Swiss intellectuals seek to reverse minaret ban

Amid mounting controversy over Switzerland's ban on building minarets, the country's liberals are planning to push for a new referendum aimed at overturning the ban.

Club Helvetique, a group of over 20 Swiss intellectuals, are in the process of drawing up an action plan to overturn the ban, which the United Nations slammed as "deeply divisive" and "clearly discriminatory."

"A new initiative is the most democratic way of achieving this," the Sunday newspaper, Sonntag, quoted constitutional lawyer Joerg Mueller as saying.

According to the paper, two complaints questioning the legality of ban have already been handed to Switzerland's Federal Court.

A simple majority, 57 percent of the voters, said "yes" to a late November referendum declaring the construction of new minarets illegal. The approval was in defiance of the government's warning that initiative violated the Swiss constitution, freedom of religion.

The far right parties pushing for the vote had denounced the minaret, a distinct architectural feature built on top of Islamic mosques from which the faithful are called to prayer.

However, hundreds of protesters took to the street this weekend in Zurich, Basel and the capital, Bern, to show their opposition to the ban.

Muslim and European leaders, as well as the Vatican, quickly reacted to the ban. The UN has also question the legality of the ban, saying it was at odds with the country's obligations under international law.

Iran condemned the move with Foreign Minister Manouchehr Mottaki saying that "the ban will undoubtedly change Switzerland's image as a leading advocate of human rights."

The most astonishing condemnation, however, came from Libya's eccentric leader Moammar Gadhafi, who argued that the ban would provide al-Qaeda militants with a pretext to launch attacks in Europe and particularly in Switzerland.