worship in the country.
“The Republic has a formula: everything to Muslims as French citizens, nothing to occult structures that wish to impose their influence in France through religion,” said Grald Darmanin.
“Muslims in France do not belong to anyone, no other community than the national community and no country has rights over them.” (Report Elizabeth Pineau)