Zahid Afzal for BeyondHeadlines
New Delhi: “Terrorism is terrorism, without religion, without culture, without ethnicity”, said Ibrahim Kalin on Friday, 26 April. Ibrahim Kalin is a Turkish senior advisor to the President of Turkey Tayyip Erdogan. He visited India at the invitation of the National Security Advisor, Shri Ajit Doval. This session held at Conference Hall, Observer Research Foundation headquarters, New Delhi. ORF is a Delhi-based think tank.
Kalin thoroughly described various global issues and more about the facts of the Middle East and its relation to the rest of the world.
He addressed the importance of globalization in the world and how various changes took place after that. Later he discussed the various civilizations that took place at different lands and how the world kept on changing. He threw light on how in the 19th Century the term civilization is highly misused. According to him, civilization is not equal to modernization it is beyond that. He had briefly described the importance of civilization and its hidden role in the contemporary world.
With enthusiasm, he described how modernization took place in Turkey and due to its geography, the imprints of Europe were found in Turkey, Turkey has a long path of modernization due to Europe. Later he talked about the Islamic philosophy and its development. He applauded the Indian philosophy which is very old and enriched with great ideas. Under his secession, he tried to highlight the misconception related to Orientalism, as there are many writers who write about Orientalism but without visiting there, it is merely their imagination.
He further pointed out the importance of culture between the two countries and how culture plays a vital role in establishing strong ties. Importance of cinema and rise of hanged narrative, as Hollywood predominantly exhibit violence and sex whereas others including Bollywood, Iranian theatre try to portray another dimension of cinema.
He expressed that with the arrival of AKP party in Erdogan era, series of development took place and in 2005 by opening an embassy in Africa, they started to look African policy and more funds and aids were provided to Somalia and with this, their participation in Geneva process.
Turkey has started working for Kurds security issues and believing in removing all the disputes. They have started working with Iran further development of economic relations. Besides this Turkey also wanted to develop their relations with the central Asian countries that are with Kazakhstan, Tajikistan, etc, they are also trying to develop warm relations with the sub-continent countries.
According to him, economic relation is a major factor to resolve all forms of issues. After the Erdogan visit their economic relations with India has also increased. The subject of terrorism required to be solved and that may be possible by the collective step of the countries.
Kalin strongly argued in his talk that Muslims, according to him should not be apologetic for the crimes of ISIS just like all Christians are not required to apologise for the crimes of the Christ Church terrorist who carried out the terror attack. He explained it with an example from India, that if a Hindu, carries out an attack and claims that he is doing it for a Hindu Nation, then all Indians are not required to apologise for it.
(Zahid Afzal is pursuing M.A in West Asian Studies from Jamia Millia Islamia)
