"[Israel] continues to be entrenched in its illegal practices of punishing the Palestinian people," Belkeziz said.

Additional Reporting By Kazi Mahmood, IOL Southeast Asia correspondent

PUTRAJAYA, Malaysia, October 11 (IslamOnline.net & News Agencies) - The Organization of the Islamic Conference (OIC) opened their conference Saturday, October 11, opened with a call for "the eviction of foreign forces from Iraq".

"Islamic nations should commit themselves to the eviction of foreign forces from Iraq, allowing the U.N. to administer Iraqi affairs," OIC Secretary General Abdelouahed Belkeziz was quoted by Agence France-Presse (AFP) as saying.

"It is a prelude to the restoration of Iraq's independence, and to the rebuilding of what has been destroyed over the past 20 years, all in accordance with a clear and short time-table," he stressed.

The Iraqi people had "been afflicted by the occupation of their territories, usurpation of their sovereignty, denial of their independence, destruction, plunder and burning of their country," said the Moroccan national, who has been OIC secretary-general since 2001.

Addressing the 10th OIC senior officials preparing for the OIC foreign ministers' meeting on October 14-15 and leaders summit on October 16-17, Belkeziz underlined that the Islamic world had been "in the face of the storm" in the three years since the last full summit of the 57-member organization in 2000.

The global fallout from the September 11, 2001 attacks on the U.S. had seen Afghanistan invaded, Iraq occupied and "the campaign against Islam, the Islamic culture and its adherents gain momentum," he asserted.

Apart from Iraq, the conference is expected to focus on "terrorism, globalization, dialogue among civilizations, campaigns against Islam and Muslims, human rights," said Belkeziz.

The Palestinian issue will also be prominent, as it has been since the founding of the OIC in 1969.

Belkeziz condemned Israel for its failure to live up to peace process commitments.

"It [Israel] continues to be entrenched in its illegal practices of punishing the Palestinian people," he said.

The OIC chief said the pan-Islamic organization will also review the situation in other Muslim countries.

"Others include the situation in Afghanistan, Jammu and Kashmir, the situation of Muslims in Azerbaijan, the Philippines and Somalia as well as the economic situation in the Islamic world," he added.

Turkish Dilemma

However, Turkey's decision to provide troops to Iraq, which is represented in the conference by the U.S.-sanctioned interim Iraqi Governing Council, triggered divisions within the organization.

The head of Iraq's delegation, Riyadh al-Fadhli, told reporters: "We don't like to have any peacekeeping troops from neighboring countries because it might cause problems inside Iraq.

"We have very large commercial and trade relations with Turkey, so we would like to stick to this connection and not have Turkish troops inside Iraq for the time being."

The Iraqi council unanimously opposed the deployment of any Turkish troops, which also  drew criticism from Iraqi Kurds, who suspect Turkey wants to gain a foothold in their northern enclave.

His Turkish counterpart, Tahsin Burcuoglu, countered that Turkish troops would be in Iraq to help the people and "will not be there as part of the occupation."

On opposition to the troop deployment by Iraqi officials, he said: "In Iraq, there is one authority and that is the American authority."

Iraq will be represented by Iyad Allawi, the current head of the Governing Council, despite initial objections by Malaysia on the grounds that the country is still under occupation.

On October 3, Malaysian Foreign Minister Sayed Hamid Albar confirmed that Iraq would be attending the OIC summit as a member, not an observer.

The OIC held an extraordinary summit in Qatar in March this year at which it "totally rejected" the then-anticipated U.S.-led invasion of Iraq, although members Kuwait and Qatar allowed the use of their territory by U.S. troops in the build-up to the war.

Only a handful of Islamic heads of state or government turned up at that one-day meeting.

The OIC summit in Putrajaya, the first to be held in an Islamic country in the Asia Pacific region, will be attended by 35 heads of state and government and the first full OIC summit since the 9-11 attacks on the U.S.

Afghan President Hamid Karzai will attend, along with Saudi Arabian Crown Prince Abdullah bin Abdul Aziz, Iranian President Mohammad Khatami, Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak and Colonel Muammar Qaddafi of Libya.

Russian President Vladimir Putin and Philippine President Gloria Arroyo will be present as observers, while the U.N. will be represented by Secretary-General Kofi Annan.

The OIC came into being at a time of crisis for the Muslim world. It was formed in September 1969, weeks after an arson attack on one of Islam's holiest sites, Al-Aqsa mosque in Al-Quds (occupied Jerusalem), and two years after Israel had occupied the West Bank.