Contents

Speech by

Mr. Amr Moussa

Secretary General of the League

of Arab States

In the Name of ALLAH, the Most Gracious, the Most Merciful;

Excellencies,

Ladies and gentlemen,

It is a great pleasure for me to participate in this symposium that addresses the issue of human cultures and civilizations and calls for moving from dialogue to alliance. It is indeed very important to reach that moment where civilizations would join into an alliance for the benefit of humanity, as it was rightly called for by Spanish Prime Minister, Mr Zapatero. However, I believe that we are still going through the phase of conflict; we have not moved yet towards the phase of real dialogue, which is essential for building an alliance.

Yet, let me first of all salute a great man who has adopted significant and firm positions on behalf of the Muslims in the face of the unprecedented attack against Islam, both as a culture and as a religion, as well as against Muslims, both as a community and as a nation.

I greet and welcome Dr. Mahathir Mohamad; I also praise his valuable speech as well as his productive attitudes, which represent the conscience of the whole Ummah. He is the one who led Malaysia towards the strong position it currently enjoys; a position that made his country an example to be followed not only by the countries of the Islamic world, but among third world countries as well. I would like also to salute Mr. Ekmeleddin Ihsanoglu, the Secretary General of the Organization of the Islamic Conference, who is working very hard to prepare this important Organization to be the platform and focal point in the field of protecting the legitimate interests of Muslims.

Ladies and gentlemen,

I am sure that this gathering of intellectuals is following with great concern the situation of conflict among civilizations that is continuously fanned and whose thrust is directed against Islam both as a religion and a civilization. As you all know, the issue of the conflict among civilizations and the drawing up of a policy meant to demonize Islam, was not a mere result of the September 11 events; in fact, it came together with the end of the Cold War at the end of the eighties of the last century. To refresh our memories, let’s go back to what two western political scientists wrote about the future of the relationship between western and Islamic civilizations.

Barry Buzan, a Professor in many American and British universities, wrote in 1991 about “The Real Policy in the New World”, where he gave account of potential new types of global security in the XXI century. He found out that the identity that is likely to clash with the West is the Islamic civilization because of values differences and historical rivalry. He added that global security in the XXI century will be governed by the clash between civilisational identities, a clash he named the social cold war between the West and Islam.

A few years later, Samuel Huntington came up with his famous thesis in 1993 entitled “The Clash of Civilizations”. This thesis was full of false representations about the history of the relations between civilizations and nations. Mohammad Abed Al Jabri, the eminent Moroccan intellectual, commented on that thesis and said that Huntington elaborated his unreliable concept relying on an aggressive flawed idea about the inevitability of the conflict between the West which believes in democracy, and the other civilizations which, allegedly, reject democracy, headed by the Islamic civilization.

Thus, towards the end of the XX century, the spark of a new clash with Muslims and Islam, as a civilization, a policy and a value system, was ignited once again. Ever since, the conflict has never waned, despite all the symposia and conferences we see and even attend to, and which stress the importance of dialogue and the necessity of alliance. In fact, reality does not, by any means, suggest that the poisonous idea of clash has changed, that the policy it produced has been amended, or that a truce between the parties involved was declared. It is yet to be established whether or not dialogue has become the agenda of the relations between these two contending civilizations, i.e. Islamic and Western civilizations.

Ladies and gentlemen,

Any researcher seeking to explore this critical issue will find out that it is a political conflict that has no bearing on the cults, the teachings or the foundations of religions. Indeed, it is relative to the attitudes to be taken with regard to some key issues that interest the victor in the cold war; issues that may have to do with redrawing the world map and creating a new international order away from the one that came about in the aftermath of the Second World War. That system is also based on another theory (the end of history) which holds that western civilization will score a conclusive victory over whoever challenged it during the XX century. Accordingly, Islamic civilization and its values do not fit in the framework that the victorious civilization wants to draw for the XXI century. Those theories have never considered that a good management of differences between civilizations can generate a positive tendency based on the intellect and complementarity of work instead of fabricating a conflict where the great loser will be the whole humanity. In fact, the civilization which considers itself as the winner during this phase has rather yielded to some calls to extremism from within, in order to assess its policies on a basis of double standards and disregard not only of law, but of the principles of human rights themselves. As Dr. Mahathir previously mentioned, this civilization has breached the rules of justice under the pretence of serving Justice, and has disregarded on many occasions the foundations of democracy pretending to consolidate and spread democracy. This has led to an abject failure in dealing with the Palestinian issue and preserving the rights of the Palestinian people because of the repulsive bias and the hostile attitude with regard to the rights of Arabs.

As Dr. Mahathir pointed out, war has to be banned, incriminated and forbidden. However, some people are striving to enlarge the scope of wars and to find new reasons to wage them, invoking such concepts as preemptive and preventive wars. This is a matter of great concern considering the degradation into which the new world order will be heading.

As to disarmament, we are suprised to find out that while fervent attempts are made to prevent some countries from enjoying their right to the peaceful use of nuclear power, others are allowed to possess nuclear weapons, following an irrational policy that should be thwarted.

In this regard, I do not dismiss our responsibility and our mistakes. Indeed, our societies suffer from backwardness, our development policies prove such inefficiency, our educational institutions are so weak, our policies so timid, and we lack the needed will to reform …

It is high time to be honest and take up the responsibility we missed to abide by. Let us decide that it is time – not too late – to launch a real and full reform system in the whole Islamic world. This system should be founded on reform, development and modernization of all aspects of Muslims’ contemporary life; it should also be based on reconstructing the individual Muslim so that he plays his full role as a partner in leading humanity in this new century, in building the new international order, consolidating its foundations and fixing its landmarks.

A strong reaction from our side should not only consist in issuing declarations, taking decisions, giving lectures or suggesting a reserved dialogue. All these initiatives might be useful; however, the real action that should be taken is to start off a real and daring reform process, a process that sets the XXI century, that is the XV century of the Hegira, as the century of reform, the century of development. This vision also entails that Islam and Muslims would not only embark on the globalization train, but they will participate in its control. This is not because it is a right we claim or because we pride ourselves on a past civilization, but because it is part of our firm belief in the fundamentals of our religion. This also stems from our unshakable will to live up to our time, to participate in the new world’s civilization and in the process of embracing the future on equal foot with the other civilizations with whom we should not seek to clash but rather to interact and coexist for the benefit of humankind as a whole.

I am calling upon this symposium and upon the great men of culture, arts and sciences here, I call upon ISESCO and ALESCO as well as the great bodies they represent, to suggest and draw up, in collaboration with UNESCO, a program or many programs dealing with the development and modernization of all fields of life: democracy, freedom, Human Rights, fields of sciences and arts, education, publishing, translation… etc. This is a battle to be fought for many years if not decades, and the implementation of such programs should be divided into short, medium and long term objectives. It is through this structured development that the clash of civilizations can end up by defeating the forces of evil and negativism, and letting the forces of good and objectivity to emerge, launching not only a dialogue but an interaction between the parties, on an equal basis. Only then would the call to move from dialogue to alliance become authentic and really achievable. Indeed, alliance can exist only between civilizations that are competitive in their powers, equal in their abilities and united in their wills. Their assets are a dynamic present and a future that is mostly oriented towards an ever-evolving science and modernized thought, and well-equipped with insightful visions.

I would like to seize this occasion to salute the initiative of the Spanish Prime Minister about alliance of civilizations; an initiative that aims to gather an international political consensus about many practical and realistic procedures that the United Nations is to implement on behalf of all nations. The objective of this initiative furthered by Spain and Turkey is to consolidate communication and understanding channels between the different peoples of the world in order to assert religious and human diversity and the possibilities of coexistence, which open wide doors towards a full improvement of Islamic civilization with all its ramifications. Yet, this is possible only through our firm commitment and by achieving the progress I mentioned earlier.

Ladies and gentlemen,

Finally, let me express my greetings to President Zine El Abidine Ben Ali for extending his patronage to this symposium as well as for his insightful opening speech. I would also like to express my thanks and appreciation to my brother Dr. Abdulaziz Othman Altwaijri, the Director General of the Islamic Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization, and to my brother Mohammad El Aziz Ben Achour, Minister of Culture and Preservation of Heritage in the Tunisian Republic who gave us the opportunity to gather on the soil of this dynamic country to discuss the role of human cultures and civilizations in building a better, more stable and more communicative world.

I wish every success to the symposium.

Wassalamu alaïkum warahmatu Allah wabarakatuh.

Publications of the Islamic Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization

-ISESCO- 1428H/2007 A.D