Muslims in Southeast Asia need enlightenment

Muslims in Southeast Asia need enlightenment

Muslims in Southeast Asia in general are tolerant and
moderate. Therefore they need to be helped in maintaining this
tradition. In a conversation with The Jakarta Post's Kornelius
Purba, Dr. Surin Pitsuwan, during the recent Asian Statesmen
Forum in Bali, shared his view about Islam based on his
experience as a Thai Muslim and former Thai foreign minister.
Surin, an advisor to the Geneva-base Henry Dunant Centre, also
talked about the situation in Aceh.

Question: What is your view about Islam in Southeast Asia?

Answer: In general, Muslims in Southeast Asia are tolerant,
moderate, and very accommodating, partly because when Islam came
to this part of the world, the region was already very much
influenced by other cultures and civilizations of the east, like
Hinduism and Buddhism. And therefore the Muslims were in a
position to make accommodations; to interact, to adapt and adopt
various ideas, values, and practices, so long as that did not
contradict drastically with the cardinal principal of Islamic
faith, for example the idea of one God, the idea of practicing
the ritual and tradition, rules and the declaration of Islam.

And people in the region themselves are very accommodating and
flexible, so there had been experiences of mutual accommodation,
mutual respect. The end result is that Muslims in Southeast Asia
are quite ready to accommodate changes to adopt new ideas, new
approaches to their own problems, problems of globalization,
problems of modernity, living with each other in an environment
of diversity. This is the uniqueness of Muslims in this region.

Q: Has that situation remained after Sept. 11?

A: After the Sept. 11 tragedy, there was much concern of how to
engage the Islamic world, and ... we offer a very unique
opportunity. In the past the Muslims, the Arabs, had contributed
to the evolution, the transformation of Europe. The wisdom of the
Greeks was kept alive and flourished, and was nurtured,
reinterpreted by the Arabs, by Muslim scholars, and then passed
on to the West, to Europe during the dark ages. And the result
was renaissance. Later on of course reform, enlightenment, the
industrial revolution and many other things.

I think now the reverse could happen; the developed part of
the world, west or east, could also help the Muslim community,
especially in Southeast Asia, because it is ready, it is
flexible. You begin here and try to support this effort for
reform, revival, efforts for a true renaissance. In the past
three decades you have seen a lot of crisis of resurgences of the
Muslims. And that was a reaction from the Islam side to much
pressure from outside, pressures for globalization, pressures for
changes, for modernity.

But now the real renaissance could be conceived with the
support of a more developed world, which has benefited from
Muslims in the past; so to achieve a true renaissance to
development, to science and technology through human resources
development. I'd love to see that. It will certainly help reduce
the high level of mutual ignorance, mutual understanding,
distrust and confidence, among the two communities; that is
between the developed part of the world and Muslims.

Q: How about Muslim terrorist links in this region?

A: The real roots of this violence is the lack of engagement with
globalization because of the lack of education, lack of
opportunity. So this problems is internal, internally generating,
internally caused. But it does not mean that the outside
community does not have a role to play. There is no direct
relation may be, between poverty and terrorism, but certainly,
poverty and the lack of opportunity and quality to benefit all
changes that are taking place, contribute to the frustration.

The competition is very fierce; you need to prepare yourself
for competition. If you fail to compete, what can you do? If are
you are denied the opportunity, you can be frustrated. (Then) you
are likely to fall victim to other forces. That could be drugs,
violence, other forms of transnational crime. You are engaged in
shady activities, like human trafficking, gambling, extortion, or
any kind that would allow them to at least in a way compensate
for the lack of opportunity.

The argument that poverty has nothing to do with terrorism is
problematic, because the next logical steps (would be that) the
world has no concern or sense of responsibility to help in the
eradication of poverty. So you have to be very careful, to use
the argument that it is nothing to do with poverty, that you
therefore can keep them languishing in poverty without any
responsibility. That is very dangerous, and makes the world very
divisive.

Q: Do you have any particular feelings as a Muslim in
predominantly Buddhist Thailand?

A: Thailand is a Buddhist majority country, but it is very open,
and accommodating. The King is supreme patron of all religions,
he is the figure head and the patron of all communities. The
space is unlimited for everybody to make a contribution, to play
a role in the economic and political life of the country. As a
Muslim I have found that there is no limit as long as you are
qualified, you can compete, no problem.

Q: As an advisor to the Henry Dunant Center, how do you see the
situation in Aceh?

A: I think the commitment from both sides, the Indonesian
government and the GAM (Free Aceh Movement) has been progressive,
in the sense that rather than using force and oppression as the
means to solve the problem, both sides have agreed to use dialog.
We are on the right trick. I am very honored to be a part of this
dialog process; respecting the internal nature of affairs of
Indonesia, the Henry Dunant Center is only helping to facilitate
the dialog process ...

We are not mediators or negotiators. It is the parties who are
talking with the facilitation of the center. The four of us,
including U.S. Gen. (ret.) Anthony Zinni, the "Four Wise Men",
are helping the Center. But I think the dialog process is moving
ahead ... And we hope that some effective and sustainable
resolution will be found.

Q: What are the most delicate problems in Aceh?

A: Again this is an internal matter. But as long as both sides
realize that violence is not the way to solve the problem, it is
a good beginning. It is an issue of mutual confidence,
development, poverty reduction and cooperation.

Q: How about human rights problems?

A: That is the issue that both sides have to discuss. The issue
has been very much on the priority list of both sides, and that
is the consequence of violence. Both sides realize that they have
made efforts to reduce violence, and must create mutual
confidence.