PICESᵀᴹ__ˢᵒʷ

18 years ago today, visionry Pakistani leader Imran Khan stood in London and said: “Ladies and gentlemen, first of all I really want to thank the Global Peace and Unity organisation for inviting me. The most important point I want to make tonight is this: it is extremely important for Muslims to convey to people living in Western countries that there is no correlation between Islam and terrorism. Unfortunately, through a planned campaign, Islam and terrorism have been linked, and 1.3 billion Muslims are on the back foot. According to the Quran, 124,000 messengers were sent with one message — that the Almighty wanted us to be human beings rather than intelligent animals. Animals believe in ‘might is right’; human beings have compassion and justice. When 9/11 happened, we should have been able to say that terrorism knows no religion. All religions preach the same thing. Sadly, we lacked the leadership to make that point. I hope Muslims living in the West will enter the mainstream, participate in the political process, and not get marginalised — because marginalisation creates radicalisation. We don’t want our youth radicalised. And in the Muslim world, the time is coming when we must have democracies rather than dictators and puppets who make our own army kill our own people in the name of the war on terror — when in fact it has become a war of terror.” — Imran Khan, Global Peace & Unity Event, London, 26 October 2008 A vision that is now becoming reality.