Portal:Norway/Selected article/17
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Islam is the largest minority religion in Norway with over 2% of the population. In 2006, government statistics registered 72,023 members of Islamic congregations in Norway. 56% lived in the counties of Oslo and Akershus. Scholarly estimates from 2005 regarding the number of people of Islamic background in Norway vary between 120,000 and 150,000. The vast majority have an immigrant background. The Islamic community in Norway is highly diverse, but many mosques are organised in the umbrella organisation Islamic Council Norway (Islamsk Råd Norge). Muslims in Norway are a very fragmented group, coming from many different backgrounds. Kari Vogt estimated in 2000 that there were about 500 Norwegian converts to Islam. The rest are mostly first or second generation immigrants from a number of countries. The largest immigrant communities from Muslim countries in Norway are from Pakistan, Iraq and Somalia. The Turkish, Pakistani and Iranian communities are quite established in Norway. 55% of Iranians have lived in Norway more than 10 years. The Iraqis are a more recent group, with 80% of the Iraqi community having arrived in the past 10 years. In the 1990s there was a wave of asylum seekers from the Balkans. In recent years most immigrants arrive as part of family reunification.
