Moscow, July 18: In the first-ever visit by a sitting president to a Muslim worship place, Russian President Dmitry Medvedev has met with Muslim leaders, asking for their help in promoting Islamic tolerance against extremism.
“It (extremism) destabilizes the situation in our country and we are obliged to take all the necessary measures to neutralize it,” Medvedev told 12 Muslim muftis in the Congregational Mosque, Reuters reported Thursday, July 16.
“In these conditions our crucial joint task is to spread the ideas of tolerance and acceptance of other faiths.”
Medvedev praised Muslim contributions in Russian society, noting that 57 of Russia’s 182 different ethnic groups are Muslims.
“Muslim religious organizations make important contributions to supporting civil order, to providing spiritual and moral guidance to an enormous number of people, and to fighting extremism and xenophobia,” he said.
“This is an important indicator of the importance of Islam in our country.”
Built in 1904, the Congregational Mosque is regarded the oldest Muslim worship place in Russia.
The Russian Federation is home to some 23 million Muslims in the north of the Caucasus and southern republics of Chechnya, Ingushetia and Dagestan.
Islam is Russia’s second-largest religion representing roughly 15 percent of its 145 million predominantly Orthodox population.
New Era
Medvedev’s initiative drew a swift welcome from Muslim leaders.
“We thank you for helping the Muslim brotherhood by visiting Dagestan and Ingushetia,” Ravil Gaynutdin, the head Mufti of Russia, told Medvedev.
“We Muslims in Russia want dialogue with the Russian Orthodox Church.”
Muslim leaders said that Medvedev’s visit marks a new era in the official Russian relations with its Muslim population.
“There is only one nation – Russian,” Russia’s Supreme Mufti Talgat Tadzhutdin told Medvedev.
Relations between Russia and its Muslim community have been strained for years, affected by the Russian abuses of Chechen Muslims.
During Soviet times, religion was discouraged by the state though many, including Russia’s Muslim community, practiced underground.
In recent years, the Caucasian nation witnessed increasing number of racist attacks against dark-skinned immigrants, mainly Muslims, actions rights groups say linked to the social turmoil that followed the collapse of the Soviet Union.
For years, the Kremlin efforts aiming at controlling the predominantly Muslim regions through imposing pro-Russian leaders have not been much of a success.
Analysts hailed the new move as relying on actual leaders who would help stem the unrest.
“These regions have become increasingly explosive,” said Maria Lipman, an analyst at Moscow’s Carnegie Centre think-tank.
“I think there is a crying need to have at least some people at some level to take decisions, not yes-men.”
–Agencies