Speech by Minister George Yeo at "Promoting Peace: The Role of Inter-Faith and Intra-Faith Dialogue" - A Public Dialogue cum Book Launch, jointly organised by SIIA and Peace Matters, 27 Jan 07, 11am, Singapore National Library

Dear Friends,

Ladies and gentleman,

Some months ago when I was visiting Pak Maidin during Hari Raya, he asked me to launch Ustaz Haniff's book ""Unlicensed to Kill: Countering Imam Samudra's Justification for the Bali Bombing". I had not read the book. I was also a little nervous because this is a debate within Islam. I did not feel I had the locus standi to express approval or disapproval of the book. But I've known Mohd Maidin for many years; we were in politics together in the same GRC. I've known him to be a person who would not recommend something lightly. So we worked out an arrangement where I would support the publication of the book but without putting myself in the invidious position of passing judgement on the book which I'm not qualified to do.

2 Sometimes, dilemmas are posed to us. And we have no choice but to do according to what the inner voice in us tells us to do. So why did Pak Maidin, Zulkifli Baharuddin and others embark on this book project? Because something inside them told them that this is the right thing to do.

3 Just like this morning, when many others would prefer to spend their Saturday mornings on other activities, why are we here? Because something inside us tells us that this peace dialogue is worth supporting. Why is Ustaz Haniff's book important? It is important because it is part of a process to counter something which is very dangerous. I'm going to use a metaphor which I hope would not be misunderstood because any metaphor which you overstretch becomes absurd. But I believe for a lot of the things that we are interested in here, this metaphor will be helpful. And the metaphor is to draw an analogy between the deviation that is happening in Islam today with the mutation of good cells into malignant cells; the process of cancer formation. We can argue about how the mutation has taken place; but once the mutation has taken place, it exists as a fact of reality. And all cancers have a way of replicating themselves until they meet something which stops them. When a cancerous mutation has taken place, you don't notice it at first. Then one become two, becomes 4, 8 and so on. After a while, it metastasizes and becomes a tumour. Then you notice it. It could take a long time. In fact we would not have discovered about Jemaah Islamiyah until September 11 when we received a tip-off. Al-Qaeda had a long gestation going back, some say to Afghanistan.

4 But really if you were to look at the evolution of that mutation, you might trace it all the way back to the Ikhwan Muslimin. But this is not to say that the Muslim Brotherhood had the wrong ideas. In the evolution of cancer, the cells are good before turning bad. Suddenly a switch happens, and it becomes a problem. You take the name Jemaah Islamiyah (I think it means the assembly of Islam), how could such a name be associated with something bad? But it's precisely evil presenting itself as good which makes it so dangerous. So everything that they do: the cultivation of individuals, the taking of lives, the justification of their deeds; subjectively, they may believe that even as they are killing you, they are doing the right thing. As those who burned the witches at Salem also believed that they were doing the right thing. Like the Inquisitors in the Catholic Church who said "Look, if you are good, the flames will not kill you; if the flames kill you, it shows that you are bad and therefore you should be killed". How can you win such an argument? When such mutations take place, they penetrate deep and they create huge problems. Now for a tumour, you can do surgery and eliminate it. They moved in to clean out the Taliban in Afghanistan. But is it really cleaned up? No. As with cancer treatment, from time to time, you have to apply chemotherapy. You know the way chemotherapy works: it attacks not just the bad cells but the good cells as well. And sometimes the chemotherapy attacks the good cells more than the bad cells causing the patient to feel very ill. Ultimately, the fight has to take place at the cellular level. The good cells have to identify the bad cells and attack them.

5 The problem of this perversion cannot be solved by the US, the UN, non-Muslims or even by ordinary Muslims. It can only be solved by Muslim religious leaders. Because it is at that level where the battle has to take place. It is at that level that Ustaz Haniff has decided to do combat. We must encourage him and others like him to take on this challenge. This is the only long term solution to the problem. The rest of us can be helpful. If there is a tumour, we can help remove the tumour, we can help set up the lines to administer chemotherapy, we can provide nutrition, look after the body politic. But the ultimate counter to the perversions of Imam Samudra are precisely books like "Unlicensed to Kill", which cut off the blood supply, identify the bad cells, and attack them, so that they cannot replicate.

6 As I have earlier said, I am only using a metaphor. Mutation happens in all religions from time to time for reasons which are complex and not easy to analyse. It happens in Buddhism, Hinduism, and Christianity. In fact, it has happened in all religions before. It has stricken Islam now. Why? You can trace it back to the fall of the Ottomans. The great frustrations that Muslims were being attacked all over the world; their territories carved up; the caliphate removed. Different responses arose after Kemal Ataturk took over Turkey. Some hoped that by returning to the origins of the religion, a solution can be found. Others felt that everyone was against them, and they had to hit back; the great evil, first the Soviet Union then the US, and so on. And then suicide bombing and the emergence of Al Qaeda. Many books have been written about this subject, and I don't think I can add to it. But that is not important. What's important is that it has happened and since it has happened, it will get worse until there is a countervailing response. The book by Ustaz Haniff is part of the countervailing response.

7 In Singapore, Islam is only one part of the story because we are a multi-religious society. And multi-religious societies are complicated. They will never melt into a goo where all are the same. It is not possible. For a Buddhist, a Christian, a Sikh, for example, the sources of their beliefs are deep. And if you were to do a DNA analysis on their religions, you will know that they have very different starting points. But something unites them. And we should find out what is the thing that unites them, and use that as a way to hold us all together.

8 I have just come back from a journey to India, which is a very complicated and spiritual country. I was attending a Confederation of Indian Industries Summit conference in Bangalore. After Bangalore, I went to Calcutta. I did a side trip to Jamshedpur, where the Tatas a hundred years ago built the first steel works outside the UK in the British Empire. Then I went to Delhi to do my official calls, and spent two days at Amritsar before taking a direct flight by SIA home.

9 Without quite intending it, the trip also became a religious journey. In Jamshedpur, I was greatly impressed by the Tata sense of fairness and their faith in human beings. People can be good and we can bring out the good in them. The Tatas are Parsees. When the Muslims took over Iran, the Zoroastrians left and went to Bombay. I'm not sure, I can't quite remember all the details, but the story goes something like this. If there are Parsees here, please correct me. The Parsees wanted refuge from the local ruler to live in India. The local ruler was reluctant at first and wanted to tell them that he had no place there for them. He gave the Parsees a glass of milk filled to the brim. The Parsees understood the meaning, that the glass was full. The Parsee leader took some sugar and gradually dissolved it into the milk without causing it to overflow. Everywhere the Parsees go, they sweeten the milk which is their host. And this philosophy shows in their philanthropy. In Bangalore, they established the world-famous Indian Institute of Science in the early 20th century. They wanted an institution to equal the best in London.

10 Then I went to Calcutta. Calcutta is the home of Tagore and Subhas Chandra Bose who established the Indian National Army in Singapore. One evening I visited the Sri Radhakrishna Temple, a donation by the Birlas. The Birlas are Marwaris. The Marwaris control a large part of the economy of Calcutta. It is a beautiful temple, all marble, absolutely clean, beautifully lit. It was a gift by the Birlas to the people of Calcutta. I thought it was a wonderful act. Then, I attended Mass at Mother Theresa's House. You know this tiny woman from Albania, tiny but having tremendous determination to change things around her. There was a Singapore nun there who had been there more than ten years. Sister Maria Tony. It's tough. You go to the back alleys and serve the poorest of the poor. I asked if they still pick up dead bodies in the morning. She said yes. Despite all the developments, there were still many poor people. Some are migrants with no families. When they are sick and dying, there is no one to look after them. I asked myself why a Singaporean would leave the comforts of home to go there, to dedicate her life to do this? It's not easy. At that mass, the priest told them that their lives would be hard. They only take the first vow after five years; after that, they renew their vows yearly. Then they take their final vow in the tenth year and that is for eternity; so please jangan main-main, be very careful. Do not decide and then be stuck; there is no turning back. Why do people do these things? But because of them, we have the love and compassion which hold human society together. And those of us who cannot be like that, we can at least support what they do. Through their work, humankind becomes better.

11 Then I had a wonderful visit to Amritsar. I wanted to see the Chief Minister but elections are on so under the code of conduct, he couldn't see me. Instead, I was briefed by the Chief Secretary on the developments of Punjab. I was scheduled to visit the Golden Temple the day after but decided to go that evening. It is open 24 hours a day. And the experience at night can be quite different from daytime. It was cold. I covered my head, washed my hands, took off my shoes and socks and washed my feet. I was walking on the cold marble, and my two feet felt as if they were blocks of ice. Of course there were carpets but we were not walking on them all the time. There was continuous chanting and free food served 24 hrs a day. Anybody can come to stay. You can be a hippy, you can stay there; they will not drive you away. You can eat there and receive free medical treatment. And this is all out of the philanthropy of Sikhs from all over the world who happily donate money to the Temple.

12 The official who brought me around, Kuldip Singh: he's a good-natured fellow. When we passed one of the gates in the Temple, his expression suddenly changed. He said in 1984 the tanks came down here, and then just before the big pool, the tanks turned their turrets, trained their guns, and bombarded Bhindrawale's headquarters building. There was outrage, anger and hatred. Indian security told PM Indira Gandhi that she could not trust her Sikh guards anymore. However, she would not believe this. She thought that they had been so long a part of the Indian Army, their discipline was unquestionable. They shot and killed her. I asked Kuldip who was there whether he was very angry. He said no. He said that he watched all the violence in sadness and in the end all those who perverted the religion were killed. Then he showed me two tall masts, wrapped in saffron cloth. He said in Sikhism, like Islam, you cannot separate religion from politics. "We have two masts; one is higher than the other." Even though they cannot enforce their laws within the community, they can still exercise it. So if a Sikh had done something wrong, he has to be punished. One of the offenders was an Indian minister or official, who in order to be re-admitted back into the community, went back to be tried and punished. The elder sentenced him to be tied around a post, but just for a short while. Then he was released and reconciled with the community.

13 The following morning, I went back to see the Temple in the daytime. Kuldip brought me around a second time. He was happy to see me again; I was happy to see him again. He gave me a Sikh bangle to wear. I asked myself, what is the commonality in all this: the Birla gift of a Hindu temple, the work of Mother Theresa, the philanthropy of the Parsees, and the way Sikhs welcome of non-Sikhs. In the end what unite us cannot be our different religious beliefs. Our religious beliefs are so different, our holy books cannot be reconciled. If theology is our starting point, it must all lead to anger and unhappiness. So what then should our starting point be? Our starting point should instead be the human being. And in the end, whether it is picking up the dying in Calcutta or accomodating hippies, or treating workers with respect, or trusting another person with your life; in the end it all goes back to our common humanity. On that, I think all of us can agree and that shoud be the beginning and the end; we as creatures of god; we as pilgrims on earth taking different journeys home. In other words if we take the human being as the focus of our collective work, I believe in the end we will do the right things. But if we begin from the abstract, from the theoretical, we will end up fighting one another and doing each other evil.

14 Near Amritsar is the Wagah border with Pakistan. Lord Mountbatten, when he had to partition India in a rush, drew the line there. Because Lahore was the Mughal capital of Punjab, it had to go to Pakistan. Amritsar, the home of the Sikhs, went to India. The line was drawn in between. In 1947, millions crossed the border, and Muslims and Hindus and Sikhs killed each other in cold blood. Trains arrived at the stations full of dead bodies. People went mad.

15 When politics intrude into religion and take over religion, you get tanks killing people and bombs going off. Innocent people are slaughtered in the name of good. But if we turn things the other way around, and start with the human being, we will do what is right and good. Thank you very much.

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