A southeastern Spanish town, Jumilla, has banned religious gatherings at public sports centres that have been predominantly used by the local Muslim community in recent years to celebrate Eid ul-Fitr and Eid ul-Adha, reports Al Jazeera on Thursday.
The decision, first of its kind in Spain, has drawn criticism from the country's left-wing government and a United Nations official.
It stipulates that municipal sports facilities can only be used for athletic activities or events organised by local authorities. Under no circumstance, it said, can the centre be used for "cultural, social or religious activities foreign to the City Council".
The ban was initially proposed by the far-right Vox party and then amended and approved by the centre-right Popular Party, to which the town's mayor belongs.
Its introduction follows clashes between far-right groups and residents and migrants that erupted last month in the southern Murcia region after an elderly resident in the town of Torre-Pacheco was beaten up by assailants believed to be of Moroccan origin.
Earlier this week, Vox's branch in the Murcia region hailed the measure, saying on X that "Spain is and always will be a land of Christian roots!"
Meanwhile, Spain's Migration Minister Elma Saiz said on Friday that the ban, approved by the conservative local government of Jumilla last week, was "shameful", urging local leaders to "take a step back" and apologise to residents.
The town's mayor, Seve Gonzalez, told Spain's El Pais newspaper that the measure did not single out any one group and that her government wanted to "promote cultural campaigns that defend our identity".
But Mohamed El Ghaidouni, secretary of the Union of Islamic Communities of Spain, said it amounted to "institutionalised Islamophobia", contending the local government's assertion that the Muslim festivals celebrated in the centres were "foreign to the town's identity".
The ban, he said, "clashes with the institutions of the Spanish state" that safeguard religious freedom.
Saiz told Spain's Antena 3 broadcaster that policies like the ban in Jumilla harm "citizens who have been living for decades in our towns, in our cities, in our country, contributing and perfectly integrated without any problems of coexistence".
Separately, Miguel Moratinos, the UN special envoy to combat Islamophobia, said he was "shocked" by the City Council of Jumilla's decision and expressed "deep concern about the rise in xenophobic rhetoric and Islamophobic sentiments in some regions in Spain".
"The decision undermines the right to freedom of thought, conscience, and religion" as enshrined in the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, he said in a statement on Friday.
"Policies that single out or disproportionately affect one community pose a threat to social cohesion and erode the principle of living together in peace," he added.
Far-right clashes with locals
For centuries, Spain was ruled by Muslims, whose influence is present both in the Spanish language and in many of the country's most celebrated landmarks, including Granada's famed Moorish Alhambra Palace.
Islamic rule ended in 1492 when the last Arab kingdom in Spain fell to the Catholics.
Right-wing governments elsewhere in Europe have passed measures similar to the ban in Jumilla, striking at the heart of ongoing debates across the continent about nationalism and religious and cultural pluralism.
Last year in Monfalcone, a large industrial port city in northeastern Italy with a significant Bangladeshi immigrant population, far-right mayor Anna Maria Cisint banned prayers in a cultural centre.
The move led to protests involving some 8,000 people, and the city's Muslim community is appealing it in a regional court.
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