Akkari-Laban dossier

The Akkari-Laban dossier ( _ar. ملف عكّاري لبن) is a 43 page document which was created by a group of Danish Muslim clerics from multiple organizations set out to present their case and ask for support in the Jyllands-Posten Muhammad cartoons controversy. [cite web| url=http://service.spiegel.de/cache/international/0,1518,398624,00.html| date=February 1, 2006| title=Alienated Danish Muslims Sought Help from Arabs| publisher=Spiegel| accessdate=2006-05-07] [cite web| url=http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/south_asia/4686536.stm| title=A clash of rights and responsibilities| publisher=BBC News| accessdate=2006-05-07]

Among the leadership of the Danish-based European Committee for Prophet Honouring, formed as an umbrella group of Muslim organizations were Imam Ahmad Abu Laban of the Islamisk Trossamfund and Akhmad Akkari, the spokesman of the group. Danish Sheik Raeed Huleyhel was named head of the group and signed the petition letters.

The first delegation of five, headed by Abu Bashar of The Community of Islam, landed in Egypt on 3 December 2005 and returned 11 December 2005. Among the people the group met on their visit to Egypt were: The General Secretary of the Arab League Amr Moussa, the Egyptian Grand Mufti Ali Gomaa and the Sheik of Cairo's Al-Azhar university Muhammad Sayyid Tantawy and Muhammed Shaaban, an advisor to the Egyptian Foreign Minister. This meeting was arranged by Egypt's ambassador to Denmark, Mona Omar Attia, later criticized by the Danish foreign ministry for adding to the unrest by alleging that Islam was not an officially recognized religion in Denmark, [da icon [http://politiken.dk/VisArtikel.iasp?PageID=438583 Trossamfund angriber Muhammed-satire i Egyptisk ambassadør fik verbal afklapsning] ] and transferred from her post at Copenhagen.

The second delegation, comprising four Danish Muslims headed by Sheik Raeed Huleyhel, traveled to Lebanon 17 December 2005 and returned to Denmark 31 December 2005. In Lebanon they met the Grand Mufti Muhammad Rashid Kabbani, top Shiite Sheikh Muhammad Hussein Fadlallah, Maronite Church leader Nasrallah Sfeir. During that time, Imam Ahmed Akkari also visited Syria to present their case to Grand Mufti Ahmed Badr-Eddine Hassoun. [http://www.theledger.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20060209/ZNYT03/602090454] Furthermore a smaller delegation traveled to Turkey while individuals visited Sudan, Morocco, Algeria, [http://www.e-jp.dk/12-02-2006/demo/JP_02-01.html] and Qatar, where Abu Laban briefed Sheikh Yusuf al-Qaradawi of the Muslim Brotherhood. [http://www.weeklystandard.com/Content/Public/Articles/000/000/006/704xewyj.asp]

At a 6 December 2005 summit of the OIC, with many heads of state in attention, the dossier was handed around by the Egyptian foreign minister Ahmed Abul-Gheit on the sidelines first, [http://news.independent.co.uk/world/middle_east/article344482.ece] but eventually an official communiqué was issued. [http://news.yahoo.com/s/afp/20060129/wl_mideast_afp/denmarkislamsyriabahrainunreligion_060129160121]

The dossier consists of several letters from Muslim organizations explaining their case, multiple clippings from Jyllands-Posten, multiple clippings from Weekend Avisen, [http://www.dr.dk/Nyheder/Indland/2006/01/04/161736.htm] and some additional images that, according to the dossier's authors, had been sent to Muslims in Denmark.

The dossier appears to have been assembled and added to until some point after 8 December 2005, with the first lobbying visits to Egypt having taken place before finalization. Several pages contain hand written notes, mostly translations from captions of cartoons. It is unknown if these were already present in the dossier or are later additions.

References

ources

*The complete dossier, high resolution, color. [http://politiken.dk/media/pdf/5679.PDF] (PDF, 11.8 MB file)
*Another source for the complete dossier: [http://monkeydyne.com/photos/?d=akkari_dossier monkeydyne.com]
*Danish translations of the introductory letter, and a letter to Islamic ambassadors, and a letter to government ministers. [http://ekstrabladet.dk/VisArtikel.iasp?PageID=332707 Ekstra Bladet]
*Complete translation of the dossier into Danish [http://politiken.dk/VisArtikel.iasp?PageID=440579 Politiken]