GEERT WILDERS, the Dutch far-right politician, stepped up his rhetoric against Islam and immigration at preliminary hearings before a trial for incitement to hatred and discrimination.
He claimed yesterday that Islam was a “totalitarian ideology” that “distinguishes itself mainly through murder and killing”. Mr Wilders is facing a retrial on charges that his anti-Islamic remarks have led to discrimination against Muslims in the Netherlands.
The trial’s significance has grown since elections last year made Mr Wilders’s party, the Party for Freedom (PVV), the country’s third largest. The PVV now provides the swing votes that give the governing coalition its majority in parliament.
Mr Wilders used his closing statement at the hearing to argue he was “obliged” to oppose Islam.
“All over Europe, the lights are slowly going out,” he said. “Everywhere in Europe, the ruling elites are defending an ideology that, for 14 centuries, has been trying to destroy us.”
Mr Wilders’s first trial on the same charges was annulled in October, after his lawyers revealed the presiding judge had spoken in advance about the case with an expert witness for the defence when the two met at a society dinner. Mr Wilders was granted a retrial before new judges.
The hearing on Monday focused on the mechanics of the retrial, which has not yet been scheduled. Lawyers for the plaintiffs argued there was no need to repeat the entire trial, and that the new judges could rule based on the testimony and evidence from the first trial.
But Mr Wilders and his counsel, the Dutch celebrity lawyer Bram Moszkowicz, want the new trial to provide a broad platform for justifying Mr Wilders’s campaign against Islam. They have also called a long list of witnesses they believe will provide grounding for Mr Wilders’s negative statements regarding Islam.
These include an Iranian cleric, Ayatollah Mesbah-Yazdi, known for his anti-Semitic pronouncements, as well as Mohammed Bouyeri, the convicted murderer of the Dutch television producer Theo van Gogh. Also on the list are a number of authors of publications and websites critical of Islam.
The Dutch ministry of justice stated that a new trial would be required if the defendants demanded one. It remains to be seen which witnesses will be allowed to appear.
Mohammed Rabbae, former Dutch parliamentarian and chairman of the National Council of Moroccans, a plaintiff in the case, said Mr Wilders’s statement was part of his party’s campaign for provincial elections.
“He took advantage of the presence of television and radio broadcasters for his campaign,” he said. “It had nothing to do with the trial.” – (Copyright The Financial Times Limited 2011)