Daily Times

The Kuala Lumpur summit has made fault lines in the Muslim world very obvious and visible and instead of providing unity it has divided countries into certain blocs. The summit, though attended by more than 420 officials, scholars and leaders from the entire Muslim world, sans Saudi Arabia, Pakistan and the UAE, has created a Malaysia-Turkey-Iran-Qatar bloc, challenging the hegemony of Saudi Arabia-led KSA-UAE-Arab countries bloc. The summit is significant for Pakistan as it was embarrassingly forced by Saudi Arabia to stay away from the event. The summit was the brainchild of Malaysian Prime Minister Mahathir Mohamad, Turkish President Tayyip Erdogan and Prime Minister Imran Khan mainly to fight Islamophobia and to “do something” to improve the lives of Muslims. Good intentions, however, are not more powerful than petro-dollar lending countries’ egos and power politics. The four-day summit will “…find a way to address our shortcomings, our dependency on non-Muslims to protect ourselves against the enemies of Islam,” said Mahathir. The most pressing issues that can be discussed at the gathering are the Muslims of India, Kashmir, Palestine, Yemen, Syria, Rohingyas and Uighurs. It is yet to be seen after Pakistan’s pullout if Kashmir will be discussed or not. Earlier, in the UN General Assembly, it were only Malaysia, Turkey and Iran which spoke in support of Kashmiris but Pakistan’s financial constraints and Saudi Arabia’s stubbornness have marred the spirit of the Kuala Lumpur summit.

Saudi Arabia’s main problems — Iranian President Hassan Rouhani, Qatari Emir Sheikh Tamim bin Hamid Al-Thani and Turkish President Tayyip Erdogan -graced the Kuala Lumpur gathering. Though Mahathir has tried to water down KSA’s fear of being diplomatically isolated, King Salman still says the right forum to discuss issues of the world’s 1.75 billion Muslims is the Organisation of Islamic Cooperation (OIC). A close look at the OIC’s dismal performance shows that at one point, it excluded Iran from the concluding remarks, and at another time, the Saudi-led military alliance skipped Iran, Iraq and Syria from the coalition. While Saudi Arabian policies are predominantly sectarian, and not pro-Muslim, the Malaysian summit aims at discussing the state of affairs of the Muslims, not religion or religious affairs. Right now, millions of Muslims are under oppression, incarcerated or detained, and displaced to European countries due to conflicts.

It is hoped that the Kuala Lumpur summit would forge a powerful coalition meant to work for the welfare of the Muslims. The new alliance should also reach out to Saudi Arabia for greater unity. Meanwhile, Pakistan should also think independently, as it did on the Yemen issue.   *