A Summit of 57 State Leaders doesn't happen every day.

March 8, 2008 8:01 AM

Leaders and Representatives of 57 Islamic countries (one exception is Mr. M. of Pakistan) and other dignitaries (including UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-Moon are meeting in Dakar, Senegal from March 8th-14th (link to flash video) for the 11th summit of the organization of the Islamic Conference. The OIC "combine their efforts and speak with one voice to safeguard the interests and secure the progress and well-being of their peoples and of all Muslims in the world." Topics to be discussed at the summit also include brokering a peace deal between Chad and Sudan . Some of Dakar's residents1 (2, both in French) are not happy about the summit.

Timeline of the OIC provided by the BBC.

posted by fizzix (14 comments total)

whew, information from the Press (especially in English) about this was quite difficult to find (took me about an hour to make this post).

For some reason, metafilter stripped out the links to English translations on preview, so here they are: here is a google translation of article 1 and article 2.

Any mefis happen to be there right now ? I have some friends there and hope to contact them about it.
posted by fizzix at 8:11 AM on March 8, 2008

I thought the last sentence of teh FPP meant that there were 2 residents, both of whom were French, that were not happy about teh conference. PS. the second link in that bit is broken.
posted by Space Coyote at 8:19 AM on March 8, 2008

"combine their efforts and speak with one voice to safeguard the interests and secure the progress and well-being of their peoples and of all Muslims in the world."

Including women?
posted by ZenMasterThis at 8:27 AM on March 8, 2008

Including women?

It said people, not women.
posted by Krrrlson at 8:34 AM on March 8, 2008 [1 favorite]

Including women?

Are you asking because something in one of the links made this question pertinent, or simply because the word "Muslim" appeared in the post?
posted by dsword at 8:41 AM on March 8, 2008

Is this where the "Islamofascists" get together to plan their takeover of the world and the destruction of "our" freedoms?

Can they even assemble a navy amongst them?
posted by three blind mice at 9:26 AM on March 8, 2008

I'm asking because I read the oic-un and allafrica links and saw nothing specifically mentioning the progress and well-being of women, as opposed to other organizations like RAWA which do.
posted by ZenMasterThis at 9:27 AM on March 8, 2008

Regularly scheduled summits of longstanding multi-governmental organizations are usually non-news, but I'm kind of surprised that FoxNooz or some other pseudojournalistic anti-Islamic entity isn't all over this summit with red flags flying and terror alerts blazing. The actual level of threat any assemblage of Islamic Nations could have to the non-Islamic World was brilliantly summed up by three blind mice ("Can they even assemble a navy amongst them?"), while the all-inclusiveness of Sunni and Shiite nations seem to make it more likely the summit will end with at least two members declaring war on each other. And, sadly, any attempt at anything addressing the status of women would have to be a farce to prevent many (exact number unknown) of the members from quitting the organization. This should be interesting to someone with an honest curiosity in the "Islamic World", but anyone with a reasonable amount of knowledge will only be looking for something - anything - surprising.
posted by wendell at 10:51 AM on March 8, 2008

The OIC is such a joke.
posted by parmanparman at 2:34 PM on March 8, 2008

I blame the sad state of affairs in the muslim world on the fall of the Ottoman Empire. If the US lost a war and was dismantled, 100 years later we'd probably have just as many militant Christian fundamentalist wingnuts in our impoverished backwaters.
posted by mullingitover at 3:12 PM on March 8, 2008

You will... you will...
posted by Krrrlson at 3:13 PM on March 8, 2008

Musharraf knows that if he left the country, they probably wouldn't let him back in. There is a precident for that sort of thing in Pakistan.
posted by chillmost at 4:58 PM on March 8, 2008

Including women?

Are you asking because something in one of the links made this question pertinent, or simply because the word "Muslim" appeared in the post?

I think it's a valid question to ask. A large gathering of Muslim leaders is a good opportunity to hold their feet to the fire regarding the appalling treatment of women in many Muslim counties. Would you object to picketing a Promise Keepers gathering?

Signed,

Your Friendly Neighborhood Kafir Goy Heathen.
posted by Scoo at 5:13 AM on March 9, 2008

Sadly, my only experience of this will be the inability to buy gas (stations in the city are closed) and get to work (was unable to get a pass to use the road, because they did not print enough.) Most people in my neighborhood are not unhappy, just resigned to the inconvenience, which is the general attitude towards the government here.
posted by Nothing at 1:53 PM on March 9, 2008