Iran FM: Extremism an outcome of West’s wrong policies

Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif said Wednesday that the existing violence and extremism in the region are the outcome of adopting wrong policies by the West. During a speech in the second and last day of the two-day international conference on ‘World Against Violence and Extremism’ in Tehran, Zarif said that the international community and all regional players have to recognize violence and extremism as the number one threat to global peace, tranquility and stability.

Zarif noted that downgrading the fight against violence and extremism is as dangerous as downgrading the existence of the phenomenon itself which would entail severe consequences. Extremism and violence are not new things; the new things in this regard are the modern styles of extremism and violence which have tied up ideology and technology, Zarif said.
He accused certain regional players of trying to exploit the violence and extremism as a means for serving their individual and political interests. The foreign minister said that extremism and violence in the current international relations are not inevitable and necessary. He said that this phenomenon is shaped by a series of intellectual and visual factors in the region and the whole world.

On the importance of intellectual roots of violence and extremism, Zarif said that ‘wars primarily begin in our minds’.
Hostilities are an outcome of hegemony which has psychological roots such as racial, class and ethnic discriminations and so on, Zarif said. He noted that peace and friendship, on the other hand, also first get shaped in the mind.

The Iranian top diplomat also referred to occupation, crackdown, violation of basic human rights, colonialism, hegemony, foreign invasion, poverty, injustice, backwardness and sanction as objective factors contributing to the creation of extremism and violence. ‘What needs to be paid due attention in the new international relations is the violence in the guise of a mild face,’ Zarif said. ‘The interventions made under pretext of defending human rights actually pursue strategic purposes.’

‘Few regions in today’s world have become as violent as our region,’ Zarif said, but added that violence is not inherent in this region but has been imposed on it.’ He blamed the crisis in Syria and Iraq on certain regional and international players that are seeking their own interests in the region and are exploiting violence and extremism to this end.

He called for replacing short-term interests with realism in order to be able to, in a common effort, get rid of the imposed violence on the region. Zarif said that the Muslim population is a special privilege for the region, saying the nature of Islam is against resorting to extremes and violence.