An Islamophobic far-right group that planted crosses on a construction site for a mosque in the eastern Netherlands will not be prosecuted, Dutch prosecutors announced.
The prosecutors said that PEGIDA, Patriotic Europeans Against the Islamisation of the West, will not be prosecuted as "the words and the actions they used were shocking but did not contain any insult or discrimination against any group."
PEGIDA, a far-right anti-Muslim and anti-immigrant movement, made the construction site for a mosque look like a graveyard by planting 23 crosses in the city of Enschede earlier this month.
The group had also posted anti-Muslim hate messages on its social media account.
Banned in UK
Earlier this week, the German founder of PEGIDA has been banned from entering the UK.
Lutz Bachmann, who has led many anti-Muslim and anti-immigrant marches attracting tens of thousands of people in Germany, arrived in the UK last Saturday night but was refused entry at London Stansted Airport.
Bachmann was subsequently detained and removed from the UK Sunday morning.
Speaking to The Independent, a spokesperson for the Home Office said Bachmann was refused entry because his presence in the UK was not in the public interest.
"Border Force has the power to refuse entry to an individual if it is considered that his or her presence in the UK is not conducive to the public good," the spokesperson reportedly said.
In 2017, there were 950 incidents on Muslims and mosques in Germany alone, according to new government figures.
