2023 Quran burnings in Sweden

The most notable of them occurred on 28 June 2023, when 37-year-old Iraqi Assyrian refugee Salwan Momika ripped out and set fire to pages of the Quran outside the Stockholm Mosque.

On 20 July, Momika planned another Quran burning in Stockholm, which resulted in protestors storming the Swedish embassy in Baghdad and committing arson.

Counterprotests, in the form of violence and boycotts, eventually caused Denmark to reintroduce blasphemy laws criminalizing the "inappropriate treatment" of religious texts.

[21] The Pakistan-based Sunni extremist organisation Lashkar-e-Jhangvi called for a genocide against Pakistani Christians to avenge Sweden's quran burning in a statement on 1 July.

[29] In response to the burnings, the Iranian militia Ashab al-Kahf, which is also active in Baghdad, issued threats on Telegram urging followers to target "every Swede" with violence.

[30] On the evening of 16 October 2023, an Islamic State sympathiser killed two Swedish nationals attending a football match at Place Sainctelette in Molenbeek, Brussels, and injured another.

[36] On 2 July, the Organisation of Islamic Cooperation said that international law and other collective measures were needed to prevent future incidents involving the desecration of the Quran.

[67] On 12 July, the United Nations Human Rights Council adopted a motion "countering religious hatred constituting incitement to discrimination, hostility or violence" in response to the Quran-burning incident.

[23] In February 2023, the Swedish Police Authority refused permission for "an association and a private person" to burn the Quran outside the Turkish and Iraqi embassies in Stockholm.

A judge found that the police's fear of security problems was not obvious enough to override the constitutional right of those who planned to burn the Quran to hold what they claimed to be a political demonstration.

In response, Denmark's parliament passed a bill banning the "inappropriate treatment" of religious texts, including the Quran, the Bible, or the Torah, on 7 December 2023.