Saturday September 29 9:32 AM ET
Biggest Muslim Body to Meet on Attacks in
U.S.
By Kedar Sharma
DOHA (Reuters) - Representatives of the world's 1.2 billion Muslims
will hold an emergency meeting in Qatar next month to forge a united
stand over possible U.S. military action against Muslim Afghanistan
(news - web sites), Qatari officials said on Saturday.
The officials told Reuters that Qatar, current head of the 56-nation
Organization of the Islamic Conference (OIC), was awaiting
confirmation from member states they would attend, but preparations
for the meeting have already begun.
One senior official said Arab ministers from the Jeddah-based
organization would meet on October 8 and a full OIC foreign ministers'
meeting would follow on October 9.
Qatar's official QNA news agency quoted OIC Secretary-General
Abdelouhed Belkaziz as saying during a visit to Doha that the meeting
would be held in the Qatari capital on October 10.
The United States has begun a massive build-up for potential
retaliation against Afghan-based militant Osama bin Laden (news - web
sites) and his al Qaeda organization, suspected by Washington of being
behind the September 11 attacks on New York and Washington.
President Mohammad Khatami (news - web sites) of Iran, one of the
OIC's most influential members, called for the meeting shortly after
the attacks, saying Muslim states must coordinate their stance toward
``terrorism.''
Most Arab and Muslim states have condemned the suicide-hijack attacks
that left some 6,500 people dead. But they have deplored what they see
as Western attempts to link Islam to ``terrorism.''
Khatami warned on Thursday that ``evil hands'' were using the attacks
on the United States to create a clash of civilizations.
``Evil hands and others, who do not like to see improvement through
new thoughts in the world, are trying to take advantage of the
sensitive situation and cause confrontation between Islam and other
beliefs,'' he said.
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