Secretary General of the Muslim World League Sheikh Dr. Mohammed Al-Issa stressed that Saudi Arabia has established the world’s largest extremism and counter-terrorism platforms. He told Asharq Al-Awsat that the MWL is keen on “extending bridges of cooperation with different religions and cultures in order for us to work together to reach common goals.” He made his remarks on the sidelines of the Responsible Leaders Summit that was held in New York last week. The MWL has a major responsibility to “take the initiative” that has been recognized and hailed by different religious groups. This has consequently allowed the MWL to sign agreements with independent Christian and Jewish organizations with which the League shares common objectives, Issa explained. They are also keen on criminalizing hate speech, which creates violence and terrorism, he added. Commenting on the West’s tying of Islam and Muslims with violence, he said that the New York conference has helped “clarify the facts through several initiatives and programs.” He said that many people in the West have received wrong information from racist sources. “Islam is a peaceful religion as demonstrated by its texts and history,” Issa stressed. Terrorist entities and extremist groups only represent themselves. Extremism and terrorism don’t even make up a fourth of a percent of the total number of Muslims in the world, who amount to nearly 1.8 billion people, he stated. Moreover, he said Saudi Arabia has taken the initiative to combat terrorism and extremism in all of their forms. It has set up the world’s largest platform to combat terrorist ideology and formed the Islamic military coalition to fight terror. The coalition seeks to combat terrorism on the military, ideological, media and financial fronts, he went on to say. Commenting on Iran’s failure to exert efforts to fight terrorism, he noted: “One cannot rely on adherents of sectarian policies to combat extremist and terrorist thought.” Iran “also needs to be given advice to re-assess itself and abandon its policies, which we believe is harmful to Islamic peace all over the world,” Issa remarked. The MWL is determined to fight extremist and terrorist ideology and it is proud that its main headquarters are located in the holy city of Makkah in Saudi Arabia, he added.