Berlin, Aug 17, (dpa/GNA) – Following the stabbing of Salman Rushdie, German President Frank-Walter Steinmeier, has paid tribute to the writer’s courage.
The author made a conscious decision “not to let Ayatollah Khomeini’s inhumane call for killings prevail, and to oppose authoritarian rule with individual freedoms,” Steinmeier said in a get well message to Rushdie published on Wednesday.
“The truth of literature and freedom will always be stronger than the lies and the brute force with which religious zealots and authoritarian regimes, try to gain control,” the politician asserted
The British-Indian author, was attacked by a man at an event in New York state on Friday, and remains in hospital with serious stab wounds. There are currently no details on the assailant’s motive.
Rushdie has been persecuted by religious extremists for decades. In response to his novel “The Satanic Verses,” the then Iranian revolutionary leader Khomeini, called for the writer to be killed in 1989.
In his letter to Rushdie, Steinmeier expressed profound outrage over the attack: “this was an attack on the freedom of the world, and on a society based on civil liberties.”
GNA