The 48th Session of the Council of Foreign Minister of the Islamic Cooperation Organization (OIC) was opened in Islamabad on Tuesday (March 22). In his main address in the first session of the meeting, Pakistani Prime Minister Imran Khan offered a sad assessment of OIC’s failure in Kashmir and Palestine, and regretted that the West was serious.
“We have failed both Palestine and the Kashmir people. I am sad to say that we have been able to make an impact at all,” Pakistan Dawn’s newspaper quoted Imran. “We are a broken house and the power (west) who knows it … we (Muslims) are 1.5 billion people and our voices to stop this blatant injustice is not significant,” he said.
‘Muslim voice’
OKI, known as an Islamic Conference organization until 2011, is the second largest organization in the world after the United Nations, with membership of 57 countries spread across four continents. OIC describes himself as a “collective voice of the Muslim world”, and the purpose stated is “to protect and protect the interests of the Muslim world in the spirit of promoting international peace and harmony among various people in the world”.
OIC has reserved its membership for Muslim majority countries. Central African Republic, Russia, Thailand, Bosnia & Herzegovina, and “Country” Cyprus Turkey which is not recognized has observer status.
The Islamic Conference organization was founded by the First Islamic Summit Conference held at Rabat, Morocco, in September 1969, for Marshal The Islamic World after the burning of the Al-Aqsa Mosque in Jerusalem that year. The incident has dropped the Middle East into the worst crisis after the 1967 Arab-Israeli war.
In 1970 the first meeting of the Foreign Minister’s Islamic Conference (ICFM) was held in Jeddah, who decided to establish a permanent secretariat in the city, led by the Secretary General of the Organization. The Secretary General of Oki is currently Diplomat Chadian and Hissein Brahim Taha politician, who took over from Saudi Arabia Dr. Yousef Ahmed Al-Othimeen in November 2020.
Oki and India
As a country with the second largest Muslim community in the world, India has been invited to the founding conference in Rabat in 1969, but it turned out to be released by Pakistan’s orders. Then Agriculture Minister Fakhruddin Ali Ahmed was invited upon arrival in Morocco.
Thirty-seven years later, in 2006, with post-reform India has come to occupy an important position in the world, Saudi Arabia invites New Delhi to join as observers. But India moved away because of various reasons, no less important because as a secular state, it did not want to join the organization established on the national religious identity.
Once again, in the 45th session of the Foreign Minister’s Summit in May 2018, Bangladesh, the host country, suggested that India, where more than 10% of the world Muslims live, must be given observer status. But Pakistan opposed the proposal. While OIC is mainly controlled by Saudi Arabia, Pakistan, as the only Islamic country with nuclear weapons, has said a strong in the organization from the start.
In 2019, Sheikh Abdullah bin Zayed al Nahyan, Foreign Minister of the United Arab Emirates (UAE), was invited at that time Indian Foreign Minister Sushma Swaraj to overcome the 46th Session of the 46th Session of the OKI Minister of Foreign Affairs in Abu Dhabi as “Guest Honor “.
OIC position in Kashmir
OIC generally supports Pakistan’s establishment in Kashmir, and has issued a statement that criticizes the alleged “cruelty” of India in the state. However, New Delhi has long been used to combat this statement, and consistently and forcibly submit its position.
Importantly, Pakistani position on the OIC side, New Delhi has almost no friends in the organization. India has a very good relationship individually with almost all member countries – and this is the reason why most are able to not take statements issued by the group as a whole.
