Nationalist Sofia Nominee Vows to Ban Muslim Prayer Calls

Politics | October 10, 2007, Wednesday // 00:00
Bulgaria: Nationalist Sofia Nominee Vows to Ban Muslim Prayer Calls Binev used the occasion to put one of his electoral posters on the fence that surrounds the mosque in Sofia downtown. Photo by Nadya Kotseva (Sofia Photo Agency)

Controversial businessman Slavi Binev, running for mayor of Sofia on the ticket of nationalist party Ataka, vowed to ban Muslim calls for prayer if he is elected.

The calls, blaring from loudspeakers in the mosque in Sofia downtown, distressed believers from other religious denominations, Binev said on Wednesday.

"Everyone has the right to pray, but in such a way as not to get in the way of other people - that's tolerance," he told his supporters who gathered near the mosque during one of the daily prayers.

"There are many mosques in Bulgarian cities, but they are not emblematic of European capitals, neither is the wailing that is heard from them," he went on to say.

Ultra-nationalist party Ataka considers eastern orthodoxy the religion of the Bulgarian nation, while also strongly opposing both the Turkish and Roma ethnic minorities in the country, who make up most of its Muslim population.

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