COLOMBO: Sri Lanka’s senior-most Muslim politician yesterday warned that his government’s failure to restrain Buddhist monks accused of sparking religious hate attacks will foment Islamic extremism and threaten security.
Justice Minister Rauf Hakeem said he had been under pressure from supporters to quit President Mahinda Rajapakse’s coalition after it failed to prevent last month’s deadly religious violence.
Four people were killed and 80 wounded in the worst religious riots in recent decades.
Hakeem told the Foreign Correspondents’ Association that “Islamophobia” was gripping the mainly Buddhist country where Muslims accounted for 10 percent of the 20 million population.
“The Islamophobia in the West is copied and edited to suit local conditions and exploited. The Muslim community has become the punching bag (for Buddhist extremists). If you do not nip this in the bud, then there could a radicalisation of Muslim society. It could be a fertile ground for extremist external forces. This is what we are worried about.” AFP
