EDARA president: Fight against Islamophobia must be through dialogue

Holding a conference on combating Islamophobia is the hope of developing recommendations for targeted actions to eradicate this phenomenon and strengthen mutual understanding in the world through dialogue, the President of the European Development and Research Academy (EDARA) Laytouss Brahim (Belgium) told Report on the sidelines of the “Embracing Diversity: Tackling Islamophobia in 2024” international conference in Baku.

The EDARA president explained that Islamophobia is not just an irrational fear of Islam and Muslims, but also a social phenomenon.

“Islamophobia is a complex, multifaceted problem that also includes political dimensions that require political solutions. But, above all, we hope that we can work to bring together different opinions, because it is very important for us, Muslim citizens of Europe, to maintain dialogue. Even if mistakes are made or things don't go in the right direction. We look forward to continuing to work to bridge differences in the future through dialogue,” he said.

Laytouss Brahim noted the importance of Azerbaijan's efforts in the fight against Islamophobia.

“At the conference, there are many different opinions and voices on how to fight Islamophobia. And this is useful - it is the basis of dialogue. You can hear from different countries with different points of view. Scientists, politicians and experts gathered here, which adds great value to this event,” he said.

“We hope that we can develop recommendations to continue to fight this phenomenon [Islamophobia] and use dialogue as a tool to bring people together rather than divide them. This gives hope for positive changes in the future. Otherwise, we will find ourselves in a state of polarization and confrontation. And we need mutual understanding, dialogue and more and more different ones that will help solve this problem,” he concluded.