۱۰ فروردین ۱۴۰۳ |۱۹ رمضان ۱۴۴۵ | Mar 29, 2024
Kuala Lumpur Summit highlights fissures in Muslim international politics

Amidst the distraction of the politics surrounding Pakistan’s withdrawal, the heads of state of Malaysia, Turkey, Iran and Qatar discussed ways to counteract global trends in Islamophobia and their mutual interest in developing financial mechanisms between Muslim nations that circumvent the global dominance of the U.S. dollar.

Hawzah News Agency - (Kuala Lumpur - Malaysia) - The Kuala Lumpur Summit was designed by the leaders of Malaysia, Turkey and Pakistan to proactively address the challenges facing the Muslim world. Instead, the last-minute withdrawal of Pakistani Prime Minister Imran Khan, under pressure from his ally Saudi Arabia, highlighted the fissures in Muslim international politics.

Amidst the distraction of the politics surrounding Pakistan’s withdrawal, the heads of state of Malaysia, Turkey, Iran and Qatar discussed ways to counteract global trends in Islamophobia and their mutual interest in developing financial mechanisms between Muslim nations that circumvent the global dominance of the U.S. dollar.

“Trade in national currencies has gained urgency amid talks of trade wars,” Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan said at a roundtable on economic development challenges at he summit last week. “We should first of all put the issue of Islamic finance on our agenda.”

Iranian President Hassan Rouhani also used the summit to call for deepening financial and trade cooperation between Muslim countries to counteract the threat of U.S. sanctions, which are a chief concern for both Iran and Turkey.

“Iran has long sought to break the American dominance of the international financial system. The key to that dominance is the dollar. The dollar is also key to the enforcement of U.S. sanctions, given the ubiquity of the dollar in international trade,” Jonathan Schanzer, senior vice president of the Foundation for Defense of Democracies, told Ahval. “It is therefore no surprise that Iran is looking for ways to circumvent the dollar.”

Turkey, Iran, and Russia agreed in September to conduct trade between each other in their national currencies, not the dollar.

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