Iran urges global fight against Islamophobia, hatred

New York, IRNA - Iran's chargé d’affaires to the United Nations in a statement called for a global fight against exporters of hateful Takfiri ideologies and Islamophobia.

'In this regards, we need to take a collective and resolute stand against exporters of hateful Takfiri ideologies,' Eshagh Al Habib said addressing the General Assembly session on elimination of racism, racial discrimination, xenophobia and related intolerance - Item 72.

'A global fight against such phenomena, with their abhorrent and evolving forms and manifestations, must be a matter of high priority at the national, regional and international levels,' he added.

The full text of Al Habib’s speech is as follows:

Madam President,

Allow me to begin by expressing my sincere gratitude to H.E. Mevlüt Çavupžlu, Minister of Foreign Affairs of Turkey, for accepting the request to hold the recent emergency Ministerial Meeting in Istanbul. 

I would also like to extend my gratitude to his distinguished colleagues here in New York for skillfully conducting negotiations on the draft resolution entitled 'Combatting terrorism and other acts of violence based on religion or belief' to address the criminal terrorist attack against innocent Muslim worshippers in Christchurch.

Further, I would like to take this opportunity to reiterate our appreciation to the Prime Minister of New Zealand for her compassionate behavior vis-à-vis the victims of this tragedy. 

Given the barbarity of such actions, the Islamic Republic of Iran condemns this terrorist act in the strongest possible terms, offers its deepest sympathies to the families of the victims and wishes a quick recovery for the injured. 

Regretfully, countless human beings continue to be victims of racist, xenophobic and Islamophobic attacks that are contemporary manifestations of ideologies and practices based on the racial or ethnic discrimination of superiority.

These abhorrent incidents are illustrative of the fact that the international community is far behind in attaining the primary objectives to combat terrorism, racism, racial discrimination and related intolerance because, mainly, the root causes of these instances were not adequately addressed. 

In regard to the Christchurch attack, the anti-Muslim literature that the terrorist left behind is similar to the hate speech created in abundance by the mass media of some certain western countries in an obvious contradiction to article 19 and 20 of the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights (ICCPR). 

The ICCPR defines the legal framework in order to prevent the misuse of freedom of speech for propaganda for war or advocacy of national, racial or religious hatred that constitutes incitement to hostility or violence.

Over the last few decades, there has been an unsettling rise of a vast network of xenophobic propaganda outlets masquerading as news platforms, hate groups masquerading as think tanks and even civic groups promoting a hostile and abusive environment against Muslims and other minorities, such as migrants, in the West. 

As a result, we are witnessing a political tolerance to hostility and discrimination as well as an incitement of hate have gained the ground against persons belonging to religious minorities in particular Muslims, in recent years. 

Such efforts to spread this propaganda are enabled by well financed institutions backed by affluent, government-tied tycoons. 

If unchecked, this wicked network of xenophobia, with its socially motivated feelings of hate, has the capacity to undermine the stability of many societies and strain the relationship between States and great religions, thereby jeopardizing international peace and security.

Madam President,

It is essential that, the perpetrators, organizers, financiers and sponsors of these acts of terrorism conducted by members of racist and supremacist groups be held accountable and brought to justice.

We appreciate those Western politicians who condemn racist and white supremacist terrorism in the strongest terms. 

At the opposite end of the spectrum are those officials who encourage Islamophobia, including through such measures as the Muslim travel ban, banning Muslim symbols such as headscarf and Minaret, and the abhorrent use of such ignorant terms as “Islamic terrorism” who should be reproached. 

As a pretext for fanning their Islamophobic extremism, some authorities in the West cite extremist terror groups such as Da’esh and Al-Qaeda as purveyors of Islam, whereas, in reality, they have nothing to do with Islam. In this regards, we need to take a collective and resolute stand against exporters of hateful Takfiri ideologies. 

At the same time, a serious dialogue, should be initiated in order to find ways and means to collectively combat Islamophobia, hate and discrimination. Furthermore, the initiation of innovative and holistic approaches that can both strengthen and enhance the practical and effective measures to combat these devastating evils of humanity with a view to their total elimination must be planned and implemented. A global fight against such phenomena, with their abhorrent and evolving forms and manifestations, must be a matter of high priority at the national, regional and international levels.

Thank you, Madam President.

West’s claims to leadership exposed in Durban

Editor

Being powerful is one thing — being powerful, respected and popular is entirely different and altogether more difficult. The US’s position as the dominant power in the world is now widely recognised, as is its freedom to do as it pleases, virtually anywhere in the world, with scant regard even for its Western allies, let alone anyone else. Equally clear is its ability to manipulate international institutions such as the UN to legitimise its actions, despite the principles that these institutions claim to uphold. Its insistence on maintaining genocidal economic sanctions and murderous military operations against Iraq is a case in point; another is its support for zionist expansionism in the heart of the Muslim world, along with all the repression and brutality that go with it.

Such power may appear impressive, yet its visibility is a sign of the West’s weakness. The most effective power is exercised discreetly, leaving its victims grateful rather than resentful. The West is well aware of this, hence its attempts to hide its true nature behind a facade of democracy, human rights, freedom and other fine-sounding principles, along with a massive public relations façade designed to dazzle the world with a portrayal of the West as a haven of everything good in life. The Western drive has been not only to dominate all societies, but also to make people believe that the West is a force for good in the world, while all the problems and evils must be someone else’s fault.

Being powerful is one thing — being powerful, respected and popular is entirely different and altogether more difficult.

The West’s failure to achieve this was demonstrated at the UN World Conference Against Racism, Racial Discrimination, Xenophobia and Related Forms of Intolerance (WCAR) in Durban earlier this month. Such events are usually opportunities for the West to polish its credentials as a champion of the world’s masses. This time, the world’s resentment of US arrogance was such that Washington was glad of the excuse to withdraw early from the fray as a ‘matter of principle’ because its blood brother Israel was coming under sustained attack for zionism’s inherent racism, its oppression of the Palestinians, and its expansionism. Many observers recognised that this was mostly a fig-leaf to cover its desire to evade condemnation for the West’s enslavement of black Africans; fewer realised that this condemnation also extended to the West’s continuing economic exploitation of the non-Western world.

That this resentment was expressed largely by criticism of Israel is significant, however. Nowhere else in the world today is the West so brazenly involved in the dispossession, exploitation and repression of a non-Western people. What people see happening in Palestine now is what people all over the world recognise as having happened to themselves in the past, and which, in most cases, is still continuing in a different form. The US would not dare to take on an enemy so directly today; instead it uses proxies, many of them suborned members of subject peoples, to do its dirty work while it claims to champion human rights and democratic principles. Israel, however, is now recognised as the embodiment of every political evil that the West claims to abhor; the West’s unreserved support for it betrays its own true nature. The centrality of the Palestine issue in Durban was indicative of the extent to which the Palestinians’ resistance to Israel has come to symbolise anti-Westernism generally.

This anti-Western sentiment was initially generated not by governments, which are vulnerable to Western pressure, but by non-governmental organizations (NGOs) meeting in Durban before the conference proper; their success in defying the West made it easier for governments to do the same. Notably, these NGOs were both non-western and western; the fact that awareness of the nature of the West is growing even in the West is particularly worrying to the powers that be: hence their increasing repression of domestic opposition, such as the anti-globalization movement.

The West is a behemoth of immense power but, like all oppressors, it is creating the seeds of its own downfall. History can sometimes move very quickly; witness the collapse of communism barely a decade ago. One day soon, the West’s failure to win over the hearts and minds of world’s people, and its growing dependence on naked force to maintain its position, will be recognised as fatal weaknesses. Future historians may come to regard the uprising against zionism in Palestine in 2000-01, and the revolt against US hegemony at the UN conference in Durban in 2001, as key points in the West’s decline.