The European Court of Human Rights (ECHR) rejected, Thursday, August 4, a request to suspend the expulsion order to Morocco of Hassan Iquioussen, an imam officiating in France, the ECHR said in a press release.

Interior Minister Gérald Darmanin announced last week the forthcoming expulsion of this preacher of Moroccan nationality.

Reputed to be close to the Muslim Brotherhood, he is accused by the French authorities of having launched calls for hatred and violence aimed in particular at the Jewish community.

The court, which sits in Strasbourg, was seized on Wednesday by Hassan Iquioussen under article 39 of its rules, which allows it to order states "provisional measures" when the applicants are exposed to "a real risk of damage irreparable".

Hassan Iquioussen invoked the provisions of the European Convention on Human Rights on the prohibition of torture and inhuman and degrading treatment, the right to respect for private and family life, freedom of thought, conscience and religion or freedom of expression.

An imam in the sights of Gérald Darmanin 

According to the ECHR, Gérald Darmanin issued an expulsion order for this imam on Friday, withdrawing his residence permit as well as a second order fixing Morocco as the country of destination.

“Because of the seriousness of the threat to public order, the minister considered that there had not been a disproportionate attack on his right to family life”, further specifies the ECHR.

Gérald Darmanin again justified the expulsion of this imam on CNews on Thursday, judging that he had made "openly anti-Semitic, openly xenophobic, openly homophobic, openly anti-women remarks".

He "has nothing to do on national soil", insisted the Minister of the Interior.

Morocco, he announced on Tuesday, issued a "consular pass" to "expel manu militari" Hassan Iquioussen who lives in the North and is registered according to him in the "RPF", the file of wanted persons.

This preacher is very active on social networks, in particular on his Youtube channel followed by 169,000 people and his Facebook page with 42,000 subscribers.

Born in France, in Denain, and living near Valenciennes, Hassan Iquioussen, 57, had decided when he came of age, still according to Gérald Darmanin, not to opt for French nationality.

He claims to have given it up at the age of 16, under the influence of his father, and then to have tried in vain to recover it. 

With AFP

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