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APEC Forges Anti-Terrorism Consensus, Muslim Nations Urge End to Attacks
SHANGHAI, Oct 18 (IslamOnline & News Agencies) - Pacific Rim nations on Thursday agreed to intensify common efforts to fight terrorism in talks attended by U.S. Secretary of State Colin Powell, although Muslim member countries urged a speedy end to attacks on Afghanistan.
Foreign ministers of the 21-member Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC) forum finalized a historic anti-terrorism declaration to be issued at a weekend APEC summit due to be attended by U.S. President George W. Bush.
Bush arrived in Shanghai Thursday evening for the summit and a heavy program of bilateral meetings, aiming to consolidate the global anti-terror coalition.
Chinese Foreign Minister Tang Jiaxuan told reporters the ministers had agreed at a breakfast meeting that APEC leaders would call for countries to choke off terrorist funds and bolster the role of the United Nations in the anti-terror fight.
"The fight against terrorism is a fight between good and evil, and a trial of strength between civilization and barbarity, rather than a conflict among different ethnic groups, religions or cultures," he quoted ministers as agreeing.
The statement will be the first separate declaration on a political matter issued by APEC, which normally confines its discussions to trade and economic topics.
Powell said ministers agreed the terrorist attacks represented "a new threat against our economies, against the civilized world, and we have to respond."
"I was pleased in our meetings this morning there was a uniform understanding of this basic concept," he said.
He acknowledged expressions of hope among other countries that the military campaign would end soon, but he said it was necessary to "root out" the terrorists and to punish the Taliban regime.
The United States has stressed that its campaign against Afghanistan launched after the September 11th attacks on New York and Washington was not a war on Islam. But Muslim-dominated APEC members Indonesia and Malaysia have expressed opposition to an extended military operation.
Malaysian Foreign Minister Syed Hamid Albar said Malaysia wanted the U.S. to review its campaign of strikes against the Taliban regime.
He said he told the breakfast meeting that U.S. attacks should be ended "as soon as possible".
"Indonesia is more forthright. It said it is very dangerous for Muslim countries if the military action is protracted until the fasting month where the emotions of Muslims are heightened and this can cause a lot of problems," Syed Hamid said.
The Muslim holy month of Ramadan, during which Muslims worldwide will fast from sunrise to sunset, is due to start in mid-November and stretch thirty days into the winter.
Malaysian International Trade and Industry Minister Rafidah Aziz added that the U.S. campaign was not achieving its goals.
"Obviously these have not received the desired results because no terrorists have been harmed, no real terrorist network has been disbanded except for the Taliban, and they have not been able to reach out to their targets," he said.
Taliban and Western sources differ widely on the number of civilians killed so far, because Western journalists cannot move around in the Taliban-controlled territories under attack, but Western sources have confirmed the destruction of a U.N. demining agency, in which four Afghan staff were killed, and the destruction of two Red Cross food storage warehouses, in which one staff member was injured.
The U.S. has also admitted that one of its bombs fell on a civilian area near Kabul, but the Taliban says that in one destroyed village nearly 200 civilians were killed, and that more than 400 have been killed so far in the campaign.
"The people who are dead are innocent people," Rafidah said.
The ministers did not discuss the current wave of anthrax scares during the talks lasting one hour and 20 minutes, a Japanese foreign ministry official said.
APEC groups Australia, Brunei, Canada, Chile, China, Hong Kong, Indonesia, Japan, South Korea, Malaysia, Mexico, New Zealand, Papua New Guinea, Peru, the Philippines, Russia, Singapore, Taiwan, Thailand, the U.S. and Vietnam.
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