New York : Bringing the United Nations Security Council’s (UNSC) attention to the rise of right-wing extremists and fascist movements, Pakistan has decried the “dangerous stigmatisation of Islam and Muslims”.”It is not understandable, and is indeed unacceptable, that every name on the Security Council’s terrorism lists is Muslim, while terrorists and violent extremists elsewhere escape scrutiny. There is no non-Muslim in the lists,” Pakistan’s UN Ambassador Asim Iftikhar said during a UNSC meeting on “Threats to international peace & security caused by terrorist acts”.
Urging the need to make adequate changes to the sanctions regimes to incorporate new and emerging threats, envoy Iftikhar called for an “end to the stigmatisation of Islam and Muslims”.”We must accept the reality. There has been a surge in the emergence of right-wing, extremist and fascist movements in several countries and regions of the world, leading to terrorist violence.
“Yet, we see a strong inclination to see acts by non-Muslims not as terrorism, but often described just as violent crime,” remarked the Pakistan envoy.The diplomat further highlighted that the existing situation contradicted both the UN and UNSC’s stated position that terrorism is a global phenomenon and it cannot and should not be associated with any religion, nationality, civilisation or ethnic group.