UK foreign policy alienating Muslims: Lib Dems
Regional-UK, Politics, 10/12/2006

Britain's Liberal Democrats Wednesday called on the British government to change its foreign policy and stop escaping responsibility for alienating so many Muslims.

Commenting on the government's call for a 'fundamental rebalancing' of it with Muslim organizations, Liberal Democrat Shadow Communities Secretary Andrew Stunell said that ministers had spent far too much time trying to justify the indefensible.

"The government needs to go further and show some humility about their foreign policy and the insensitive remarks of some ministers," Stunell said.

Earlier, Communities Secretary Ruth Kelly pledged Wednesday to make a 'fundamental' shift in its ties with Muslim groups, by offering to fund only those committed to fighting extremism and defending shared British values.

"In the future, I'm clear that our strategy of funding and engagement must shift significantly towards those organizations that are taking a proactive leadership role in tackling extremists and defending our values," Kelly said.

Stunell said that nothing excuses terrorism, but the government had spent too much 'escaping blame' for which Muslims have repeated warned is more to do with the some of the excesses of the UK's foreign policies.

The Islamic Human Rights Commission (IHRC) also criticized the proposals to set conditions around any government funding for Muslim organizations.

"The deliberate confusion surrounding the word 'extremism' is a ploy by the government to use its financial muscle to socially engineer a new brand of Islam which will be subservient to its foreign policy," IHRC chair Massoud Shadjareh said.

"Kelly should be genuinely honest and recognize that there is a tremendous commitment to a multicultural multi-religious Britain throughout the Muslim community irrespective of its diverse views on foreign and domestic policy," he said.

British ministers have also come under criticism over recent calls for Muslim women to remove their face veils and for Muslim parents to spy on their children as potential terrorist.

Previous Stories:
  Muslims most disadvantaged in Britain - survey   (10/6/2006)
  Beckett defends pro-Israeli Mideast policy   (9/27/2006)
  Terrorism is not our fault: Blair   (9/27/2006)

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