Article by Sir John
Jenkins, Senior Fellow, for Policy Exchange
Die Welt – the Berlin-based centre-right German newspaper of
record – reported on 25
April that the European Commission apparently continues to
fund organisations that either the Federal Government (FG) or
the domestic German intelligence and security agency, Das
Bundesamt für Verfassungsschutz (BfV – The Constitution
Protection Agency), have found to be Islamist and some of
whose employees have made anti-Semitic statements.
One of these organisations, according to Die Welt, is
Islamic Relief Deutschland (IRD), which the newspaper says
the FG identified in 2019 as having significant personal
connections to the Muslim Brotherhood or associated
organisations. In 2016 the Berlin Senate also claimed –
according to the report – that IRD had on several occasions
sponsored organisations close to the MB.
A second organisation whose EU funding Die Welt
questions is the European Muslim Union, whose founder, a
German lawyer named Andreas Abu Bakr Rieger, was identified
by the BfV in 2008 as “ close to an Islamist movement” and
seems to have a record of anti-Semitic hate speech. In 1993,
for example, he was reported as saying that Germans, like the
Turks, had a history of fighting for the right cause,
“…though I have to admit that when it came to our common
enemy my grandfathers were not thorough enough.” Rieger has
disowned this statement. But his current homepage continues
to display photographs of him with or links to others who
have made anti-Semitic statements, including the current
Mufti of Jerusalem and the former PM of Malaysia, Mahathir
Mohammed. Rieger has described Mahathir’s inflammatory
remarks after the murder of Samuel Paty last October as
“cynical and false”. But he continues to claim on his
homepage that he has a “close relationship” with him and
acted as his lawyer in Europe and elsewhere.
A third questionable organisation in receipt of EU
funding, according to Die Welt, is the Weimar Institute for
Spiritual Issues and Contemporary History – again established
by Rieger. In 2017 the government of Mecklenburg-Vorpommen
classified this Institute as “Islamist”. In 2009 and 2010 the
BfV cited it in connection with “Islamist extremism”. Rieger
told Die Welt that he had he had not been on its board at the
time of the funding arrangement. Die Welt reports that a
search of the Weimar registry shows him to have been a member
of the board once again since July 2020.
Die Welt concludes by quoting two German members of the
European Parliament, Nicola Beer (FDP) the Vice-President and
Monika Hohlmeier (CSU), the Chair of the Management
Committee, as expressing concerns about the matter. A
spokesperson for the European Commission said that no funding
went to organisations with an illegal or extremist agenda. If
this were found to have happened, funding could be clawed
back. The commission was committed to preventing
radicalisation.
This represents another interesting insight into
growing German and wider European concerns about the use of
official funding for Islamist organisations.
