Amid the various domestic and international events in recent days – many of which, from a legal standpoint, are also worth contemplating by the nation’s legal community – some news from WikiLeaks about Saudi Arabia provided an opportunity to mull over Saudi Arabia’s illicit connections, even if it was only to confirm the dozens of previously published reports on the subject. In the aforementioned news report, which many of the distinguished audience have probably seen, the U.S. Secretary of Defense announced that Saudi Arabia is the foremost source of financial support for terrorists around the world.
It has been noted in published documents that the Taliban and the Lashkar-e-Taiba in Pakistan, who are recognized as being among the most significant terrorist groups in the world, enjoy financial and moral support from Saudi Arabia. A perspective on the importance of this issue is presented in the points below in hopes that it will be useful and beneficial for those seeking justice in our dear country and for those friends of peace all over the world.
The first point is that we know that numerous international conventions about combating terrorism exist, which have forecasted the various dimensions of terrorism and have regulated the campaign against it. They have also placed the responsibility for the specific obligations on governments and all others subject to international law. Likewise, many of the distinguished audience are aware that the Organization of the Islamic Conference (with the new name Organization of the Islamic Cooperation) has also approved conventions for the fight against terrorism in 1999 that, again, places the specific obligations on individual Islamic governments.
In the UN as well, dozens of resolutions and other documents concerning the fight against terrorism have been approved, targeting every aspect of the subject. Under the supervision of the Security Council, a committee was created for monitoring and tracking Council resolutions for combating terrorism, especially after the events of September 11. This committee has conducted the entire operation to this point and continues to track various activities.
With all of these international legal documents, one might imagine that various countries possessing a rigid ideological background and fanatical extremist groups are, naturally, not allowed to support terrorists and are not permitted much leeway. However, the reality shows something different than this initial assumption. Saudi Arabia, for example, is one such country that can be studied.
In this country, where Wahhabism is the focal point of all political, social, cultural, and faith based activities, they openly recognize every opposing viewpoint as heresy and deserving of death. Why politicians and influential Wahhabi assemblies in Saudi Arabia can so easily brush aside international documents and endanger international peace and security is itself an important question that can be examined in different ways. Some of them will be noted presently by stating the second point.
Saudi Arabia – with its system of hereditary monarchy and its lack of even the minimum amount of democratic systems – for years has taken advantage of its position in the Islamic world due to hosting millions of pilgrims to the Sacred House of God, the tomb of the Holy Prophet (peace be upon him), and the rest of the immaculate ones (peace be upon them). They have introduced themselves among the Muslim nations as the servant of the Sacred House of God and conveyed the message that they act according to Islam. This approach has always been pursued with various contributions of financial support and by distributing the oil wealth of the Saudi people all over the world.
Saudi Arabian officials have always tried to exploit their role in order to, first, spread the attitudes of the Wahhabi and their hardliners in the name of Islam and, second, to persist in both their servile devotion to the West and in the subjugation of Muslim peoples confronting oppressive rulers. It is this second role that has caused the West to show favor to Saudi Arabian officials, which extends to turning a blind eye to their efforts to spread Wahhabi ideology and even in some cases to encourage it because in this way, Islam automatically appears violent and illogical among certain audiences. What accomplishment would be better than Muslims ruining themselves by their own hands and setting the stage for the worldwide domination of Western liberal thought?
In the years following September 11, American and Western academic circles and then a large number of politicians have apparently just begun to understand that connivance in dealing with the spread of deviant and extremist ideology coming from Saudi Arabia does not simply help distort the picture of Islam among their intended audience; it also leads to the spread of terrorism as well. This very issue has entangled them and will continue to do so. That is why Western governments are pursuing a suitable solution for eliminating this threat; however, it still seems as if the political interests that come with the Saudi officials’ relationship with the West still take precedence over those same officials demonstrating a strong and effective response to the crimes committed by Saudi supported terrorists. This issue causes us to acknowledge and remind the Western governments that they are also responsible for dealing with a large number of terrorist events. The global community has the right to refuse to accept your claims concerning fighting terrorism and to consider you complicit in much of the bloodshed.
The third point is that if we pay attention to the events of the past few months after the popular uprisings in Islamic Arab countries, the more we will comprehend what Saudi officials are doing and just how much Western officials are committed to their international obligations in regards to fighting terrorism.
In Tunisia, the people revolt. The dictator who for years committed crimes and must be tried so that justice may be done goes to Saudi Arabia and takes refuge. Saudi officials have refused repeated requests from the new government of Tunisia to turn him over. No Western government complains to Saudi Arabia about why they ignore the rights of the Tunisian people and international human rights standards.
In Egypt there is revolution. Saudi officials make every effort to turn the people’s path from revolution and rescue Mubarak from trial. They collaborate with Western governments so that military leadership dominates affairs and the Egyptian people are not the main decision makers. Again, the West welcomes this fact.
In Yemen, the people revolt. Saudi politicians support the dictator with all of their might, shelter him, and conspire with the West to whisk Ali Abdullah Saleh away without a trial while another of Saleh’s allies takes charge of affairs. In this regard, heavy-handed Yemeni security forces utilize a variety of suppression tactics so that the Yemeni people are not free.
Western governments, especially the United States and Great Britain, offered a variety of assistance and neither received any objection as to why Saudi Arabia does such things. Amidst all of this, Saudi Arabia proposes the draft of a resolution in the U.N. General Assembly titled Combating Terrorism.* And here is the ridiculous part: the West also voted in favor of the resolution thanking the Saudi king that he has agreed to fund the budget creating the Combating Terrorism Center in New York.
In Iraq, terrorists slaughter the people. The Iraqi government obtains the necessary intelligence that one of the individuals present in the higher levels of government institutions directed these terrorist actions. Therefore, they want to arrest him in order to refer him to the Iraqi judiciary. They cause him to run away and yet such a person again goes to Saudi Arabia, receives encouragement, and then is hidden in another location. No one in the West says how a person accused of terrorist actions becomes a fugitive from justice being carried out by the Iraqi justice system. Wasn’t it that same justice system that even tried Saddam and had the necessary capacity for impartial legal proceedings?
Saudi Arabia and its fellow dictators under the guidance of the West are providing various types of arms assistance in Syria to opponents of the Syrian government in order to prolong the bloodshed. However, they again flee from giving an answer to this question: Why are they promoting terrorism in Syria?
Final Word
It seems that Saudi Arabia is one of the main sources in the spread of extremism and violent ideology of a religious nature throughout the world just like the WikiLeaks report quoting the U.S. Secretary of Defense has stated. Terrorism is a loathsome phenomenon throughout the world. Therefore, every activist that wants to get rid of the roots of terrorism cannot remain ignorant of the centers of the formation, guidance, management, and support of terrorists. Neither can anyone active in seeking peace ignore the fraudulent and inhumane role of some Western politicians in claiming to combat terrorism on the one hand while collaborating with terrorists supported by countries like Saudi Arabia on the other.
Certainly enlightenment and broadening the sensitivities of world opinion toward various types of abuse – whether in the name of religion or promoting violence and crime – is the important first step in remedying the current situation and holding dictators and their supporters accountable. In the next step, the global community of various religious believers including Muslims and especially the statesmen of Islamic countries are expected to be the messengers of peace, friendship, kindness, humanity, and the necessity for the elimination of injustice and discrimination. The popular uprisings in various Islamic countries are a loud cry that millions of Muslims are chanting in order to have their rights recognized and obtain worthy governance. You must hear these cries and honor them.
*Editor’s note: for the text of the UN resolution, please see http://www.un.org/ga/search/view_doc.asp?symbol=a/66/l.5.