Organisation of Islamic Cooperation
The Collective Voice of The Muslim World
Date: 12/12/2011
Doha, State Of Qatar 11th December 2011 Excellencies, Distinguished Delegates, Ladies and Gentlemen Let me at the outset express my pleasure to be present at this august gathering in this wonderful city of Doha. As Secretary General of the Organization of Islamic Cooperation, I am emotionally overtaken by the fact that an Annual Forum of the UN Alliance of Civilizations is being held for the second time in a OIC Member state. The holding of this important event serves to add strength to the OIC’s commitment to join hands with the AOC Group of Friends, to realize the lofty objectives of the Alliance when it was first conceived, and in the implementation of recommendations made in the Report of the High Level Group. It is important for the AOC family to keep in mind that the urgency and priority that motivated the Prime Ministers of Turkey and Spain together with the Secretary General of the United Nations to formally launch the Alliance of Civilizations was to address mutual suspicion, fear and misunderstanding between the Muslim and Western societies and to bridge the divide. One of Alliance’s programmes, “Restore Trust, Building Bridges”, can be adopted as a motto while taking up its activities and projects. Today the AOC has a variety of issues in its agenda. Not to undermine the relevance of any, we must not in any way shift the focus and priority from the very purposes for which the Alliance came into being. If we do, the AOC will, in my opinion, become just another organization removed from its essence and roots. Dear Friends The theme of our debate in this panel is important and interesting. A question has been addressed to us on how culture matters to development. My immediate response would be that development and culture are intimately intertwined, one influencing the other. A sociological definition of culture would incorporate all aspects of human existence, ranging the podium from where I am addressing you, the laptops that I can see all around and transmission of our deliberations across to the four corners of the earth; the languages we speak, the food we eat, the way we dress, the way we think and the manner we interact with each other. All these are deeply and inexorably interlinked with development. Development cannot take place in isolation. Nor does it spring out of a magician’s hat. It cannot be measured just on material terms, wealth and resources. Development is multidimensional. It has the philosophical dimension from which ideas and wisdom emerge; the socio-economic dimension that create the conditions, access and opportunities to education and research; the political dimension that make up the infrastructure on which countries and states are governed and administered. And then we have the cultural dimension that makes development suited to the needs, hopes and aspirations of the people. At the end of it all, these and other factors which I might have missed, make up the human dimension of development. The proverbial truth that no man is an island is relevant also to our debate this morning. This is all the more true in the present day globalized world. The pace of socio-economic and political development over the past three decades has been phenomenal. The world atlas has indeed shrunk and mankind has been rendered to live in a global village in which no development takes place that does not have an impact on the other, be it positive or otherwise. But the problem begins here. We may be living as neighbors but not as equals. We have, on one side, unlimited wealth and advancement of technology which allows the citizens to live in prosperity, having access to opportunities of high quality education, health, and social welfare, economic and political stability. The other side of the fence is dismal in which the citizens are deprived of the bare and minimum necessities to lead a life in human dignity. An overwhelming majority of the world’s population languor in poverty conditions, denied access to the basic ingredients of economic and social development and suffer instability because of lack of institutionalized political infrastructure for good governance. The inequality in development may be linked to a great extent to rejection or lack of will to embrace cultural diversity. This state of mind also hampers on the extent and content of sharing of technology and wealth by the developed countries with the lesser developed. The growing disparities of economic development have indeed prompted migration of people of the less developed countries to the wealthier ones. The migrants in many cases were welcomed as they were a source of easy and cheap labour. However, their status in terms of human dignity hardly underwent any marked change. They are still referred to as aliens after fifty years of stay in their new homelands and considered inferior in status. Their access to opportunities provided by the state is limited if not denied totally. I have to note here that most of these migrants are Muslims. On the other hand, the global climate change, including global warming, has a direct relation between culture and development. The major cause of global warming is the high level of carbon dioxide emissions from the industrialized and developed countries to maintain their high living standards. But the paradox here is that the underdeveloped world, which has done nothing to cause the crisis, is paying the price. The rise of the sea level will displace millions that is sure to have disastrous impact on cultural harmony between peoples. Dear Friends, In recent years, religion has become a major, and if I may add, a worrying factor in discrimination of migrants and immigrants. Intolerance of immigrant communities based on religion or faith and their cultural background, have become acute in many parts of the developed world. The Organization of Islamic Cooperation is well aware of this aspect as Muslims have been the principal victims. Such a culture of hate and intolerance is surely not healthy for development. Rather, it is detrimental to development and may hamper growth on a global scale. I do not have to spell out the implications. Even a stray incident has the potential to trigger off a domino effect, one strife leading to another and growing in dimension. As the Secretary General of the OIC, I took this matter to heart and devoted all our efforts to bring the international community to reach a common ground to establish that cultural diversity is conducive to development. The major impediments against this objective are intolerance, negative stereotyping, stigmatization, discrimination, and incitement to violence based on religious beliefs and cultural diversity. To combat these impediments, we need a well structured, practical and comprehensible dialogue, involving all segments of the society to create appropriate confidence building measures of mutual trust and respect and to embrace cultural diversity as an essential vehicle of development. In that respect, the OIC was able to make the first breakthrough by taking the initiative at the UN Human Rights Council earlier this year that resulted in the unanimous and consensual adoption of HRC Resolution 16/18. It is a matter of great satisfaction that we were able to reach yet another milestone on November 15, 2011 when the UN General Assembly in New York adopted the OIC sponsored Resolution again by consensus with some additional positive provisions. Let me conclude by saying that the reality of a multicultural society and the need to live in peace and harmony in such an environment must be understood and appreciated by all. Our societies must be convinced of the benefits that cultural diversity brings to our lives. Once we can do this, we will be able to make great strides in our common quest for developing a culture of peaceful and harmonious cohabitation which will facilitate the cause of development in all its manifestations. I thank you for your attention.
