Court Orders Reopening of Beauvais Mosque Closed for Controversial Sermons

The Great Mosque of Beauvais can welcome its worshippers again. The judge of the administrative court of Amiens ordered this Monday its "provisional reopening", reports Saphirnews. This decision is motivated by "the changes that have occurred" since its closure. These include "the removal of the previous imam", the "deletion of the content of his sermons and the texts related to them on the social media accounts of the managing association". In light of these changes, "the continued closure of the mosque seriously and manifestly infringes on the freedom of worship," the judge ruled.

The prefecture of Oise had ordered the closure of the Great Mosque of Beauvais for a period of six months at the end of December last year due to the "sermons delivered by a regular imam who glorify jihad as a duty, by glorifying the fighters he describes as heroes, in the service of the protection of the Muslim religion which would, according to him, be threatened by Western societies". The mosque had then filed a first appeal in court before the administrative court of Amiens, requesting the suspension of the prefectural decree. The latter had rejected it on December 31, 2021.

On Friday, a hearing was held in Amiens, during which the mosque authorities had demanded its reopening, assuring that they had "corrected" the "dysfunctions". "As early as February 2022, the Beauvais mosque was asking, as part of a discussion with the prefecture, that it be allowed to reopen given the measures proposed by it (moderation on social networks, etc.). Despite this, the administration refused, within the framework of an amicable procedure, to grant the request of the managing association, even going so far as to demand the collective resignation of all the members of the association’s office, which was unacceptable for the association, the members being democratically elected," says the mosque’s lawyer Sefen Guez Guez.

"After the mosque of Pessac, the mosque of Beauvais becomes the second place of worship to obtain satisfaction before the administrative justice and demonstrates, once again, that a real mobilization and an adjusted defense makes it possible to obtain satisfaction in the face of the administration," he rejoices.