First mosque in Athens opens doors to worshipers

ATHENS: The first mosque in the Greek capital, Athens, has finally opened its doors to Muslim worshippers.

The mosque’s first prayers were held on Monday evening under physical distancing measures due to the rising number of COVID-19 cases in Greece. Only a handful of people were able to attend.

With the opening, Athens shakes off its status as the only European Union capital to lack a mosque. The mosque’s first imam is Zaki Mohammed, aged 49, a Greek citizen of Moroccan origin.

The opening of the mosque “sends a clear message … of democracy, religious freedom and respect,” the government secretary for religious issues, Giorgos Kalantzis, was quoted by local Greece media.

Opposition from the Greek Orthodox Church had delayed the opening of the mosque since 1979. It took years even after the government gave the approval in 2006.

The decision to build a mosque with a budget of $1.04 million was held up by bureaucratic hurdles, protests by far-right groups, and legal challenges.

The vast majority of Greeks, 97 percent, are Orthodox Christians. However, there is a Muslim minority concentrated along the land border with Turkey, and tens of thousands of Muslim workers and refugees live in the country.

Turkey has long decried Greek violations of the rights of its Muslim and Turkish minority, from closing down mosques to letting historic mosques fall into disrepair. Turkish officials say these measures violate the 1923 Treaty of Lausanne as well as European Court of Human Rights (ECHR) verdicts.