2nd Congress of Leaders of World and Traditional Religions

Astana City, Kazakhstan

Dibawah kubah piramid moden di Astana City, Kazakhstan, ketua-ketua agama dan pemimpin berhimpun membincangkan isu-isu keselamatan sejagat dibawah kelolaan Presiden Nursultan Nazarbayev. Mencari titik persamaan mungkin agak sukar dengan himpunan manusia yang berbagai akidah dan hatibudi. Namun untuk kesejahteraan sejagat, ia mesti dicuba. Anak jantan yang berani sepatutnya berada disini, mempertahankan ugama dipentas dunia.

Petikan ucapan

Role of religious leaders in strengthening international security

I do not think I can offer much because it is difficult to see a positive role for religious leaders in strengthening international security. This is because for many of the people who virtually rule the world, religions are passe, obsolete and irrelevant.

International security or insecurity does not just happen. There is always a reason, a cause. The cause may be the perception of the affected people of the injustice and oppression that they suffer from or maybe it is because other means to secure justice for themselves have been of no avail. We may think they are wrong but it is what they think that causes them to act. So we have to consider what their perception is or what they think.

The solution to the threat to security must therefore be in the removal of the cause or causes of the alleged injustice.

It is perhaps easy to merely label those who threaten international security as terrorists and to take action to stop them by force of arms. However this will not provide a lasting solution. The elimination of one leader or one group of those who threaten our security will simply result in the emergence of another leader or group. And so it will go on for as long as the causes are not tackled and removed. The frustration and the anger caused by their very failure to obtain what they consider as justice for themselves will spawn even more threats to the security of those they consider to be responsible for their grievances.

We know that the root cause of international insecurity today is the bitterness and anger initially of the palestinians arabs whose land had been taken away from them and they were expelled from their country. They first tried to recover their land through conventional war but they failed and they lost more land. The building of settlements on their land infuriated them more.

To draw attention to their plight they set up a resistance group which attacked enemy tanks with catapults and stones. This was countered with bullets, live bullets. Children were killed and many were wounded. The world saw all these live on tv. Apart from a temporary expression of horror over children being killed and wounded, nothing was done. They threw more stone and more children were shot at and wounded or killed. And the world cared nothing at all.

All religion abhors killings. The religious leaders in the European countries could have applied pressure on their leaders to stop the killing. But they did not. None of the leaders of the countries were advised by their religious leaders to stop the unequal fight between armored tanks with machine guns against children with stones and catapults. The anger and the frustration of these people have reached a level where rationality is no longer possible. Bereft of other weapons they resorted to blowing themselves up and killing innocent people. We should condemn them for this, for killing the innocent people. But then their own people are also being killed indiscriminately. No one cares for these people.

The world must surely see that the strategy of out-terrorizing the terrorists is not working. All that was happening was an escalation in their terror-attacks wherever they can and whenever they can. And now the whole world feels insecure. We are haunted by the fear of being blown out of the sky every time we fly. The world is no longer safe for anyone. We may have the most powerful military forces. We may have the biggest arsenal of nuclear bombs. But all these would not guarantee our security anywhere. We may be walking in the safest places in the world but there is no guarantee that a sniper might not shoot us dead.The only way to ensure security for everyone is to tackle the root causes of the bitterness and anger which is behind the acts against our security. The leaders of the world must strive to remove the causes.

I believe that this problem that we are faced with is caused by leaders of countries who refused to understand the causes underlying the security problem. Or they refuse to admit the real cause. Or they think their armed forces will triumph over those who threaten their security and international security. Clearly these leaders are wrong or are wrongly advised or they refuse to accept the truth. They are the ones who created this problem in the first place. They took other peoples land in order to create a state for someone else. They should give their own land and not what belongs to others in order to solve their problem. These are the initial causes. Perhaps it is not possible to undo what has been done initially. The only people who can stop this aggravation are the leaders of the countries which created the problem initially.

I do not know how religious are the leaders. Many i believe are people who have no faith in religion? They are therefore not likely to respond to the advice of religious leaders. But some leaders i understand have developed a new commitment to religion. With the latter it may be possible for religious leaders to exert some influence to restrain them from aggravating the situation by more aggressive actions.

There is now a belief that other countries should also be attacked and democratized. These are the places which are alleged to be harboring the people threatening international security. The way to deal with the situation is to destroy these countries. This is madness. If these countries are destroyed and their people bombed out of existence, i do not think there will be submission and surrender. The government may, but the people won’t. There will only be more terrorists, more threat to international security.

Religious leaders must understand this. They must strive to stop the folly. Unfortunately we see in some countries religious leaders who are more aggressive than the lay leaders. These religious leaders actually preach hatred for peoples who are not of their faith. These evangelists want to see the annihilations of all their enemies, enemies who are enemies simply because their faith is different. Needless to say we do not need such religious leaders.

We need to see real religious leaders who abide by the true teaching of their religions. They, these religious leaders, should influence the warmongers among the leaders of these aggressive military powers that a military solution is not an option. The religious bodies and their leaders must play a bigger role in the affairs of their countries. They should promote peaceful solutions and not war and violence.

But what about the religious leaders of those who are said to threaten international security. They have a role to play also but it would be quite limited. It would be difficult for them to convince their flocks that they should not indulge in actions that can threaten international security. However they should still be persuaded to use other ways, such as negotiations, arbitration of reference to international courts.

The other thing that they can do is to meet the leaders of other religions to explain and discuss the dilemma that they face. A dialogue between Muslim, Christian and Jewish religious leaders may result in better understanding of the problems of international security caused by acts of terror. The participants must have an open mind and a desire to solve the threat to international security.

If we look at the records it can be seen that international security is not caused by criminals after some personal gains or booty. If they are than they would not want to harm themselves when carrying out their crime. It is easier to deal with these people. But when the act of terror is committed not for personal gain, indeed where the criminal actually welcomes death, than threats of arrest and captivity will not work.

In a case in Malaysia when members of the Japanese red army took hostages, it was possible to negotiate and offer terms. But to fanatics who believe that they are fighting for a cause and are prepared to die doing so the threats of capture and punishment will not work. As you can see religious leaders have some role to play in strengthening international security. But it would be secondary and confine to influencing leaders of governments to recognize the problem and to employ solutions that would not aggravate matters.

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