Pakistan PM Khan urges Muslims to combat blasphemy, Islamophobia in the West

Pakistani Prime Minister Imran Khan said the Islamic world needed to do more to explain to the West why Muslims feel great pain when the Prophet Muhammad is insulted.
2 min read
02 June, 2019
Sensitivity was lacking when it came to discussing the Quran or the Prophet Muhammad [Getty]
Pakistani Prime Minister Imran Khan said on Saturday that the Islamic world needed to do more to explain to the West why Muslims feel great pain when the Prophet Muhammad is insulted.

Addressing the 57-nation Organization of Islamic Cooperation in Mecca, he called on summit leaders to make clear that it was not acceptable for people to use freedom of expression as a justification for ridiculing Islam.

Khan said the Jewish community had been successful in explaining why diminishing the Holocaust was a sensitive issue for Jews.

But he said such sensitivity was lacking when it came to discussing the Quran or the Prophet Muhammad.

The Organisation of Islamic Cooperation (OIC) meeting, the third and final Iran-focused summit in the holy city of Mecca this week, also denounced controversial US moves to transfer its embassy to Jerusalem and recognise Israel's sovereignty over the Golan Heights.

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The summit, marked by the notable absence of Iranian and Turkish leaders, called for a "boycott" of countries that have opened diplomatic missions in the city.

The OIC's statement comes as Trump's son-in-law Jared Kushner prepares to roll out economic aspects of his long-awaited Middle East peace plan at a conference in Bahrain later this month.

The plan, which has been heavily talked up by Trump and dubbed his "deal of the century", has already been rejected by the Palestinians, who say the president's policies have shown him to be overwhelmingly biased in favour of Israel.