Saudi Arabia to Lead U.N. Interfaith Conference

Posted on Nov 17th, 2008. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0. You can leave a response or trackback to this entry

A two-day UN conference on religious tolerance is going on in which more than a dozen world leaders, including President Bush, Israeli President Shimon Peres and British Prime Minister Gordon Brown and Saudi King Abdullah

U.N. Secretary General Ban Ki-moon hosted the dinner for the leaders attending the conference which is supposed to promote a global dialogue about religions, cultures and common values.

The event is part of a personal initiative by Saudi King to promote an interfaith dialogue among the world’s major religions.

It was the first time for The Saudi leader to dine in the same room as the Israeli president at a pre-conference banquet Tuesday hosted by U.N. Secretary General Ban Ki-moon. But Ban hinted that the two were seated at a distance.

“Normally, in the past, they have not been sitting in the same place like this. That is very important and encouraging,” Ban said.

He also said,”I wholeheartedly support the convening of the interfaith meeting that will be held here at headquarters tomorrow. The values it aims to promote are common to all the world’s religions and can help us fight extremism, prejudice and hatred.”

The Saudi initiative emerged in the summer during a meeting of religious leaders in Mecca.The Saudi leader subsequently gathered a variety of religious groups — including Muslims, Christians, Jews, Hindus, Taoists and others — together in Madrid in July, where they signed a declaration calling for greater cooperation among religions. King Abdullah of Saudi Arabia asked the General Assembly to hold the conference as a follow-up to the interfaith meeting he organised in Madrid.

General Assembly President Miguel d’Escoto Brockmann sent invitations to all 192 UN member states to attend thethis high-level meeting under the broad topic, “Culture of Peace.”

President Bush is scheduled to address at the conference on Thursday. The US administration said earlierthat it welcomed the Saudi initiative and supports “the right to practice one’s religion” and other principles of religious freedom enshrined in the U.N. charter.

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