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– We want to live in peace and not disturb others. Just look at the photo of our new center. It is located in the middle of the forest, says director Sadiq Baker Alezairjawi (54) at the Al-Ghadir Islamic Center of the Shiite religious community in Østfold to Dagbladet.
This is the first time he has been interviewed by the Norwegian media in general, and about the serious infection situation associated with members of the religious community in particular.
Young people are the most huggers, but also most concerned about coronary heart disease
According to the director, the Al-Ghadir Islamic Center has more than 700 members in total, the majority in the Fredrikstad municipality, then in the neighboring Sarpsborg municipality and spread over much of the country.
The one-year-old director sits in isolation with a proven covid-19 infection in the Sarpsborg home with his wife and four children under one roof.
Fear: – I don’t notice anything
– I have not noticed anything about the disease before or now. That’s what is scary. Many of our members who have been diagnosed with the infection have not noticed anything. In this sense, we ourselves are victims. It must have come from somewhere, the director tells Dagbladet.
Corona outbreak: neither Sarpsborg nor Fredrikstad will close for now
Previously, the director and the congregation had only transmitted some figures and the description to the public in the municipality of Sarpsborg. It happened on Thursday, September 3.
Precisely, the new center of the religious community in a rural setting in Skjeberg is the nucleus of the flourishing of the infection.
Terraced house
– First, it is important to be in control of the infection situation. Then the municipality will consider later whether to react to the religious community. The property is originally a semi-detached house with garage and workshop.
– It is not approved for meeting rooms. And if it had been approved, it would have been for only 20 people. We understand that there were 170 people gathered there, Mayor Sindre Martinsen-Evje (Labor) tells Dagbladet.
Superintendent Sadiq Baker Alezairjawi explains:
– We sent a request to the municipality of Sarpsborg before the big feast on August 29 during the holiday ashura. The rejection of the municipality occurred on September 2. We used the house on August 29 because the lease in Fredrikstad for the old meeting place had expired.
He says there were between 60 and 70 men and 50 to 60 women on the property that day.
– Not in the same room
– They were spread out and not in the same room at the same time. We were very careful to inform everyone about Norwegian infection control measures in advance, and the center sends infection control information every day now that the infection has spread. We believe that we have good contact with the municipalities of Fredrikstad and Sarpsborg, and we do our best to follow the Norwegian infection control rules, says the director.
Their phones ring 24 hours for church members.
FHI notification issues
– There is not much fear among our members. They just want to know what is the best they can do. And we haven’t noticed any hateful moods from other people, says the director.
He emphasizes that the celebration of the Ashura feast was interrupted as soon as the first positive test arrived. It was the afternoon of August 29.
Does not exclude review
On Sunday afternoon, Martinsen-Evje told TV 2 that they have not decided how to react to the outbreak.
– We have not concluded, but we are in an evaluation and we are seriously looking at what has happened, says Martinsen-Evje to the channel.
– I cannot rule out the municipality reporting the matter, says Martinsen-Evje.
Dagbladet has contacted Alezairjawi for comment, but was unable to make contact.
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