Thanks for backing NZ on cartoons, PM tells Muslims

Prime Minister Helen Clark yesterday thanked the Islamic community in New Zealand for trying to defuse negative reaction overseas to controversial cartoons published in local media.

The cartoons, first published in Denmark, included one of the prophet Muhammad wearing a bomb as a turban. They were subsequently published in several other countries, including New Zealand, and provoked a storm of outrage in the Muslim world - leading to calls for trade bans on countries where the cartoons were published.

But Helen Clark told participants at an "interfaith" religious peace forum at Parliament that New Zealand Muslims had played a constructive role.

"Thank you also to the Islamic community for the steps they took to reach out to the wider Islamic community to say that New Zealand is a ... tolerant, inclusive country of peace - that's very important for our country's reputation."

Helen Clark also said New Zealand was making a deliberate effort to form relationships with Islamic countries to bridge "the deep gulf" that had been created since September 11, 2001.

She indicated that the fruits of New Zealand's efforts had been the visits to New Zealand last year of leaders of Indonesia, Malaysia, Pakistan, Bahrain and Turkey as evidence of efforts to engage more with the Muslim world.

"We've never seen anything like that with leaders from countries with huge Islamic populations coming to see us."

She said later that she and Governor-General Dame Silvia Cartwright had made many visits to Islamic countries.

"It has been a conscious effort of ours to try to build up links and empower models in the Islamic world."

Helen Clark plans to speak at the opening of an Interfaith Dialogue conference in the Philippines in two weeks with Philippines president Gloria Arroyo "to reinforce the reputation New Zealand has as a country which seeks to build peace and understanding".

- STAFF REPORTER, NZPA