Category: Declrations

Dr. Salim M. AlMalik, Director-General (DG) of the Islamic World Educational, Scientific, and Cultural Organization (ICESCO), and on behalf of ICESCO’s staff members, expressed his sincere condolences to the Kuwaiti people and the Arab and Muslim Ummah on the passing of His Highness Sheikh Sabah Al-Ahmad, may Allah have mercy on him, stating that he learned this loss with great sadness.

Dr. AlMalik described the Late Sheikh Sabah as the great leader who made significant contributions to support joint action at the regional and international levels while underscoring His Highness’s wisdom, statesmanship, and humility. May Allah have mercy on him and grant him the highest paradise.

As Covid-19 ravages lives and economies in 213 countries and territories around the world, Islamic World Educational, Scientific, and Cultural Organization (ICESCO) pays tribute to medical and social frontliners who risk their lives every day to curb the outbreak.

This year’s celebration of World Humanitarian Day is peculiar as it comes at a catastrophic time for humanity in the form of a devastating pandemic of Covid-19. The numbers are telling. A UNOCHA July 2020 report estimates that up to 6,000 children could die every day from preventable causes as a result of Covid-19. With economies going into recession, unemployment and poverty are spiking up. This creates a huge threat to food security. In fact, the report states that the number of acutely food-insecure people in countries affected by conflict, natural disaster, or economic crises is predicted to increase from 149 million pre-COVID-19 to 270 million before the end of the year if assistance is not provided urgently.

The case of gender-based violence (GBV) has also surged during the COVID-19 pandemic. Reported cases of GBV and the number of calls to dedicated hotlines has jumped from 60 to 770 percent in different countries. UN Women estimates that in the past 12 months, up to July 2020, 243 million women and girls, aged 15–49 years, globally, were subjected to sexual and/or physical violence perpetrated by an intimate partner, while older women were also experiencing violence. Projections indicate that for every 3 months the lockdown measures continue, an additional 15 million cases of GBV are expected worldwide.

All 57 countries within the Islamic World have also been affected by the pandemic. With limited resources, domestic conflicts and widespread poverty, the Covid-19 pandemic has a tremendous impact on the lives and livelihood of millions of people in the Islamic World. During the lockdown period, ICESCO provided support to 24 Member States in the fields of education, culture, science and technology, and emergency humanitarian assistance to the most vulnerable people.

Despite the overwhelming inadequacies, medical frontliners and health workers in the Islamic World put aside their comfort and risked their lives in the middle of infection zones, just to make sure people are safe and cured and that the outbreak is contained. They sacrificed their normal lives and deprived themselves of quality time with their families to fight a bigger war for the sake of humanity.

These are the real heroes of our countries, and ICESCO, as an intergovernmental organization representing 54 Member States, pays its highest tribute to these unsung heroes.

ICESCO calls for more solidarity and policy action within the Islamic World and beyond and urges governments to place priority funding towards the medical, social, and humanitarian sector. The focus is particularly on ICESCO’s Comprehensive Humanitarian Coalition, to support the most vulnerable groups in society, namely children, women, marginalized people, and the displaced minorities. To also curb the incidence of GBV from spiralling out of control, ICESCO urges governments to increase the provisions in the welfare and mental healthcare sectors to leverage much needed support for women under oppression during these terrible times.

On April 26 of each year, the world celebrates World Intellectual Property Day. This year’s celebration is held under the theme “Innovate for a green future,” in line with the World Intellectual Property campaign that puts innovation and intellectual property rights at the heart of its effort.

This occasion is celebrated this year under exceptional circumstances that compelled states, governments and nations, affected by the COVID -19 pandemic, to adopt extraordinary working measures and procedures. It also pushed strategic studies centers and decision-making circles in different countries to recognize the need to drastically rethink the current choices and patterns and ponder upon the future of humanity exposed to threats at all levels.

In these extraordinary circumstances, copyright-supported innovation that aims to maintain human health, growth and prosperity, and strives to preserve the earth and its ecological balance is a crucial scientific mechanism and one of the most effective ways to deal with the current challenges and crises, including COVID-19.

ICESCO allocated a US$ 200,000 award to whoever discovers an effective cure or a preventive vaccine against the coronavirus. This initiative is within the framework of its strategic vision and part of its numerous initiatives to support Member States and the global community’s efforts to mitigate the impact of the coronavirus and encourage innovation in the medical field. In the same context, the Organization launched the “Global Humanitarian Coalition” through which ICESCO seeks to build an international coalition to conduct the most effective field interventions to face the pandemic; curb its current and future effects on the world at large; and promote the power of innovation and scientific research. Likewise, ICESCO launched a number of other initiatives to encourage applied scientific research, cultural creativity, and educational innovation; support states and individuals’ efforts to produce and test educational alternatives that compensate for face-to-face activities and programmes during the social distancing period.
The whole world should learn from crises and disasters to avoid making the same mistakes.

Perhaps, the most valuable lesson learned from the current global crisis is that our society, which has become a unified and tightly-linked large village facing the same fate, is more vulnerable and less equipped to face major disasters. Such reality calls for the adoption of a universal and holistic developmental approach, founded on the concepts of sustainability and universal rights including intellectual property rights, in implementation of the resolutions of the Eighth Islamic Conference of Environment Ministers, held in Rabat, Kingdom of Morocco (2-3 October 2019), under the theme “The role of cultural and religious factors in the protection of the environment and sustainable development.”

The current situation also requires increasing investment in scientific research, development, and entrepreneurship. It also calls for building integrated national systems to promote and protect innovation, especially in the Islamic world, in a bid to expedite our countries’ transition to knowledge societies and guarantee a better future for our peoples and humanity at large.

Today, we are proud to celebrate International Women’s Day as a momentous occasion when weacknowledge and recognize the progress made towards achieving gender equality and women empowerment. A few decades ago, the Islamic World Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (ICESCO)highlightedthe significance of this important day dedicated to women, calling on all sectors of society to march towards gender equality, women’s rights and their rightful place in all spheres at the turn of the century.

In its new strategic plan, ICESCO has identified women’s participation and leadership in peace-building initiatives, science and technology, as among crucialdrivers of change. The development of a dynamic and an all-inclusive ecosystem, ensuring progress for women at all levels, in culture, education, and other socio-economic undertakings, is paramount.

One glaring reality, as nations of the world commit themselves to the UN’s 4th Sustainable Development Goal on education is that girls and women currently comprise 65 percent of the world’s 40 percent illiteracy rate. Education policies still do not adequately address all of the development challengesfaced bygirls and women in vital sectors if we are toachieve sustainable development and growth.These goals can only be achieved if we muster the full and equal participation of women and men in all ofour communities.

Dr Salim AlMalik, Director General of ICESCO, urges us to challenge antiquated gender norms, empower each other,embracediversity and inclusion,dismantlestereotypes, reject discrimination, and act together to safeguard women’s rights and their enormous potential in leadership roles.

ICESCO calls for greater political commitment to gender equality, more effectiveimplementation of laws and policies, activating legislation that preserves women’s dignity and shields them fromhuman rights violations. The Organization also callsfor spreading concepts based on the highest socio-cultural values and necessary legal protections likely to help overcome the obstacles currently hampering women’sparticipation in different economic sectors and to provide all other forms of support to ensure the success of women in all spheres.

The Islamic World Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (ICESCO), in keeping with the responsibility incumbent upon it and by virtue of its competencies and functions;
In view of the risks posed to the world by the spread of coronavirus (COVID-19);
And being aware of the serious repercussions of the spread of this pandemic in the Islamic world;
Calls upon the Member States’ competent authorities in the fields of education, sciences, culture and communication to exercise the highest degree of vigilance and precaution to prevent the causes of this disease and take urgent and effective measures to reduce its spread.
In the event educational institutions were to be closed temporarily in countries that show signs of the spread of this pandemic, and class attendance were to be substituted with available educational alternatives according to each country’s means, ICESCO expresses its permanent willingness to support the efforts of Member States in such a way as to ensure the sustainability of the right to education and the continuity of the educational process in the best appropriate conditions.

In its bid to encourage medical and specialized scientific research, thereby promoting humanitarian and social undertakings as its core objective, the Islamic World Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (ICESCO) announced setting up a US$200,000 prize award for individuals or group who will find an effective cure or develop vaccine against Coronavirus (Corvid 19).

         The ICESCO Director General, Dr. Salim M. AlMalik, reaffirmed this initiative, reflecting the Organization’s awareness of the serious repercussions of this virus, threatening to become a global pandemic with serious impact on the world socio-economic situation.

Dr. AlMalik added that setting up this Prize goes in harmony with ICESCO’s new vision which highlights the need to adopt applied scientific research as a tool to find appropriate solutions to exigent and challenging issues, calling on all governments, international organizations and civil society institutions to assume their roles and intensify their efforts to counter the spread of this dangerous virus.

In the same context, Dr. AlMalik reiterated his sympathy for the families of the victims who lost their lives to this virus, and reasserts the Organization’s absolute readiness to assume its humanitarian role to abate the continued proliferation of the deadly contagion.