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By Fu Rong, Xinhua
BEIJING: The UN-backed Alliance
of Civilizations is the latest international endeavor to promote
cross-cultural understanding and bridge cultural divides, which is
seen as a good recipe for resolving conflicts and building a
harmonious world, analysts say.
The United Nations has thrown its
weight behind the efforts to promote inter-cultural dialogue between
religions and countries, as the world body views such dialogue as,
in essence, one between civilizations, they say.
The Alliance of Civilizations
ended its first international forum last week with a series of
initiatives aimed at promoting cross-cultural understanding and
seeking new ways to handle cultural conflicts.
More urgent than ever
The need for inter-cultural
dialogue is more urgent than ever, UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon
said at the forum, designed to build bridges of understanding across
cultures and promoting understanding between the Western and Muslim
countries.
The forum will aim to “avoid
the predicted clash of civilizations, by promoting security,
understanding, tolerance, and mutual respect in a globalized
world,” Spanish Prime Minister Jose Luis Rodriguez Zapatero said
in an inaugural speech at the Alliance of Civilizations Forum, a
brainchild of his.
Conflicts and wars caused by
religious and cultural factors have intensified after the Cold War.
The Sept. 11 attacks on the United States have further strained the
relations between the West and the Muslim world.
Those conflicts and
misunderstandings have been caused not only by the religious and
cultural divides and many other factors including differing
political approaches also play a part.
The publication of cartoons of
the Prophet Mohammad in a Danish newspaper in 2005 that led to
violent demonstrations throughout the Muslim world, and the
Holocaust conference in Iran last year are telling examples.
“These events that seem to
happen every few months and are not purely political but get quite
politicized,” said Shamil Idriss, acting director of the Alliance
of Civilizations.
As religions and cultures have
many points in common, such as the spirits of peace, tolerance,
respect and equality, enhancing understanding between the West and
the Muslim world and other regions is seen by many as an important
way to counter and heal the divisions that threaten world peace.
“Never in our lifetime has
there been a more desperate need for constructive and committed
dialogue, among individuals, among communities, among cultures,
among and between nations,” Ban said.
“The threats are terrifying but
the responses are at hand,” Ban added.
Forum is not just talk
The idea of establishing a forum
for dialogue between civilizations was initiated by Spanish Prime
Minister Zapatero to the UN General Assembly in September 2004,
after the Madrid train bombings that claimed 191 lives on March 11
of that year.
The forum, approved by the UN,
has enlisted support from over 80 countries in the world. Around 350
delegates, including government members and representatives of
international organizations and civil society, discussed ways to
bridge gaps, promote exchanges and dispel misunderstandings.
The attendees also included
Turkish Prime Minister Recep Yayyip Erdogan, who co-sponsored the
idea along with Zapatero, and UN High Representatives for the
Alliance Jorge Sampaio.
The forum aimed to contribute to
isolating those extremists who attempt to use religion and culture
as pretexts to achieve their political purposes, Zapatero said.
Youth, education, migration and
the media are four areas to which the Alliance pays special
attention. In a bid to prove the forum is not just talk, Queen Noor
of Jordan has unveiled a project of $100 million to promote movie
productions that help build cross-cultural understanding.
A Rapid Response Media Mechanism
is another project announced at the forum, which is aimed at
providing a platform to journalists from all over the world when a
cross-cultural crisis erupts.
Challenges and hopes
While there is confidence and
hope, some people issued cautious or even suspicious note about the
prospects of the forum.
For one thing, some major
countries were absent from the forum, with the United States most
conspicuously, which has been spearheading efforts to combat
terrorism by military means.
However, Sampaio said that at
least they were not against such an idea and that he hoped to bring
those absent on board.
Some critics of Zapatero in Spain
even dismissed the forum as a futile bid simply aimed at boosting
the Socialists’ standing ahead of Spain’s general elections in
March.
While the road ahead is tortuous,
the Alliance did provide a ray of hope. As Sampaio put it, the forum
provided “a solid glimpse of a renewed hope that if we unite
efforts we will bring some change to the world.”
The forum serves not as a miracle
solution to all problems in the world but as one of the best ways to
handle confrontations—”the work on the ground counts,” Sampaio
added.
It is easy to speak about
building bridges of trust, but harder to make it into concrete
action, one commentator said.
“Fostering dialogue will not
produce change overnight. It is not the fast way. But it is the sure
way. It is the enduring way. The careful plans of the Alliance will
deliver in the long run,” Ban said.
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