Paulius Abdulhakimas Bergaudas from Klaipėda converted to Islam on his own initiative while finishing school and later completed a PhD in the subject at Cambridge. In an interview with LRT.lt, he talks about the myths surrounding Muslims in Lithuania and what the country’s politicians should avoid doing.
What do you think we fail to understand about Islam in Lithuania?
Knowledge of Islam is very limited, not only in Lithuania but throughout Europe. For example, people do not know what sharia is. Many say it should be banned, but one of its teachings says you should smile at your neighbours, friends and other people.
A good example is a 2020 study by the Lithuanian Office of the Equal Opportunities Ombudsperson on which neighbours people would not want to live alongside. According to the study, 41% of Lithuanians would not want to live next door to a Muslim, but only 11% would not want to live next door to a Turk. Yet almost all Turks are Muslims.
This means that, statistically, 30% of people in Lithuania do not even know what a Muslim is. They probably imagine an Arab wearing a turban, even though Arabs make up a minority of Muslims worldwide. The vast majority of the world's Muslim population lives in south-east Asia, particularly Malaysia and Indonesia.
We often hear claims that there is a clash of civilisations, that Christian identity is under threat and that Islam will sweep away our culture.
There are two possible answers. First, the arrival of Muslims in Europe is good for Christianity because it reminds Europeans that they are Christians. People often forget this and remember it only when their neighbour becomes Muslim, even though they themselves may never have set foot in a church.
From an academic perspective, I believe the Clash of Civilisations theory was developed not to explain reality, but to justify US hegemony and control in the Middle East.
When violence in the Middle East is met with violence in response, it is described as a clash of civilisations, even though that violence would not have occurred had the US not struck first. This rhetoric is now being applied to domestic politics to stir up fear. Vytautas Sinica is among those trying to use it.
Muslims are a minority in Europe and the West. Comment sections often feature remarks such as: “If you like Muslim countries so much, go and live there.” But that is precisely where most Muslim migrants go – to Saudi Arabia, Qatar and the United Arab Emirates.
While Muslims may account for around 10% of the population in Europe, immigrants make up about 80% of Qatar's population, most of them from South Asia, including Pakistan and India.
Lithuania’s Conservatives (TS-LKD), for example, claim their numbers are growing and that things will soon get worse.
The number of immigrants will continue to grow as long as the relevant immigration policies remain in place, but Muslims still account for a minority of all arrivals. We need to decide where to draw the line and what proportion of immigrants people are willing to accept.
In reality, all the percentages being discussed are plucked out of thin air. Successful integration and peaceful coexistence depend directly on trust in state institutions, including the police, the armed forces and healthcare services.
If immigrants do not trust these institutions, they are more likely to isolate themselves from society and take no part in its activities. When problems arise, they will be less likely to seek help and more likely to try to resolve matters on their own terms.
That is precisely how ghettos emerge. If politicians do not undermine trust through their rhetoric, integration will be successful.
In the UK, protests and riots broke out this summer following a knife attack carried out by a migrant. What is the mood there?
A horrific crime took place in Belfast when someone was attacked with a knife in a public place. But it was neither the only nor the first horrific crime. Ironically, and tragically, the same victim had been set on fire by another local man, probably a Christian, 20 years earlier. There were no protests then.
In Belfast alone, local men – husbands, brothers and sons – have killed 30 women over the past six years, but nobody organised protests over that.
If we genuinely care about crime, we should be equally concerned about all offences, not just those committed by immigrants. We could deport every immigrant, and women would still suffer violence. The hypocrisy becomes clear: people are not really concerned about crime; it is an excuse to express racism under the guise of civic concern.
Fear makes it harder to integrate migrants and increases the likelihood that they will commit crimes. The demographic group most likely to commit crime is young men from disadvantaged backgrounds.
If integration goes badly, newly arrived migrants will struggle to escape poverty. They will remain in disadvantaged environments and become more likely to commit crimes. Then people will say: “Look, immigrants commit more crimes”, even though this will be explained purely by demographics and economics, rather than by the fact that they are immigrants.
In the UK, Lithuanians account for 2% of the foreign population but 4% of the prison population. Does that mean Lithuanians are twice as likely to commit crimes?
What does the Muslim community in Lithuania look like?
Most people who have arrived over the past five to 10 years are here temporarily. The number planning to stay long-term is growing, but much more slowly. If immigration to Lithuania suddenly stopped, most would leave within a few years. It would be similar to Lithuanians who emigrated when EU borders opened.
One important detail is that the vast majority are men who have come to earn money to support their families. That is another reason why it would be strange to assume they are more likely to commit crimes. Although most immigrants from Muslim-majority countries are men, they still [proportionately] commit far fewer crimes than Lithuanian citizens.
Lithuania ranks ahead of Latvia and Poland in terms of tolerance and acceptance of other people. As a result, some immigrants decide to stay once they have learned the language.
What constitutes a good integration policy?
Trust in state institutions goes beyond integration policy. Do communities – not just migrants – trust the police, the armed forces and healthcare services?
During the pandemic, for example, many people refused to be vaccinated. The same applies to migrants: if they do not trust institutions, they will become isolated and will not take part in community activities. If they become victims of crime, they will not turn to the authorities but will try to resolve matters in their own way.
When there is no trust, people take matters into their own hands, and ghettos emerge. [...] If someone knows that they can go to the police if they are attacked because of their skin colour, they will integrate.
If politicians undermine trust through their rhetoric, they pave the way for a lack of integration. Where there is trust, there is integration.
How does the community react to Lithuanian politicians' anti-migrant statements?
Of course, it is unpleasant, and there is a lot of misinformation. Lithuania is still not like some other countries where migrants can be said to distrust the state.
There are only a handful of politicians who use populism to attract voters. If you ask people what they think of the mayor of Vilnius, you will not get the most flattering answers.
Is it because he supports introducing stricter language requirements, or because he associates migration with ghettos?
Learning the language is very welcome and a good thing. Unless there is an absolute necessity to learn such a difficult language, people will not learn it [...]. Moreover, this could deter some immigrants, so immigration would automatically decrease. It is already declining.
Incidentally, immigration is also falling elsewhere in Europe, yet people continue to talk about the need to reduce it. This shows that the issue of migrants is merely a smokescreen.
The emergence of ghettos is nothing more than fearmongering. Many people, not just Muslims but also people of other skin colours, face difficulties when trying to rent a flat: “You're from India? Next.”
In our community, we often encounter people who come to us and say: “Help me find a flat, because nobody will rent to me because of stereotypes.” This is precisely what can lead to ghettos. If we cannot integrate into society, who will support us? Other members of the community. They will all try to live together, in isolation. That is how a ghetto emerges.
On the other hand, is it necessarily a bad thing if a place is simply home to members of one demographic group? If we look at how the Tatars lived in Lithuania for centuries, the village of Keturiasdešimt Totorių could also be described as a ghetto.
We can look at the UK, for example. Migrants speak English and participate in community life. The prime minister was a Hindu, and the mayor of London is a Muslim. He recently performed the Hajj pilgrimage and, on returning, posted his support for an LGBT Pride event on social media and defended the hospitality industry against restrictions.
These things might be seen as unbecoming of a Muslim. If we want an example of the highest level of integration, we have one here. But are there still people who oppose Muslim migrants? Yes. This shows that there will always be something people claim is missing.
Are we simply racist?
There are genuine problems that need to be addressed. For example, a large proportion of Muslims live below the poverty line. Refugees, too, are often young men fleeing war zones. This means they may have psychological problems.
We can imagine that young men in such circumstances, as refugees, might be more likely to commit crimes. We need to talk about this and ensure that the people we accept do not belong to demographic groups that are more prone to crime. But they make up such a small proportion of all immigrants, and the benefits migrants bring are far greater.
Even if we got rid of all immigrants, those who dislike having a Muslim neighbour would continue to feel that way. London has a Muslim mayor who supports the LGBT community and the alcohol industry, yet people still say: “The mayor of London is a Muslim – sharia is coming.”
Have you considered the reasons behind this? Could historical trauma play a part?
Perhaps it is human nature to look for a scapegoat. In the past, Europe's Jewish communities were blamed for supposedly causing all its problems. Today, it is Muslim migrants who, in reality, make up only a small proportion of the population.
You mentioned Lithuania's Tatars earlier. How did Lithuania, the Grand Duchy of Lithuania and the Lithuanian people receive Muslims in the past?
The Grand Duchy of Lithuania was a very diverse land, where rulers were concerned not with religion or ethnicity but with realpolitik: if you were useful, they liked you. Vytautas the Great did not invite the Tatars because he was a leftist who wanted to destroy national identity, but because he needed reliable, loyal soldiers. That was how he viewed Muslims.
[...] Lithuania is unique and, I would say, an example for Western Europe of how to live alongside people of different religions, because our Muslim community is incomparably older than those in other European countries.
In my opinion, Lithuania's integration mechanisms today are also much better than those in other European countries. It is therefore disappointing to see ideas imported from populists in Western Europe, who are not Lithuanian, taking root here and turning into attacks on Muslims.
It is clear to everyone that such attacks benefit hostile forces in the East that have nothing to do with Islam. I hope Lithuanians will follow the path of their ancestors and refuse to be intimidated by a caricature of Islam as a bogeyman – one that has nothing to do with the reality around us.
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