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Ammon News - AMMONNEWS - The statements by Doha-based religious scholar Yousuf Al Qaradawi do not reflect the official foreign policy of Qatar, the Qatari foreign minister has said.

“The foreign policy of Qatar is expressed and conveyed only through the official channels of the state,” Khalid Bin Mohammad Al Atiyyah said.

“ It is shameful that we allow Al Qaradawi to continue his insults of the UAE and ties [that bind] the peoples of the Arabian Gulf.”
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“Qatar’s policy is not expressed or conveyed by the media or platforms here and there. What was said by Shaikh Yousuf Al Qaradawi does not reflect the foreign policy of the state of Qatar.

“We do have full love and respect for our brothers in the UAE. Relations between Qatar and the UAE are strategic and the security of the UAE is at the same time the security of Qatar,” the minister told Qatar Television in an interview on Friday evening.


The Qatari official made the comment days after the UAE called upon Qatar to stop Al Qaradawi from continuing to insult the UAE, following a Friday prayer sermon at a Doha mosque aired on Qatar state Television in which he accused the UAE of being “against Islamic rule”.

Al Qaradawi, the head of the Muslim Brotherhood affiliated International Federation of Muslim Scholars (IFMS) was talking about the political developments in Egypt that followed the ouster of former president Mohammad Mursi, a Muslim Brotherhood leader, in July by a popular uprising.

Al Qaradawi charged that the new Egyptian administration was “ruling against Allah’s will” and that Mursi must be reinstated in order to have a government by Islamic rule. He criticised the UAE for supporting the current Egyptian government, claiming the UAE “has always been opposed to Islamic rule”.

UAE Minister of State for Foreign Affairs Dr Anwar Mohammad Gargash condemned the comments. “It is shameful that we allow Al Qaradawi to continue his insults of the UAE and ties [that bind] the peoples of the Arabian Gulf,” he wrote on his official twitter account.

Lieutenant General Dhahi Khalfan Tamim, Deputy Chairman of Dubai Police and Public Security, wondered on his twitter account why Qatar allowed such comments against the UAE by a religious leader “known to have ties to terrorist groups”.

In his remarks to Qatar TV, Al Atiyyah said Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) relations were outstandingly special, Qatar News Agency (QNA) reported. The GCC, set up in 1981, brings together Bahrain, Kuwait, Oman, Qatar, Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates.

“The GCC is an integrated entity that cannot be divided, so the security of Qatar is at the same time the security of the UAE, and vice versa. Relations between the two countries are deep rooted and well anchored in history. They are strategic in all areas and at all popular and official levels,” he said.


* AFP