Harry Jenkins (Scullin, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

At this time of year many of my colleagues, like me, have the opportunity of joining in celebrations following the end of the holy month of Ramadan. On Saturday night, along with the member for Batman, I was a guest at an occasion celebrating Eid-ul-Fitr—the breaking of the fast—that was sponsored by the Alawi Islamic Social Centre. At this function, like on other occasions, the leadership of the Alawi Islamic Social Centre made quite clear their point of view about some followers of Islam in their strong denouncement of all types of terror. I quote from the speech of the President, Youssef Wannoush:

The Alawi Islamic community has strongly denounced and refuted all types and kinds of terror in the world and we continue so and refuse any relationship or link with any such monstrous acts.

This is characteristic of all the Islamic groups that operate in and around the northern suburbs of Melbourne. They are very much mainstream Australia. They are very much people who are proud to be living in Australia. They are proud of their faith. They understand the values under which they live here in Australia and they know that those acts of terrorism that are done in the name of Islam are not very helpful and they denounce them as anybody else would.

But they do have a genuine concern about the way in which, regrettably, Islamic Australians are portrayed in general in the media. Again, I quote from Mr Wannoush’s speech:

When we read and listen to the Australian media about the demonising of Moslems, we become extremely anxious about the future of the Islamic communities in this country which we have willingly chosen to be our homeland. We respect and hold Australia dear to our hearts and the first lesson we teach our children is to love Australia and respect its laws. We call on government officials to govern for all Australians and to preach for the unity of all Australians without discriminating between races, religions and colours to ensure that everyone feels safe and secure and to provide future generations with the appropriate environment for all to participate and contribute without fear ...

Also on this occasion, because of events that are obvious, they denounced the idea that there is any one person who can speak on behalf of the Muslim community of Australia. I think that that is very important. Mr Wannoush reminded the people at the function of Allah’s words to all faithful believers to ‘cooperate together on generosity, tolerance and piety and refrain from all rights of evil aggression’.

In the few minutes that I have left tonight I would just like to, regrettably, talk about another conflict threat in the world, and that is in Sri Lanka. If any conflict could be described as the forgotten war of the first decade of the 21st century, the situation in Sri Lanka must surely be a candidate for that label. This year there have been over 2,000 people killed. The suffering of Sri Lankans of all communities has been great. The UN estimates that 200,000 people have been internally displaced.

So it is with real regret that we see that, yet again, the consultations about Sri Lanka, organised by the Norwegian government and held in Geneva over 28 and 29 October, have concluded without even an agreement about a future meeting. This is a very sad conclusion because, as Eric Solheim, the Minister of International Development, said in his opening address to these consultations, there are three separate ways in which the international community must tackle the Sri Lankan situation. On the humanitarian suffering in Sri Lanka, there must be relief for all those who are suffering from displacement, war, killings, and simply a return to normalcy for all communities, there must be military de-escalation and there must be, in a political sense, a future that relies on addressing the underlying problems in Sri Lanka. I hope for the many Tamils and Singhalese that have made Australia home that in some way the Australian government can be involved. Sri Lanka is a member of the Commonwealth of Nations. We are a very big aid provider to Sri Lanka. This is something on which we must have an opinion and on which we must try to reach a solution and peace. (Time expired)