Among the earliest known visits by an Ahmadis to Ireland, was by Mirza Tahir Ahmad, who was at that time a student at the School of Oriental and African Studies, in London.
During this period, in Galway, the medical sector, among other industries, played a significant role in attracting Muslim immigrants, both students and professionals, from abroad and from all over Ireland.
[1] In the 1980s, an entrepreneur, Muhammad Hanif, held congregational prayers in his home, which became the Ahmadiyya Community's first makeshift mosque in Ireland.
Though a native of Waterford, in the South-East of Ireland, he became an Ahmadi whilst residing in London, after reading Murder in the Name of Allah, a book authored by the fourth caliph.
[1] In 2010 the current and fifth caliph of the Ahmadiyya Community, Mirza Masroor Ahmad, visited Galway to lay the foundation stone for a mosque.
Bishop Brendan Kelly of Galway, Kilmacduagh and Kilfenora spoke out against the vandalism, saying “I wholeheartedly condemn the actions of the perpetrators."