Two men burned a copy of the Koran in front of the Swedish parliament on Monday, the latest in a string of demonstrations in which Islam’s holy book was destroyed.

The two trampled on the Koran and then set it on fire, the Swedish news agency TT reported.

The same men have previously attracted attention with Islamophobic actions.

Earlier in July they set fire to a Koran in front of the Iraqi embassy in Stockholm, which led to violent protests in several Muslim countries. In Iraq, a mob stormed the Swedish embassy and the government expelled the Swedish ambassador from the country.

During Monday’s action, the men had no visible supporters cheering them on, TT reported. However, there were about 15 counter-demonstrators.

On Sunday evening, Swedish Prime Minister Ulf Kristersson said he was in close contact with Danish Prime Minister Mette Frederiksen about the Koran burnings and they were seeking ways to legally prevent such Islamophobic acts out of concern for public safety.

A week ago, two men burned a book in front of the Iraqi embassy in Copenhagen in an action streamed live on the internet. The men said that the book was the Koran.

“We are in the most serious security situation since World War II, and we know here that both states, state-like actors and individuals can take advantage of the situation,” Kristersson wrote on Instagram.

Danish Foreign Minister Lars Løkke Rasmussen spoke on Monday of a “rather high and heightened picture of the terrorist threat.”

The conflict is particularly sensitive for Stockholm, as the Koran burnings were one reason why Turkey had for months blocked Sweden’s bid to join NATO.

But the bar for legal action is high. In Denmark and Sweden, freedom of assembly and demonstration are strongly protected by the constitution. This is one reason why courts in Stockholm have rejected a ban imposed by the police on the Islamophobic protests.

The Organisation of Islamic Cooperation, based in Saudi Arabia, called a special meeting for Monday. In a phone call with Rasmussen, the Danish foreign minister, Secretary General Hissein Brahim Taha urged the Scandinavian country to take action to stop the desecrations.

Man Muslims understand the actions as hate crimes not covered by freedom of expression.

In Denmark, politicians are divided. Morten Messerschmidt, the leader of the right-wing populist People’s Party, stressed that the freedom of the West is based on the right to criticize and make fun of a religion.

The leader of the Conservative People’s Party, Søren Pape Poulsen, warned of further demands from Muslim states if the government gave in on the ban on Koran burnings.

“This is only the first step,” he said.

Controversy over what is seen as Islamophobic actions is not new to Denmark.

In 2005, controversial drawings by a Danish cartoonist depicted the Prophet Mohammed with a bomb as a turban. That triggered a wave of violent protests with dozens of deaths, during which Danish embassies were attacked.

The pictorial representation of Mohammed is a taboo in large parts of the Islamic world. In Denmark, where the cartoonist Kurt Westergaard was the main focus, a bitter debate about the limits of freedom of expression followed.

After the artist died in 2021, the newspaper Jyllands-Posten wrote that “Kurt Westergaard’s fight for freedom of expression must not die with him.”

Of the current controversy, Danish Parliament Speaker Søren Gade, defence minister at the time of the cartoon controversy, said Danish interests and the safety of Danes must take precedence.

“I can’t imagine that many Danes lose sleep over the thought that they are not allowed to set fire to holy writings.”

Read more: Denmark ponders law to ban burning of the Koran in front of embassies

Sri Lanka announced plans to ban the wearing of burkas and said it would close more than 1,000 Islamic schools known as madrassas, citing national security.

The country’s minister of public security Sarath Weerasekara said he signed a paper on Friday seeking the approval of the Cabinet of Ministers to ban burkas — outer garments that cover the body and face worn by some Muslim women.

“The burka has a direct impact on national security,” Mr Weerasekara told a ceremony at a Buddhist temple on Saturday, without elaborating.

“In our early days, we had a lot of Muslim friends, but Muslim women and girls never wore the burka,” Mr Weerasekara said, according to video footage sent by his ministry.

“It is a sign of religious extremism that came about recently.

“We will definitely ban it.”

The wearing of burkas was temporarily banned in 2019 after the Easter Sunday bomb attacks on churches and hotels in Sri Lanka that killed more than 260 people.

Two local Muslim groups that had pledged allegiance to the Islamic State group have been blamed for the attacks at six locations — two Roman Catholic churches, one Protestant church and three top hotels.

Mr Weerasekara also said the government will ban more than 1,000 madrassas, saying they are not registered with the authorities and do not follow the national education policy.

The decision to ban burkas and madrassas is the latest move affecting the Indian Ocean island nation’s minority Muslims.

Muslims make up about 9% of the 22 million people in Sri Lanka, where Buddhists account for more than 70% of the population.

Ethnic minority Tamils, who are mainly Hindus, comprise about 15% of the population.

Read more: Buddhist mobs target Sri Lanka’s Muslims despite state of emergency

Around 1,300 Danes marched through Copenhagen on Wednesday in protest at a new ban on the wearing of face veils in public, accusing the government of infringing on women’s right to dress as they choose.

Denmark’s parliament enacted the ban in May, joining France and some other European Union countries to uphold what some politicians say are secular and democratic values.

The protesters, many wearing the niqab veil or the all-enveloping, body-length burqa, marched from the central, left-wing district of Norrebro to Bellahoj police station on the outskirts of the capital. They formed a human chain around the station and then marched back to Norrebro before dispersing.

Demonstrators, often with children in tow, chanted “no racists in our streets” and “my life, my choice” during the three-hour rally. No incidents were reported.

The marchers included non-niqab-wearing Muslim women and non-Muslim Danes with faces covered.

“We need to send a signal to the government that we will not bow to discrimination and a law that specifically targets a religious minority,” Sabina, 21, a niqab-garbed student, told Reuters, asking that her full name not be used.

She is one of about 150-200 Muslim women – 0.1 percent of those in the country – who daily wear either the niqab or burqa garments covering the face or the entire body. Muslims account for around 5 per cent of Denmark’s 5.7 million population.

Under the law, police will be able to instruct women to remove their veils or order them to leave public areas. Justice Minister Soren Pape Poulsen said officers would fine them and tell them to go home.

Fines will range from 1,000 Danish crowns (121.87 pounds) for a first offence to 10,000 crowns for a fourth.

DISCRIMINATORY, CRITICS SAY

Despite its generic wording, the legislation is being widely interpreted as discriminating against Denmark’s Muslims and violating women’s right to freedom of expression and religion.

Critics, noting the tiny number of Muslim women in Denmark who actually wear a niqab, regard the law as largely a sop to increased anti-immigrant sentiment in the Nordic country.

“If the intention of this law was to protect women’s rights, it fails abjectly,” said Fotis Filippou, deputy Europe director of human rights group Amnesty International. “Instead, the law criminalises women for their choice of clothing – making a mockery of the freedoms Denmark purports to uphold.”

Police said none of the veiled protesters would be penalised since certain uses of face veils, such as to exercise freedom of speech as part of a peaceful protest, are exempt from the law.

The justice ministry explained that the ban would focus on women forced by their families to wear veils, though it has been faulted for vagueness in stipulating who would fall foul of it.

Danish Police Union chief Claus Oxfeldt said he would have preferred more comprehensive guidance on how to enforce the ban.

“We need as thorough guidance as possible so we don’t end up in situations where (police officers) don’t 100 per cent know how to act,” he said.

As an example, he was unsure whether Asian tourists wearing anti-pollution masks would be covered by the ban.

France – with the largest Muslim community in the EU – as well as Belgium, the Netherlands, Bulgaria and the German state of Bavaria, have all imposed some curbs on face veils in public.

France’s controversial 2011 ban added to a broader sense of alienation felt by many Muslims and some evidence surfaced that it encouraged assaults in the street on women wearing still legal headscarves as well.

Turkish police deployed in central Istanbul on Sunday to enforce a ban on the city’s annual gay and transgender pride march, blocking off a main street and dispersing groups of demonstrators who gathered nearby.

Police with riot shields and helmets sealed off entrances to Istiklal Street, where organisers had planned to hold the march before authorities announced the ban on Saturday, citing security concerns after threats from an ultra-nationalist group.

Small groups of people gathered in sidestreets waving rainbow flags, symbols of lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender pride. Police fired rubber bullets to disperse one group, witnesses said, and detained several people.

Footage posted on the internet also appeared to show them firing tear gas at one location.

Istanbul’s pride march attracted tens of thousands of people in the past, making it one of the biggest in the Muslim world. But in 2015 it was broken up by police and it was banned last year and again this year after threats from the ultra-nationalist Alperen Hearths group.

The Istanbul governor’s office said it decided to prevent the demonstration out of concern for the security of marchers, tourists and residents.

“The true reason for the reactions towards a march that took place in peace for 12 years is hate,” organisers said.

“Our security cannot be provided by imprisoning us behind walls, asking us to hide,” they added. “Our security will be provided by recognising us in the constitution, by securing justice, by equality and freedom.”

Istanbul has traditionally been seen as a relative safe haven by members of the gay community from elsewhere in the Middle East, including refugees from Syria and Iraq.

But although homosexuality is not a crime in Turkey, unlike many other Muslim countries, homophobia remains widespread. Critics say President Tayyip Erdogan and his Islamist-rooted AK Party have shown little interest in expanding rights for minorities, gays and women, and are intolerant of dissent.

Bulgaria’s parliament on Friday banned the wearing of face veils in public in a move which supporters said would boost security in the wake of Islamist militant attacks in Europe.

The “burqa ban” law, pushed by the nationalist Patriotic Front coalition, echoes similar measures in western European countries such as France, Netherlands and Belgium which have various laws banning the wearing of burqas or niqabs.

People who do not follow the ban in Bulgaria face fines of up to 1,500 levs ($860) as well as suspension of social benefits.

The ethnic Turkish Movement for Rights and Freedoms refused to take part in the vote, which followed full-face veils ban in public in several Bulgarian towns. It said the ban it would incite ethic and religious intolerance.

The ruling centre-right party said the ban has nothing to do with religious outfits but only aimed at boosting national security and allowing better video surveillance.

“The law is not directed against religious communities and is not repressive,” ruling GERB’s senior lawmaker Krasimir Velchev said. “We made a very good law for the safety of our children.”

According to the law, clothing hiding the face may not be worn in government offices, schools, cultural institutions and places of public recreation, but exceptions are allowed for health or professional reasons.

A minority of Muslim women in Europe cover their faces, but their veils have become symbols for some Europeans troubled by securty, immigration and Muslim integration.

Muslims make up about 12 percent of Bulgaria’s 7.2 million population and most belong to a centuries-old community, largely ethnic Turks.

Muslim women in the country traditionally do not wear niqabs or burqas, exept for a small group in the Roma community who have recently started, sparking tensions in the city of Pazarzhik.

Many Bulgarians are concerned that the migrant inflows into Europe may pose a threat to their predominantly Orthodox Christian culture and help radicalise part of the country’s long-established Muslim minority.