BAKU, 10 July 2004 — “Terrorism” is holding the Muslim world hostage, Pakistan’s President Pervez Musharraf said yesterday on a visit to the former Soviet republic of Azerbaijan.
But the West must also change its attitude to the Islamic world — and in particular persuade Israel to withdraw from Palestinian territory — if global terrorism is to be defeated, he said.
The Pakistani leader made the remarks in a wide-ranging speech about the challenges facing the Islamic world during his state visit to Azerbaijan, a mainly Muslim state which has forged close links with Islamabad.
“Unfortunately the Islamic world is faced with many problems. It is as if the Islamic world is facing a storm,” the 60-year-old president, speaking through an interpreter, told a special session of the Azeri Parliament.
“It is also unfortunate that terrorism does harm to Muslim countries... The tactics they use, terrorism, car bombs, executions and other dirty methods, damage our great religion. Today they are holding our societies hostage.”
“They must understand that they cannot solve the problems of the Islamic world this way...I call on them to return to the true path.”
But he said the West, and particularly the United States, had to assist the Islamic world in stamping out terrorism.
Western nations could do this by helping Islamic countries develop their economies. The West should also help resolve a series of conflicts in which Muslim communities have found their territory under occuppation, he said.
He listed Pakistan’s dispute with India over Kashmir, Azerbaijan’s lingering conflict with its neighbor Armenia over the enclave of Nagorno-Karabakh and the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.
