KARACHI: Muslims urged to invest in media, research
By Our Reporter
KARACHI, Dec 18: Participants of a seminar called upon the Muslim world to invest in research and upgrade their media to understand and counter the onslaught of the West, which they claimed had launched a diabolical campaign to undermine the ethos of Islamic society through military action, economic and political bondage, and relentless media campaign against Muslim countries.
They also urged them to be on guard against fifth columnists who were trying to deprive Muslims of their identity and independence.
They were of the view that after the fall of the Soviet Union, the West had openly stated that it felt threatened by the Islamic world. Such views were expressed before and after 9/11.
They said that the recent attacks on Iraq and Afghanistan had nothing to do with 9/11 but were part of an earlier plan to subjugate the Muslims and their resources to usher in a new ear of colonialism. It had nothing to do with the clash of civilizations though some Western leaders appeared to be harbouring the idea of a “crusade”, they said.
The seminar on problems being faced by the Islamic world and media war with the West was organized by the International Institute of Islamic Research.
Former army chief Gen Mirza Aslam Beg referred to the decline of Muslims and their subsequent struggle for independence from the colonial yoke of the West. He and stressed the need for forging a more vibrant and strong relationship with China in the transition from a uni-polar to a multi-polar world order.
He was of the view that if policy makers in Islamabad failed to realise that and became part of the American policy of countering China and creating a wedge between Beijing and Moscow, Pakistan would suffer greatly.
He slammed the West for equating the struggle for independence of Muslims the world over with acts of “terrorism”, and said it had attacked the Muslims and captured their resources to keep them under its bondage. But it was meeting stiff resistance similar to the one that caused the former Soviet Union’s exit from Afghanistan and its subsequent collapse, he added.
He said when people get fed up with state terrorism, they resort to any action. But, he said that it could not be branded as terrorism.
He said America was now worried and was finding an exit from Iraq and strengthening its position in Afghanistan. For this, the West had launched a multi-pronged strategy of creating divisions in the Muslim world, he maintained.
He said it would not be in Pakistan’s interest to become part of the new containment policy of the US. While China was pursuing a policy of friendship with all and peaceful coexistence with focus on economic cooperation, it was in Pakistan’s interest to strengthen ties with the dependable friend.
Altaf Hassan Qureshi, senior journalist said it was the age of ideas in which unfortunately the Muslim world was lagging far behind because they had not invested in research and media.
He said that it was unfortunate that despite controlling 70 per cent of the world’s energy resources, there was no university of the standard of Harvard or Oxford in the Muslim world.
He emphasized the need for projecting Islam to the West in its own language and diction. For this purpose, it was essential to have well-trained and educated media managers, while there was also the need for analysing how the Jewish lobby was dominating the West’s economy and the media.
Athar Hashmi cautioned against the Indian cultural onslaught through Pakistani and foreign TV channels. He also expressed concern over the failure of Pakistani media managers in countering the negative image of Islam being promoted on the Western media, particularly against jihad.
Shahnawaz Farooqi traced the historical evolution of the current state of affairs and why the West was so obsessed with the idea of changing the very fundamentals of Islam and Islamic society.
Mohammad Zakiuddin expressed concern over the anti-Islam tirade on the Western media. He also referred to various challenges to the Muslim world and cited verses from the Quran to support his argument.
