PM vows campaign against Islamophobia, blasphemy
islamabad — Prime Minister Imran Khan on Friday vowed to mobilise leaders of Muslim countries to make the Western world understand the feelings of Muslims over the blasphemy issue.
“We are 1.25 billion Muslims. Why can’t we do that? I feel sad to say that it is a great failure of Muslim leaders. I will run a campaign. I will contact Muslim leaders. I am sure, if we collectively make them understand that … disrespect of the Holy Prophet (peace be upon him) is the worst for us,” he said while addressing a conference held to mark birthday of Holy Prophet Muhammad (peace be upon him).
Referring to the Jewish community, the prime minister said despite being small in number Jews had managed to make denial of Holocaust a crime in some Western countries because it hurt them.
Khan said the Islamic world would have to tell the West that irrespective of the fact that thousands of Muslims had been killed in Afghanistan, Syria and Libya, the blasphemy hurt them far more than loss of their lives.
The prime minister told the audience that Pakistan would lead the campaign as he had already wrote letters to Muslim leaders around the world for a joint action.
He said consequent to such incidents, Muslims living in the West suffered the most as they were attacked, veiled women were shouted at and even mosques were desecrated.
The prime minister said that unlike Muslims, the Western society was very casual about their religion.
They even produced funny movies about their religious personalities, which was incomprehensible for Muslims, he added.
He recalled that after assuming the office he had also raised the issue of Islamophobia at the Organisation of Islamic Cooperation (OIC) summit and urged Muslims leaders to take a collective position to stop the phenomenon from growing further.
He said it was essential to tell the Western countries, the European Union and the United Nations about the reverence and sensitivity the Muslims show to their religion.
The prime minister said in fact a very small segment in the West wanted to exploit the Muslims’ sentiments and provoke the West against them through such tactics. The very “dangerous” segment called the Muslims’ reaction as violation of their freedom of expression and democracy. —