The prominent Swiss Muslim theologian, Professor Tariq Ramadan, has denied allegations of rape and sexual assault and has served notice of his intention to sue for slander, according to his lawyer Yassine Bouzrou.
French media reports say that Ramadan will file a complaint for “slanderous denunciation” on Monday with the public prosecutor of Rouen.
Henda Ayari, a French feminist and secular liberal activist, filed a complaint on Friday against Ramadan at the Rouen public prosecutor’s office.
The complaint concerns “rape, sexual assault, wilful violence, harassment and intimidation.”
Ayari, 40, president of the Libératrices Association, said on her Facebook page that she was “a victim of something very serious several years ago” but did not want to reveal the name of her attacker at the time because of “threats from him”.
In her book “I chose to be free”, published in November 2016, she described this man as Zoubeyr, speaking of a meeting in his hotel room in Paris near where this “Muslim intellectual” gave a lecture at an Islamic event.
“Out of modesty, I will not give here precise details of the acts he has done to me. It is enough to know that he has greatly benefited from my weakness,” wrote Ayari, adding that when she rebelled and shouted at him to stop, he insulted, slapped and abused her.
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“I confirm today, the famous Zoubeyr, it’s Tariq Ramadan,” wrote Henda Ayari on Facebook.
Tariq Ramadan is the 55-year-old grandson of the founder of Egypt’s Muslim Brotherhood.
He is a professor of contemporary Islamic studies at Oxford University and has a large following among Anglophone and Francophone Muslims.
He has consistently argued for peaceful coexistence between Islamic and Western cultures, but has been denounced as a dangerous radical by France’s political and media establishment.
