Farit Muhametshin took part in the conference “The Ways to Achieve Interreligious Peace”

Farit Muhametshin and Elmira Sadykova took part in the conference on the subject of ways to achieve inter-confessional harmony.

On the 25th of March in the Moscow “President-Hotel” there was held the conference “The Ways to Achieve Interreligious Peace: the Role of Theologians, Diplomats and Public Figures”.

The conference was attended by the Deputy Chairman of the Strategic Vision Group “Russia –Islamic World”, Deputy Chairman of the Federation Council Committee on Foreign Affairs, Farit Muhametshin; by Doctor of Political Sciences, Professor, Executive Director of the Foundation for strategic dialogue and partnership with the Islamic world, Elmira Sadykova; by the Academician of the Russian Academy of Sciences, Doctor of Historical Sciences, Professor, Research Advisor of the Institute for Oriental Studies of the Russian Academy of Sciences, a member of the Strategic Vision Group, Vitaliy Naumkin; by a member of the Group, Metropolitan of Kazan and Tatarstan, Theophan; by the Chairman of the Muslim Spiritual Governance of the Tatarstan Republic, a member of the Group, Mufti Kamil Samigullin and by other prominent members of the Strategic Vision Group “Russia – Islamic World”.

The participants of the forum were the experts from 38 countries – Syria, Egypt, Iraq, Saudi Arabia, Palestine, Indonesia, Lebanon, Qatar, Morocco, Oman, Iran, India, Pakistan, China, Turkey, Nigeria, Zimbabwe, Ethiopia, Djibouti, South Africa, Great Britain, Belgium, Spain, France, Portugal, the USA and other countries.

The organizers of the conference were: The Muslim Spiritual Assembly of Russia, the Council on Cooperation with Religious Associations under the President of the Russian Federation, the Russian Orthodox Church, the Imperial Orthodox Palestine Society, the Russian Association for the Protection of Religious Freedom, the Institute for Oriental Studies of the Russian Academy of Sciences, the Islamic Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (ISESCO).

The conference comprised three sections and the plenary session of the experts.

Doctor of Political Sciences, Professor, Executive Director of the Foundation for strategic dialogue and partnership with the Islamic world, Elmira Sadykova, took part in the section “Activities of Religious and Public Organizations Aimed at the Consolidation of Peace and Harmony within Interreligious and Cross-national Relations”.

In the course of the discussion there was assessed the role of interreligious dialogue for the maintenance of peace and international stability. The participants discussed experience of Russia and other countries in the maintenance of interreligious peace, the atmosphere of mutual respect and understanding between representatives of all confessions and interaction among representatives of different religions and cultures.

The Metropolitan Theophan made a speech at that session. He reminded that the subject of studying for theologians were not only religious texts and history of religions, but also the life itself. As an illustrative example, Bishop Theophan described the activity of ISIS – a banned terrorist organization in our country: “Unclean plans, unclean ideas touch the clear understanding of God and we can see the tragedy. That’s why theological questions are closely connected with the questions of religious education and upbringing nowadays. Having left for our countries and places of service, via the apprehension of what we have heard here, we will try to become an example of not just tolerance (it is a very vague word), but of a real joint life and co-working like in the Tatarstan Republic”.

Deputy Chairman of the Federation Council Committee on Foreign Affairs, Deputy Chairman of the Strategic Vision Group “Russia –Islam World”, Farit Muhametshin took part in the plenary session.

Greetings to the organizers and participants of the conference were given by the Chief of Staff of the Presidential Executive Office of Russia, Anton Vaino; by the Chairman of the Federation Council, Valentina Matvienko; by the Minister for Foreign Affairs of Russia, Sergey Lavrov; by the Mayor of Moscow, Sergey Sobyanin, and by other state and public figures.

The Chairman of the Imperial Orthodox Palestine Society, Sergey Stepashin, drew the attention of the forum’s participants in his speech at the plenary session to the fact that there was no Muslim, Christian, Catholic, Orthodox, Buddhist or any other kind of terrorism. According to the speaker’s opinion, there was terrorism and murder what exactly needed to be realized.
In his report, the Head of the ISESCO, Abdulaziz Othman al-Twaijri, expressed the idea of the value for the foreign policy of the Russian Federation to focus on the maintenance of constructive, carefully considered and balanced relations with the Islamic world. And in that regard, the Strategic Vision Group “Russia – Islamic World” was especially authoritative platform for the coordination of positions and steps towards promotion of mutual interests.

Doctor Din Shamsuddin, a special representative of the President of the Republic Indonesia on the subjects of inter-confessional dialogue and inter-civilizational cooperation, a member of the Strategic Vision Group “Russia – Islamic World” mentioned the fact in his comment to the Press Office of the Group that the conference was of great importance as there were dialogues both on the international and national levels and besides, there was heard a bilateral dialogue between Muslims and Christians.

The Press Office of the Group found it out that the international scientific-practical conference devoted to the 90th anniversary of the former Prime Minister of the Russian Federation and of the founder of the Strategic Vision Group, Evgeniy Primakov, would take place in Cairo in autumn. Egypt has become the very place of his first long-term business trip abroad.

The conference resulted in the adoption of the resolution. Taking into account the current tense situation in the world, the resolution urge all the governments of the world to act solely on the basis of international law in the field of interreligious relations.