Sweden: Muslim parliamentarian urges governments to strive for peace

...[E]xtremist forces like the Taliban seemed to be clawing back to power in Afghanistan and that fundamentalist forces in Tunisia, Egypt, Libya and other parts of Middle East were also getting stronger.

Naseem Malik, Swedish Muslim parliamentarian

Ahmadiyya Times | News Watch | EU Desk
Source/Credit: Daily Times | Pakistan
By Afnan Khan | November 11, 2011

LAHORE: First Muslim parliamentarian of Sweden, human rights activist and Social Democrat Malik Nasim urged the Swedish and Western governments to strive for peace across the globe.

Talking to Daily Times, the rights activist expressed regret over his country voting against giving full membership to Palestinians in the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organisation (UNESCO). Kalmar Malik Nasim told Daily Times that 14 out of 107 countries voted against the move while 52 abstained from voting on the issue.

He said that he, along with many other Swedish politicians and activists, had campaigned across Sweden to convince the government not to vote against the move. He said that the world should avoid the path of confrontation and that countries like Sweden were considered the symbol of peace and reconciliation across the globe, so it was not appropriate for the country to not join the positive forces.


He further added that extremist forces like the Taliban seemed to be clawing back to power in Afghanistan and that fundamentalist forces in Tunisia, Egypt, Libya and other parts of Middle East were also getting stronger.

He added that there was a lot of concern in the West and the East over the Palestine issue and that the majority of people wanted a peaceful resolution of this decades-long conflict, which had jeopradised the security of so many people across the globe.

“I hope my government (Sweden) will understand that best way of getting rid of fundamentalism from the world is by supporting peaceful forces. I also believe that we should not blindly follow American policies,” Malik asserted.

He stated that he was trying his best to convince European countries to vote for peace in the upcoming UN voting on the issue of Palestine. He said that it was very important that all Muslim countries use their influence to get it passed, even if the US threatens to veto the move. “The Muslim world should make it clear to the world that we Muslims want peace and want to create peace once for all in Middle East by solving this 64 years conflict,” Malik Nasim concluded.


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