Jordan Times
Thursday, December 8, 2005
Unify stances, King urges Muslims
MECCA (Agencies) — King Abdullah on Wednesday
said the absence of consensus on who is a Muslim and on the conditions of ifta
led to divisions and differences as well as accusations of apostasy and
internecine fighting between Muslims.
“It is not plausible for us to talk about cooperation and complementarity among
Muslims or about uniting our ranks and stances in facing the challenges of our
age or our relations with other nations and peoples, before we agree among
ourselves that an adherent to any madhab is a Muslim, and on the conditions of
ifta which regulates relations among us and unifies our stances towards the
issues and challenges of this age,” King Abdullah said in a speech, delivered on
his behalf by Prince Ali at an extraordinary summit of the Organisation of the
Islamic Conference (see full text of the speech).
“The convening of this extraordinary summit... comes at a time when the Muslim
ummah [nation] is facing several challenges that cannot be confronted or
overwhelmed except through casting aside the differences within the ummah,
through enhancing cooperation and complementarity among them and through
unifying their word, their ranks and their stances towards these different
issues and challenges, with a unified vision and rules based on the essence of
Islam.”
King Abdullah took part in the summit's opening session before leaving for Japan
on the first leg of an Asian tour.
During the summit, Saudi Arabia called for moderation and tolerance and a
rejection of extremist violence.
“Islamic unity would not be reached through bloodshed as claimed by the
deviants,” Saudi king, Abdullah Ben Abdulaziz, said at the inauguration of the
two-day summit in Mecca.
King Abdullah, whose country hosts the 57-member OIC's headquarters, was
referring to extremists, notably Al Qaeda terror network of Osama Ben Laden.
He called upon the Islamic jurisprudence arm of the OIC to “fulfil its historic
role of combating extremism.”
He also called for a reform of educational programmes in Islamic nations, which
have been facing a relentless US campaign for changing school textbooks that
Washington deemed intolerant.
“Developing the curriculum is essential to building a tolerant Muslim
identity... and to having a society that rejects isolation,” he said.
Washington has been pushing for an initiative to encourage democratic reform and
economic liberalisation in Arab and Muslim countries in a bid to abate the
frustration and poverty on which terror is thought to thrive.
Malaysian Prime Minister Abdullah Badawi, whose country chairs the summit, said
the Muslim world is “faced with grave problems that affect the lives of hundreds
of millions of people across the globe.
“We can no longer neglect these problems or expect others to solve them for us,”
he said.
Saudi Foreign Minister Prince Saud Al Faisal said Tuesday the summit was meant
to counter the “harsh offensive on Islam from enemies abroad and some of its own
children with deviant ideologies.”
On Tuesday, OIC foreign ministers held a preparatory meeting in Jeddah to draft
the agenda of the summit, which is expected to adopt two main documents: A
“Mecca Declaration” and a 10-year “plan of action to confront the challenges of
the 21st century.”
Prince Saud said the Mecca Declaration would “present a general view of the
situation as well as the common aspirations and hopes of our nation.”
The Muslim world “calls for forgiveness... among peoples and for combating
injustice, aggression and corruption,” he said.
He said the 10-year plan was “meant to confront the challenges faced by our
Islamic nation, and is based on the recommendations, visions and ideas reached
by scholars and intellectuals.”
The plan also provides for a restructuring of the OIC, including its Islamic
Jurisprudence Academy, which “should become the highest reference in
jurisprudence... and put an end to the multitudes of references and conflicting
fatwas.”
Prince Saud was referring to the religious edicts issued by extremists,
including Al Qaeda in Iraq, that have tried to legitimise deadly attacks on
civilians and assassinations.
The Islamic leaders are expected to approve a name change for the body to become
the Organisation of Islamic Countries.
The OIC, founded in 1969, is facing a financial crisis, as several member states
have not paid their annual contributions.
Non-Muslim leaders of OIC member states will only participate in the Mecca
summit via videoconference from Jeddah, about 80 kilometres away.
Non-Muslims are forbidden entry to the cities of Mecca and Medina which are home
to Islam's holiest shrines.