‘EU cannot stay separate from terrorism after supplying NATO troops’

Speakers criticise association of 'extremists' to Muslims, South Asians and Pakistanis

KARACHI: The European Union cannot claim they separated from the phenomenon of terrorism in the world after it supplies troops to the NATO, said former senator and federal information minister Javed Jabbar.

He was speaking at a session titled 'The Casual Relationship Between Factors Responsible for Extremism and Radicalisation' at the International Conference on Issues of Radicalisation in Migrant Urban Societies: A Comparative Assessment of Pakistan and Europe' on Wednesday. The conference was arranged by the Area Study Centre for Europe and the Hanns Seidel Foundation at the Royal Rodale Club.

The Western media connects the word extremist to Muslims, South Asians and to Pakistani's but rather it is a part of the human DNA, claimed Jabbar. He cited the example of the man in India who was killed allegedly for storing beef in his house. This was an example of how his neighbours turned 'extremists', Jabbar pointed out.

Jabbar admitted that there are some Muslims who have been involved in crimes, such as those who killed the first three caliphs. But those who dropped atomic bombs on Hiroshima and Nagasaki were not Muslims, he pointed out. He suggested carrying out a census to count the number of extremists living in Pakistan. "Around 98 per cent of the people of Pakistan are not extremists," he said. Due to the presence of a few hundred or thousand militants, we cannot ethnically profile all militants as Pakistanis, he added.

For the resident representative of Hanns Seidel Foundation, Kristof W Duwaerts, Pakistan's issue is externalising its problems by accusing others of causing them.

Rafiuzzaman Siddiqui, the foreign ministry's additional secretary for Europe, explained how Pakistan is committed to fighting terrorism. Pakistan's policy of countering terrorists has its origins in the country's foreign policy, which shares the agenda of world peace, he said.

Europe and militancy

The main problem that Europe still faces is that of migrants and people coming to seek asylum, said Duwaerts. Where Europe was standing at the end of WWII and where it stands today shows the success that European countries have gained, he said. French writer and philosopher Olivier Mongin pointed out that around 800 French jihadists are in Syria working for the Islamic State (IS). "A study on the usage of internet in France suggested that there are 370 jihadi websites, 41,000 pro-IS tweets emerging from France every day and around three million people in France are following Facebook pages that favour jihadi elements." During his speech, which was in French and was being translated into English, Mongin shared that nearly 30 per cent of the French citizens who are joining jihadi forces are recent converts to Islam.

Way forward

Governments can form strategies, such as Pakistan's National Action Plan, to deal with militancy and extremism but it won't be a success unless the youth are engaged, said Dr Shoaib Ahmed, a development consultant who spoke on the challenges of governance in megacities.

In his keynote speech, European Union delegation to Pakistan's acting head Stefano Gatto reiterated the EU's commitment towards helping Pakistan empower its women, the media, and bringing changes in the education set-up. European countries respect the culture of people coming to the EU, and even after the 9/11 incident, Muslims were free to practice their religion and build mosques, he pointed out, adding that only those Muslims were expelled who were preaching against democracy and freedom.  According to Gatto, the only way to solve radicalisation in urban migrant societies is opening jobs and investing on education.

Published in The Express Tribune, October 8^th, 2015.