Muslim Students in Denmark Banned from Praying During School Hours

A Muslim student from SOPU Hillerød, which is in Northern Copenhagen, highlighted the ban in a photograph which was posted on Facebook by a friend and received hundreds of likes.

In the picture, the woman held a sign which read: "New from the director. May one pray at SOPU Hillerød? The answer is NO!”

Inger Margrethe Jensen, the schools director, confirmed the decision, saying: "We have reminded our students about it and reprinted our code of conduct because we have had some incidents that required that we brush up on things,” Dutch newspaper BT reported.

"Some [students] wanted to establish a prayer room on school property and the Muslims’ prayers have become far more visible because in some cases and they have used the hallways to pray. Religion and education don’t belong together – it belongs to the private life.

"We’ve been asked why they can’t pray at specific times because there are some Islamic directions that one should pray at specific times and it is unfortunate because it just adds more fuel to the fire on 'Islamism'.”

Mia Victoria Lunderød Hansen, a student at the school who posted the image of her friend to her Facebook page, said: "We students don’t think this is right and therefore we’ve gone around the school collecting signatures.”

"A situation like this should be taken care of [because] we believe that everyone should be treated equally.”

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