One of Germany's four national Islamic groups said Monday it will stay away from a meeting with the German government this week because anoter Islamic group has been shut out of the event.
The Central Council of Muslims, which represents many non-Turkish Sunni Muslims, said it would not attend a preparatory meeting in Berlin on Wednesday to set the agenda for a round of meetings between Berlin and Muslim leaders beginning May 17.
Ayyub Axel Koehler, the council's ethnic German chairman, said the absence would permit his group to express more clearly to Interior Minister Thomas de Maiziere why it believes another group, the Islamic Council, should be included in all the meetings.
Maiziere, whose ministry is funding the meetings and choosing which Muslims may participate, denied speaking rights to the Islamic Council, saying he could not meet with a group whose leaders are under criminal investigation.
Some Muslims were furious, saying Muslims who worship at hundreds of Turkish-speaking mosques were being denied representation.
The German-Islam Conference, which began in 2006, discusses ways to bring Islam into the German education system and ease discrimination against Muslims. The Islamic Council took part in the conference 2006-09.
Secular Muslims and two other mosque federations, the Federation of Islamic Cultural Centres VIKZ and Ditib, say they will attend the conference. Ditib runs mosques with financial help from the Turkish government.
The government allocated 10 seats on the Muslim side to individuals and five to worship groups, contending that the vast majority of German Muslims are not formal members of any mosque community. The Alawite Community will also attend the conference.
The German government's criticism is directed at a fundamentalist Turkish Islamic movement, Milli Gorus, which dominates the Islamic Council. Some German states suspect it of being anti-democratic and police are investigating it for alleged fraud and currency offences.