Mahathir asserts role as Islamic leader, warns west on terrorism

Mahathir asserts role as Islamic leader, warns west on terrorism

Agencies, Kuala Lumpur

Prime Minister Mahathir Mohamad asserted his role as leader of an
"Islamic state" on Thursday, and warned Muslim terrorism would
not end until there was justice for the Palestinians.

In a two-hour address to the annual assembly of his United
Malays National Organization (UMNO), the veteran Southeast Asian
leader launched a double-barreled attack on both Islamic
extremists and Western "panic" over terrorism.

"We are sure that the principal cause of the terrorism by
Muslims is their anger against Israel, the seizure of Palestinian
land by Western powers in order to create the state of Israel,"
he said.

"If terrorism is to be stopped then the injustice and the
oppression of Israel against Palestine and its people must be
stopped quickly first."

Mahathir, 76, said that faced with the unprecedented threat of
terrorism after the Sept. 11 attacks on the United States "the
big powers appear to have panicked and lost their direction".

"Unused to handling attacks by terrorists they resorted to
conventional warfare."

Afghanistan was attacked, although the September 11 terrorists
were not Afghans, and many innocent people, including women and
children were killed, he said.

"But terrorism has not been stopped. The big powers continue
to live in a state of war because they believe that at any time
the terrorists will attack again."

Defeating the Taliban rulers in Afghanistan had not been
effective in the fight against terrorism, Mahathir said.

"Actually the possibility of terror attacks has increased
because Israel, which oppresses Palestine, used the war against
terrorism to upgrade its terror attacks against the
Palestinians."

Mahathir also told his party's congress that Malaysia's
constitution will not be changed to declare the country an
Islamic state, saying it is already run on Muslim principles.

The statement could ease fears among this Southeast Asian
nation's large non-Muslim minority -- mostly ethnic Chinese and
Indians who follow Christianity, Buddhism or Hinduism -- that
Mahathir wishes to impose an Islamic regime.

The issue is connected to Mahathir's efforts to compete with
his party's main opponents, the fundamentalist Pan-Malaysia
Islamic Party, or PAS, for support among Malay Muslims, who
comprise about 60 percent of the country's 23 million people.

"The debate on Malaysia as a Muslim country need not go on,"
Mahathir said. "There is no necessity to amend the constitution
to make Malaysia a Muslim country."

The constitution, in effect since independence from Britain in
1957, enshrines Islam as the country's official religion but
guarantees a secular government.

Mahathir's UMNO party has formed the core of every government
since independence. Malaysia's politics are based largely on
race, and UMNO rules with Chinese and Indian junior partners in a
coalition.

The fundamentalists made large gains in elections in 1999, a
year after Mahathir alienated many Malay Muslims by firing and
jailing his popular deputy, Anwar Ibrahim.

Support for the fundamentalist PAS has ebbed since Sept. 11.
Authorities have arrested scores of suspected Islamic extremists
-- some of them PAS members -- for alleged involvement in groups
plotting terror attacks and seeking to establish a hardline state
in Muslim areas of Southeast Asia.