KUALA LUMPUR, June 17: Malaysian Prime Minister Mahathir Mohamad on Monday described his country as an “Islamic fundamentalist state” whose policies abided with the fundamental teachings of Islam.

Malaysia has been wrongly called a moderate Muslim country, he said. But he acknowledged that his remarks would shock those in Western countries as they “considered a fundamentalist as someone who is violent and did all kinds of bad things”.

His remarks on the eve of a five-day annual general meeting of his United Malays National Organisation (UMNO) party suggest the party is upping the ante in the battle for the hearts and minds of Muslims who form just over 60 per cent of the 23-million population.

“If we hold to the fundamentals of Islam, we will not become bad as Islam exhorts us to be on good brotherly terms, united, do good things and hence it is not wrong to be an Islamic fundamentalist,” the charismatic leader said in parliament.—dpa