- Islam in Oceania
Islam in Oceania refers to
Islam andMuslims inOceania . Some countries in Oceania, notably Australia, have Islam as their third largestreligion , afterChristianity andBuddhism . By current estimates, there are 600,000 Muslims in Oceania. [ [http://www.islamicpopulation.com/oceania_general.html Muslim Population ] ]History
Islam has been in some parts of Oceania for at least 400 hundred years (since the
1600 s). When the people ofPapua New Guinea andWest Papua traded with China and the Malay empire, in the early 1600s, the presence of Islam was felt in Oceania for the first time. [ [http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/asia-pacific/country_profiles/3028825.stm BBC NEWS | Asia-Pacific | Country profiles | Timeline: Papua New Guinea ] ]Other parts of Oceania hadn't felt the presence of Islam until the 1800s. For instance, the first Muslims in
Fiji came when Muslim migrants came on a ship bringing indentured laborers to Fiji in 1879. Muslims consisted of 22% of the boarders on Leonidas, which was the first such ship.References
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