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Afghan Regime Firm On Destroying Statues As Hindus Burn Qur'an
contributions by Ayub Khan for IslamOnline
KABUL, March 5 (IslamOnline & News Agencies) - Taliban chief Mulla Mohammad Omar used the Eid-al-Adha festival Monday to urge the Muslim world to support the destruction of ancient Buddhist icons and unite behind his vision of Islam as Hindus in India burned copies of the Holy Qur'an.
Omar, the reclusive war veteran and "Islamic scholar", said the annihilation of Buddhist statues in Afghanistan would proceed despite vehement international condemnation and protests from Islamic states.
He said the statues, including the giant ancient Buddhas in the central province of Bamiyan, were only "one percent" of Afghanistan's historical heritage. Omar also dismissed the global outcry as a "drama" which should be transparent to Muslims with "common sense."
"Now that we are destroying false idols, the world has made a drama out of this. The Muslims of the world, particularly Afghan Muslims, should use their common sense," the Taliban militia's Radio Shariat quoted him as saying.
"I would like to ask you, do you prefer to be called statue-destroyers or statue-sellers?"
Omar last week ordered his followers to destroy all statues in Afghanistan, including the country's precious pre-Islamic figures, to prevent idolatry in line with a fatwa (religious decree) from local clerics.
His comments at the start of the three-day Islamic holiday Monday came a day after UNESCO special envoy Peirre Lafrance apparently failed to persuade the Afghan leadership to reverse their decision.
U.N. officials in neighboring Pakistan said Lafrance was still in the militia's southern bastion of Kandahar but it was not known if talks with the Taliban were continuing. Foreign Minister Wakil Ahmad Mutawakel said after meeting Lafrance in Kandahar Sunday that he could see no reason to stop the destruction, the private Afghan Islamic Press reported.
"I do not see any chance to change our decision and stop the demolition of these statues," he was quoted as saying. Governments across the globe, political and economic groupings such as the United Nations and the Group of Eight, and religious leaders including the Dalai Lama have appealed to the Taliban to rethink.
The Islamic world has also expressed its indignation, notably Pakistan, one of only three countries that recognize the Taliban regime, and its closest ally. Messages from Islamic states and religious leaders have stressed that tolerance for other religions is a basic tenet of Islam.
But Omar, known as Amir-ul-Momenin (King of the Faithful) in Taliban circles, said the issue was clear-cut and people of other faiths should not influence Muslims. "I would like to ask the world Muslims not to harmonize their voices with those of non-believers," he said. "The [non-Muslims] want to rob Islam of its spirit."
Taliban officials have said the "work" on the statues is nearly complete, with more than two-thirds of the thousands of historic figures in the country already smashed. They said the huge Bamiyan Buddhas, which stand 50 meters (165 feet) and 34.5 meters tall, were attacked with rockets and shells last week and would be reduced to rubble within days.
Carved into a sandstone mountain near the provincial capital between the second and fifth centuries AD, the taller figure is the largest standing Buddha in the world. Buddhism was introduced in Afghanistan around the third century B.C. and the area around Bamiyan, in the center of the country, remained Buddhist until the arrival of Islam in the mid-800s.
Meanwhile in India, two hundred Hindu extremists burned a copy of the Holy Qur'an and tore up posters depicting the Mosques at Mecca and Medina, in New Delhi during protests against the Taliban's destruction of Buddha statues.
The militants from the Vishwa Hindu Parishad (VHP, the World Hindu Council), a nationalist Hindu organization, protesting against the Taliban outside U.N. offices in New Delhi shouted, "Down with the Taliban. We will break Mecca and Medina."
Sunday, VHP leader Acharya Giriraj Kishore, a major player in the demolition of Babri Masjid, challenging the Taliban, said, "break the sacred stone at Mecca the way they were breaking down the priceless Buddha statues."
"The Taliban says the Buddha statues were mere stone in the form of idols. If it were so, the sacred stone at Kaba which Muslims from all over the world kissed was also mere stone, and as such the Taliban should break it too," he said.
Sultan Salahuddin Owaisi, Member of Parliament and leader of Majlis Ittehadul Muslimeen, condemned VHP activists, calling the burning barbaric and uncivilized.
In spite of the fact that the VHP have been holding violent demonstrations for the past few days, Owaisi expressed shock concerning the government's failure to check VHP activities and demanded the Indian government take drastic action against VHP militants.
He called the VHP's action cowardly and asked them as to why they did not cross the border into Afghanistan and demonstrate there, instead of doing it thousands of miles away.
Owaisi said VHP activists violated the sensitivities of Muslims by insulting the most widely read and holiest of the books in the world.
Indian Buddhists also took to the streets of New Delhi on Monday to protest against the destruction of ancient Buddha statues by the Taliban. Around 100 Buddhists, including lay people and monks chanting "Taliban shame shame" walked towards parliament, carrying banners calling on the United Nations to take action to protect the statues.
As well as speeches by Buddhist leaders, the demonstrators heard addresses by clerics from the Sikh, Hindu and Muslim faiths who added their voices to the international outcry over the Taliban's campaign.
The protests erupted last week when the Taliban said they had started rocketing the Buddhas in the central province of Bamiyan, which stand 50 meters (165 feet) and 34.5 meters tall.
The Taliban said their actions were aimed at stopping idolatry. "The Buddhist community of India is in deep shock," the Himalayan Buddhist Cultural Association, which organized Monday's protest, said in an open letter to U.N. Secretary General Kofi Annan.
"This act of the Taliban is against all religions and humanity," the letter said. "We strongly condemn the act of the ruling Taliban and urge you to take immediate action to stop the destruction of the Buddhist statues."
Tibet's exiled spiritual leader, the Dalai Lama, also condemned the Taliban, saying he was "deeply concerned" at the prospect of the statues' destruction, "Even though the destruction of the statues may be for religious reasons, I believe they are of historical importance not only to the people of Afghanistan, but to the world at large," the Dalai Lama said.
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