Maldives condemns ISIS crimes, says foreign minister

Foreign Minister Dunya Maumoon has condemned human rights abuses carried out by the Islamic State of Iraq and Syria (ISIS), calling for the respect of life and dignity in the spirit of Islam.

“The Maldives strongly condemns the crimes committed against innocent civilians by the organization which identifies itself as the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant or the Islamic State of Iraq and Syria,” she said in press release today.

Jihadist militants – who declared an Islamic caliphate in territory held across the state of Iraq and Syria – are accused by the UN of having committed mass murders against prisoners, enemy combatants, and civilians.

“IS is using the veil of religion as a pretext for inflicting terror, and committing violations of human rights,” said Dunya.

“Their philosophy blatantly violates the fundamental principles of peace, tolerance, and unity which are advocated by Islam, and their actions have tarnished the world’s perception of our great religion. A religion of peace and tolerance.”

Dunya’s remarks follow Minister of Islamic Affairs Dr Mohamed Shaheem Ali Saeed’s declaration that the ISIS would not be allowed to operate in the Maldives.

“ISIS is an extremist group. No space will be given for their ideology and activities in the Maldives,” Shaheem tweeted on Sunday night (August 24).

The opposition Maldivian Democratic Party (MDP) immediately seized upon Shaheem’s comments, suggesting that the words had not been backed up with concrete action by the government.

“We note with concern that neither the Islamic minister nor the government has taken any action while activities related to terrorism in different forms as well as extremism are carried out in the Maldives, religious strife and hatred is incited widely, and death threats are being made against various people over religious matters,” read an MDP statement.

Authorities are currently investigating the source of a number of death threats sent to journalists and politicians in recent weeks, some of which were send from a user identifying themselves as ‘ISIS’.

The threats also made reference to the recent abduction of Minivan News journalist Ahmed Rilwan Abdulla – missing since August 8. Rilwan had also been the subject of intimidation from extremists as a result of his writing and micro-blogging.

Foreign Minister Dunya also spoke in favour of moderate Islam during a meeting of the Organisation of Islamic Cooperation in June, calling for a thorough self-assessment to identify the reason Islam is being associated with intolerance, terrorism, violence, and backwardness.

“It is beyond imagination, or within the realm of belief, to think that we can overcome these dark times? Let us recommit ourselves to work together to overcome our challenges. United and strong we can once again become the standard bearers of tolerance and innovation,” she said.

Condemning Islamophobia, Dunya told the 41st session of the OIC’s Council of Foreign Ministers that the chaos seen in the Muslim world today was the result of not exercising true Islamic ideals.

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20 thoughts on “Maldives condemns ISIS crimes, says foreign minister”

  1. As long as ISIS is not against hair coloring and botox, lady Dy need not by worry

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  2. Maldives should ban Salafis, and wahhabi brand of islam in Maldives and should ban studying in Saudi Arabia and Pakistan. This is where terrorists bred in the name of Islam to revive radical Islam. People who grow beard and wear knee cut trousers need to be rehabilitated the same way drugs addicts are rehabilitated. May be this fine tuned lady is branded as Kuffar by the extremist groups by now and will be on hit list.

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  3. Instead of wasteing her breath denouncing ISIS this woman should focus on helping Gaza rebuild from Israel aggression and furthermore she should look to her own morality and deen, Sunnah tells women to practice modesty yet she is going around without even a Hijab.

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  4. Our govt condemning ISIS crimes is insincere, much like the Saudi govt fighting militant terrorists at home while aiding and abetting the very same activities in other countries.

    Dunya, her dad, the President and the elite of the ruling party are as "laadheenee" or "irreligious", meaning secular as MDP or Nasheed. Yet they had no problem stoking the religious fervour of ordinary folk while campaigning against MDP. Anti-semitism, jingoistic bigotry is rife as a direct result of their propaganda. They are so consumed with short term political gains that they don't realise that the monsters they create to bring down the MDP will turn against them once they gain a foothold among the people.

    MDP themselves are guilty of this during the 2008 campaign. They learned their lesson the hard way. Now it's time for both parties to realise that this game is so dangerous that it could destroy our society entirely.

    The terrorist genie once out cannot be put back into the bottle again. Nobody cares about 4000,000 people on some insignificant specks of islands. We will sink ourselves and the world will move on.

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  5. True, the statements should be backed by actions, but condemning ISIS is a big step in the right direction, 1 I only can applaud.

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  6. This must be the sign of times of last days. HEre we have an uncovered woman talking about islam. and this woman also happens to be a daughter of an "islamic scholar". Allah(swt) is exposing the munaafiqeen by their own words. Nobody needs to refute them or reply to them. God will unmask them for the nifaq concealed i n their hearts.

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  7. @Kashim instead of wasting peoples time and webspace, you better start focusing on fighting problems in your own country, that's what each country should do in the first place actually. As if a foreign minister of The Maldives can do anything for a place like Gaza. What you can do and she can do and what every Maldivian should do is fighting local radicalism in the first place.

    Although you sound quite radical, maybe you're the one we should fight against. How's your beard today?

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  8. Aggressive Islamist individuals like Kashim and dhivehistan, who seem to care so much more about the looks of another Muslim than the content of their statement, are a threat to Maldivian culture where being covered never was a requirement to be a good Muslim. We don't need these radical foreign Islamist influences here, move to Saudi Arabia if you don't like it.

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  9. True, the statements should be backed by actions, but condemning ISIS is a big step in the right direction, 1 I only can applaud.

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  10. Hah. Now that the wannabe arabs have outlived their usefulness, they are being disposed of by the State.

    How does it feel to be stabbed in the back, so-called 'dheenee' baigandu? Your blind actions installed this regime into power.

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  11. If you were taught to treat people based on their belief, this is where you should draw the line to falsify that teaching. ISIS is fighting for their ideology to be imposed on others and people who are motivated with such ideas should be stopped, because they are arrogant ignorant; the recipe for cooking tyrants and the enemies of progressive human race. These people think human rights are created by the West and it is alien and against Muslims. This is pure ignorance; human rights are simply natural good human quality, no one has the rights to torture, kill or punish any living things on this planet, because life is not something you have created on which anyone can claim to be better than the other. All have same fate, disease death and all can perceive pain the same way all do when inflicted harm to them. If you can’t understand such simple logic, you can’t be a normal human being, you must be sick.

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  12. Well-spoken Dunya Maumoon, yes the acts of terrorism are perpetrated by people motivated by an abuse of religion. It is a perversion of faith. I think your speech has to be followed up with a prevention of radicalism in the country, system where worried public has the possibility to report to a government special made security force without getting reported. This special force will then again monitor the reported case. If the case is bad, be able to take inn and have the person or persons de radicalized if possible. If not, keep an eye on them. Of course also keeps an eye on persons coming back from Iraq and Syria.

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  13. @Kashim and @Lady Dy! At least, we have a Foreign Minister who knows how to play by the rules of the game, unlike others in the past. Although you may disagree condemning ISIS is a huge step for a small country like Maldives.

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  14. @momo, you are mistake brother. I did not say ISIS is right, but until the Muslim world is not under threat they should not cary blame! ISIS is a response to attacks by zionism and foreign forces. We merely say that before judging a country, one must judge yourself, and this woman if she is a true Muslimah must cover herself before judging ISIS at the very least!

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  15. @momo, also there is no such "islam with human rights" or "moderate islam" there is only Islam and Islam has all the rights needed as part of it in شريعة. I doubt you are even a Muslim!

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  16. Kashim
    I am a human being first, that means I have a brain that can process information from what I see, feel, and from the experiments of great scholars, and I can come up with my own judgment to falsify the wrong and recognize the truth. Those who are fighting to implement their way of life on to other people are simply sick; this is how I perceive them that they are suffering from mental illness. Because I know what it means to go through pains when inflicted and I don’t want anyone to go through any physical pain and I believe, It is the duties of all sane people to fight to eradicate human suffering in all forms, be it from natural causes or from criminal people like ISIS, rapist, murderers and from all psychopaths who don’t have ability to understand that no one has any rights to inflict pain on other people those have different opinion about the world and nature than their own.

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  17. @kasim, it is people with radical outlook like yours your country have to watch out for, I understand you believe you are not a human being but born Muslim. If it wasn’t for moderates in any religion or non-religion the world would be very difficult place to live. Say if you were born in Palestine 20 years ago, your Muslim parents died in the ongoing war and you were adopted by parents that practiced Orthodox Judaism, you most likely be as radical in that direction. I think radical behaver has to be taken serious,one of the tests is scanning of the brain of very radical thinking persons. I think they will find differences. And In the future look into have brain scan of babies, have special schooling and training for them affected. Problem is that most of the affected areas is in poor countries, where scanning of brain is not possible. That’s where aids from rich countries have to concentrate. In one or two generations this countries will also prosper.

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  18. @willy rasta I would never be radical for judaism because its a false religion. How to believe in something like a "radical" that its a lie? You are typing none sense again.

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  19. @kasim its exactly what I mean, you have not a rational thinking mind. You have most lightly problem to see it you self, from the brain disorder I talked about before. But you are a classic exemplar Stating you are not a human being, and also stating that whatever religious group you were born into have no effect on your believe from the start. You can easily mistake your case for possible retarded. But I think its brain disorder.

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  20. Well said willy, people like kashim cannot believe in reason. Their thinking is limited to 7th century barbarism. The only solution here is multi culture, hopefully we will achieve that through sez. No need to even bother with these people, I myself lost 200 brain cells just by seeing these bigots ridiculous comments.

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