Strained Efforts to Bridge the Gap

​​For 24-year-old Deema from Jordan, the dialogue week was a chance to comprehend the nature of the crisis.

"The Danes were very open and this was very encouraging for the Muslims to express their thoughts. But contrary to before, we believed that it's a religious issue, we were surprised that it's not totally religious. It's like 5% religious, 95% political. And this was even harder because it took us some time to understand the Danish context and act upon that."

For the young Danish people of the Krogerup College, the week was a chance to understand Muslims better. Martin, a 23-year-old, says he's learned a lot about the Muslim world.

"It's the first time I've interacted with so many Muslims at the same time and I learned a lot. Before this week I saw myself kind of not knowing that much about them, but just speaking to a lot of Muslims just taught me so many things. I gained so much more respect for the culture and the religion. Jyllands-Posten had no right mocking Mohammed the way it did."

Mathias, Martin's 20-year-old classmate, even openly criticised the newspaper after the visit.

Danish dissociation

"I am very embarrassed being a Dane. I was when I walked out. Hopefully they don't represent me as a person. (…) The media created all this fuss (…). I truly believe that we can write history here and we are writing history here. Not in a sense that everybody in the world will know about this meeting. But we, as this little group of youth (…), have definitely gotten a way in understanding and learning about each other's differences."

Some of the participants were disappointed because they said the journalists did not really answer their questions, but instead referred to the Jyllands-Posten's website for more answers. And one board member went completely off the topic by talking about his personal experiences in the Far East instead of discussing the caricatures.

When the young people were later asked on a panel how they felt about their visit to the newspaper's editorial offices, Essam from Egypt and Yara from Palestine answered quite sarcastically:

"Basically it was a closed meeting so I can't say much – but you can check our website," said Essam, under applause.

"We went there and they had nothing to say, they were cold and ignorant. Wasting our time, making fun of us in some way, telling us stories. There was nothing to say."

21-year-old Ahmed from Pakistan is not convinced that the newspaper did not know what the implications of publishing the cartoons were.

"There's something else going on here"

"I didn't have any expectations going there. I just went there to really get a feeling of how they were going to do it. We went there and were given a lecture by a senior journalist. He kept stressing dialogue yet he gave us a lecture. For almost all the questions we got the same answer: Check our website. In 2000 and 2001, they refused to publish those Jesus cartoons and the Holocaust cartoons because they knew what the implications were. Journalists travel around the world, they get a feel of things. They know what the implications are going to be. There's something else going on here."

Despite the unsatisfactory visit to Jyllands-Posten, there were many other interesting parts of the project, including various workshops, a visit to a Danish school and discussions with peace activists. The young participants did not always agree on issues, but they all learned to understand more about the other's point of view. Time well spent, both for the Danes and for the Muslims, they said. Martin, explains how this week had an influence on him personally.

"I have some family members who are kind of… not really racist, but they have some points of view I don't respect. I can just feel that before I went to the Volk Highschool always when they talked about it I ignored it and I just let them say it but I just visited them yesterday and I got so provoked when they said it so I can feel the impact this meeting has had on me and I just hope other people had the same kind of experience, and just meet a lot of Muslims and just communicate with them"

Seda Sadar

© Deutsche Welle 2006

The Foreign Ministry's "Next Stop Denmark" initiative has taken place through the Danish Institute for International Co-operation and the Krogerup College.

Qantara.de

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Further information on "Next Stop Denmark" on the Danish Association of International Co-operation website