Pakistan's Prime Minister Shaukat Aziz held here today a closed meeting with seven foreign ministers of Islamic countries and Secretary General of Organization of Islamic Conference Ekmeleddin Ihsanoglu. Prince Saud Al-Faisal, Foreign Minister, led the Kingdom's delegation to the meeting. Aziz urged six foreign ministers of Muslim countries to adopt a holistic approach to meet the challenges within the Muslim Ummah as well as the external factors that confront the Islamic world. “We must have a clear vision of the way forward. We also need to act with resolve and determination and cannot simply be spectators of the tragic circumstances that continue to aggravate the situation,” the prime minister said while delivering his inaugural speech to a one-day closed-door conference of foreign ministers of Saudi Arabia, Egypt, Indonesia, Jordan, Malaysia and Turkey, OIC Secretary General in Islamabad. Palestine, the prime minister said, continues to be a festering wound that has caused tremendous suffering to Palestinian brothers and sisters and has agitated the minds of two generations of Muslims across the world. “This grave issue is one of the root causes of frustration, anger and extremism in the Islamic world. Durable peace in the Middle East demands a honourable solution of the Palestinian issue based on justice, equity and realism, which must be in accordance with the wishes and aspirations of the Palestinian people. In this context, we welcome the recent Makkah Accord that should bring calm to the Palestinian territories. We hope that that the establishment of the National Unity Government will help progress towards the realization of the objective of a sovereign and viable State of Palestine. It is high time that substantial progress is made towards this end,” Aziz said. The prime minister said the turmoil and spiraling violence in Iraq is a source of deep concern and anguish to all of us. “This dangerous conflict must be brought to an end at the earliest. Iraq's sovereignty and territorial integrity are of utmost importance to us and must be preserved. The Iraqi people must be enabled to decide their own destinies.” Similarly, he said, “we need collective efforts to arrest tensions in Lebanon and discourage forces that could push that country towards internal strife. Peace and democracy in Lebanon must be preserved.”
