French ambassador: Cooperation of Western and Muslim countries best solution to uproot ISIS

(AhlulBayt News Agency) - One of the best solutions to curb the Daesh (ISIS/IS) militants' aggression, is to establish joint cooperation between the Western and Muslim countries, French Ambassador to Malaysia Christophe Penot says.

And in this regard, he said that he would like to see more commitment from Muslim countries.

"Terrorist attacks are international problems. We have to act in many areas which include commitment from Muslim countries to deal with such a situation in a way to prevent this misleading concept of Islam by Daesh and their followers," he told.

He pointed out that Daesh was very strong in manipulating and reaching out to the people through the Internet and this was very difficult to control.

Apart from this, he said that the United Nations Security Council (UNSC) was also the right platform, where all countries could act and work together to address the international challenge and decide on further action to be taken.

The envoy said that Daesh aggression committed in the name of Islam had not only tarnished the religion's image but also backlashed the public opinion in general.

Referring to the attacks in Paris last year, which killed more than 130 people, he said that it could not be denied that there were anti-Islam feeling among the French people, who were influenced by the extremist party in France, following the incident.

"It (Daesh) has consequences on the way people think and consider on Islam. However, I insist that the vast majority of the French people don't believe the Daesh propaganda, and they don't think the militants are acting in the name of Islam at all.

"And I believe in many other countries, people are well aware of what Islam is. We know very well that Islam and Daesh and terrorism are two very different things," he said.

Penot emphasised that as France is also home to five million Muslims, the country's authorities were committed in preventing acts of Islamophobia.

Amongst measures taken were by having close cooperation with the Muslim community and their representatives, monitoring and protecting mosques as well as increasing security whenever there were events organised by the local Muslims, he said.