'Qatar offers massive funds for mosque construction in France'

French writer Joachim Veliocas said Saturday that a large number of mosques were constructed in France in recent years.

He referred to large funding offered by the Qataris to Islamist organizations in France.

He revealed at the monthly breakfast of the Center for Middle East Studies in Paris that Qatar had already paid 25 million Euros for the construction of mosques in France.

Veliocas noted that Qatar and Turkey work on a massive scale to construct mosques and offices as well as entities for the training of preachers who offer religious lessons at French mosques with the aim of spreading their ideology.

The two states, he added, also pay a lot to translate into French the books of leading scholars like Mohamed al-Ghazali who backed the murder of Egyptian intellectual Farag Fouda.

The seminar is organized on the sidelines of the G7 summit in Biarritz, a seaside town on the southwestern French Basque coast. Egyptian President Abdel Fattah al-Sisi is attending the summit for the first time.

Mariam Benrand, a political violence specialist at the Arab and Islamic World Research and Studies Institute of the French Ministry of Higher Education, is also participating in the seminar. .

Renowned Middle Eastern affairs specialist Roland Lombardi is also participating.

The seminar is mediated by CEMO Executive Director Ahmed Youssef.