ISLAMABAD, April 11: The Muslim countries should forge unity among themselves, overcome internal conflicts, adopt modern technology and have a mutually agreed interpretation of Islam and democracy to boldly face the challenges of modern time.

These suggestions were given by speakers during a seminar on ‘impact of war in Iraq’ organized by Pakistan Forum (PF), an organization which has revived itself after two years.

The forum strives to project liberal image of Islam and Pakistan as described by its chairperson Dr Kaniz Yusaf Fatima to this reporter. The seminar was attended by a select group of audience including former bureaucrats, writers, intellectuals and students.

Hamid Gul, former director-general of ISI, in his speech asked the Muslims to “realize and asses the nature of the challenge they are faced with”.

He said the Muslim countries should adopt a three-pronged formula while dealing with the powerful countries especially the US. It includes defiance, deterrence and dialogue, he added.

He said deterrence meant Jihad and possession of unconventional arms.

He defined Jihad as a nation’s will to stand against wrong. About dialogue, he said the Muslim countries should assert themselves as equal actors in a dialogue with the US.

Referring to the belligerent policies of the US, he said there were negative implications of these guidelines.

He said the administration creates imaginary outside threats to get green signal for war from the public. However, the Muslims had no real ideological conflict with the US as a nation state, he added.

He observed that war on Iraq was aimed at capturing its oil and removing all threats to the security of Israel. The oil in Iraq could last only for 40 years as compared to the untapped reserves of Central Asia which could last for 100 years, he added.

He said China’s economy was fast growing but the US would hamper this growth by controlling regulation of oil supply to the territory.

Asad Durrani, also a former head of the ISI, defended the theory of pre-emption saying one should really take measures if it was faced with threats either immediate or in near future.

However, he disagreed with the claim that the US had any kind of threat from Iraq. The United Nations did its best to stop the war in Iraq but the role of the Organization of Islamic Conference (OIC) was disappointing, he added.

Brig Usman Khalid (retired) said there were three poles of power in the world i.e China, US-Israel-India coalition and old Europe. The Muslim world should unite and become fourth pole of power, he added.

He said the Muslims were the victims of US aggression and they should join hands against it. Throughout history, the US betrayed its friends by first isolating and then attacking them, he added.

He said Muslims had huge oil reserve and should control the sea routes as well to ensure its sale and supply to other countries.—Junaid Bahadur