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War is Not Solution to Solve Terrorism: Mahathir
ASEAN should not be participating in a war, if one does break out, because the war is not solution to solve terrorism, Prime Minister Mahathir Mohamad said Tuesday.
"We should really not participate in war. If we do, we will only help to escalate the problems because an all-out war is the wrong solution, because many innocent people are going to be killed," he said during an interview with four ASEAN journalists on the "In Conversation" program aired over TV3 Tuesday night.
Elaborating, Mahathir said outsiders might not like the Taliban government in Afghanistan and this might well be the case for Afghan people themselves.
"But they have no means of overthrowing the government. In a war, those who dislike the Taliban are also going to be killed. So it is not fair to have an all-out war against them," he said.
The Taliban rulers of Afghanistan have admitted that they are hiding Osama bin Laden, the Saudi millionaire Washington has named as the "prime suspect" of the deadly attacks on American soil on September 11.
Apart from war and terrorism, Mahathir also fielded a wide variety of questions on ASEAN, the economy, attempts by certain people to establish an Islamic state in Malaysia and globalization, among others.
Strictly speaking, international actions should be initiated by the United Nations and not by any one country, Mahathir said.
"But there is a tendency for people to bypass the U.N. and this happens especially with the big powers, strong powers. And because of that, decisions are made which are not really reflecting the interest of the world as a whole," the Malaysian prime minister said.
Mahathir said the upcoming meeting of ASEAN heads of government in Brunei Darussalam would likely discuss events in the U.S. and its repercussions to this region.
"I think whether we like it or not, we will have to discuss what happened in the U.S., simply because ASEAN is actually a trade bloc and our prosperity depends on trade. When a market is hurt or not doing well, we will suffer," he said.
"So we will need to discuss this in order to find ways and means of overcoming that and putting in place new plans, alternatives that will help the economy to recover," Mahathir said.
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