By TCN News,
New Delhi: Indian Muslim leaders have rejected the western military campaign against Libya while though condemning Gaddafi regime’s suppressive measures against its civilians who are protesting for democracy in the country. Some eminent Muslim leaders today issued a joint statement.
“While we reject and condemn the autocratic Gaddafi regime’s murder of protesting Libyan civilians and we support the struggle of the Libyan people to free themselves of the shackles of a brutal dictatorship, we equally reject and condemn the western military campaign against the Gaddafi regime,” the Muslim leaders said in the statement on 20th March.
A bomb from an allied aircraft exploded along the highway near Benghazi during an airstrike on Sunday [Photo Courtesy: New York Times]
They said the western military campaign has some ulterior motives – the western power is eyeing at the oil wealth of Libya.
“This western campaign has clear imperialist and hegemonic designs against the oil wealth and the strategic geographical position of Libya. The same powers did not lift a finger against the brutal Israeli occupation of Palestinian and Syrian lands and the murderous zionist attacks against Gaza Strip and Lebanon, and the same powers are taking a diagonally opposite stand towards similar popular movements in some other Arab countries. We also condemn the Arab League for meekly providing a fig leaf for the western powers to interfere and occupy an Arab country,” the joint statement said.
The Indian leaders said the current Libyan crisis can be solved by constituting a powerful transitional government.
“The only acceptable way out of the current Libyan crisis is to support the Libyan transitional government with arms and resources enabling it to topple the tyrant regime in Tripoli. A people’s movement must not be used to impose western control over yet another Muslim country. We genuinely fear that the current western military campaign will quickly lead to landing forces on the Libyan soil in order to loot Libyan oil wealth and plant a permanent military presence on its soil as has already happened in Afghanistan and Iraq. We strongly urge Arab countries not to fall in this trap and to refrain from offering their token support as it will be used to legitimise this neocolonial campaign,” said the statement signed by the following leaders:
Dr Zafarul Islam Khan, Working President, All India Muslim Majlis-e Mushawarat
Mujtaba Farooq, Secretary, Jamaat-e Islami Hind
Maulana Abdul Wahab Khilji, President, Indian Islahi Movemrnt
Dr Taslim Rahmani, Muslim Political Council of India
Navaid Hamid, General Secretary, Movement for the Empowerment of Muslim Indians
Feroze Mithiborwala, President, Bharat Bachao Andolan, Mumbai
Prof. M.H. Jawahirullah, Tamilnadu Muslim Munnetra Kazhagam, Chennai