Vienna - Austria's first Islamic cemetery opened Friday in Vienna, ending years of delay due partly to financing gaps and an arson attack while the complex was under construction. Funding by Saudi Arabia, Qatar and the Organization of the Petroleum Exporting Countries (OPEC) was crucial to completing the site, which has space for 4,000 graves and was originally slated to open in 2003, Austrian media reported.
City authorities donated the land and part of the construction costs to the Islamic Community of Austria, which built the 3-million- euro (4.2-million-dollar) complex on a former industrial site on the capital's outskirts. It includes a mausoleum and offices.
In 2006, an arson fire damaged the partly finished visitors' building. Soon after, someone painted Christian crosses on the walls.
Austria's estimated 400,000 Muslims account for more than 4 per cent of the population.
The largest groups are migrants from Turkey and former Yugoslavia and their children.
Many Austrian cities have Muslim sections in municipal cemeteries. Vienna's is the first built specifically for Muslims.
Suspected neo-Nazis vandalized the Muslim section of a graveyard outside the city of Linz, near the German border, last weekend.
At the same time, Austrians voted massively for two far-right parties in parliamentary elections, nearly doubling their combined tally to 29 per cent.
Both parties openly campaign against Islamic influence in Austria, a largely Roman Catholic country.
