 All right, ladies and gentlemen, we have another extremely important and highly relevant panel, given what's going on in the world, obviously, but what we just discussed before. The political fallout of what may or may not be global religious war. Anyway, let's talk about it. The title is, wherever it went. Anyway, extremism and how we can counter it. So let me immediately start by introducing our distinguished guests, the most reverent and right honorable, Archbishop of Canterbury, Justin Welby. Sitting next to me, Shokhi Ibrahim Abdel Karim Alam, who is the Grand Mufti of Egypt and also the country's authority on religious edicts. And sitting in the center there is Ayatollah Dr. Ahmad Iravani, who is professor, also president and executive director of the center for the study of Islam and the Middle East in the United States and also a fellow at Catholic University in the United States. So let's get to it, let's start this. Let me ask you all to comment on where we are. I sort of said global religious war, but there is a deep, deep worry certainly here in the halls of Davos and in the region about this polarization certainly within the Islamic faith between Saudi Arabia and Iran, between the Sunni superpower and the Shia superpower. How do you address that from your perspective and then from your perspective, Dr. Welby, in terms of how it affects extremism? Let me ask you first, Dr. Alam. Thank you very much and may the peace and grace of God be upon you all. As you all know, we are living in a very difficult situation. We are all on the same boat and one can say that we have to share the responsibility regarding this ship. If we do not manage things the way we should, then we will be faced with many dangers. We face a historical responsibility and we must shoulder this responsibility and think about things deeply. I think that the problem of terrorism is the most fundamental one at the present time, and we really have to examine the reasons behind this phenomenon of terrorism, which is such a heavy burden for us to bear right now. There are many reasons, they're complex, they're interrelated, and I don't think that we can say that this phenomenon is religious only. The religions of the book do not condone terrorism. We can't say that Islam or Christianity or any other religion is responsible for terrorism. There is nothing in the sacred texts revealed by God that are responsible for terrorism. There are other reasons, therefore we must examine them, we must identify them. There are political ones, economic ones, and social ones. I'm sure as world religious leaders you will all say that in none of your books does there exist any justification for terrorism, but unfortunately religious texts are being used to justify terrorism, violence, extremism. Before I get to you, I want to ask you, Archbishop Welby, how does the West, how does the Christian communities try to de-radicalize, try to persuade your other ethnic minorities, whether they're Islamic or wherever, that this is not a war between religions, that this is something that has to be calmed down? How do you stop the extremism in our communities? Well, very clearly, at the moment, we do it almost totally ineffectively. The evidence is simply there. We all know, and it's well accepted here, that the problem of religiously motivated violence is global and it's generational. Nobody says it's short-term, nobody says it's local. We tend to concentrate it over much on Islam when actually it's afflicting all the major faith traditions, including Christianity and including Hinduism and Buddhism, and that is happening very clearly. Secondly, it seems to me that religiously motivated violence, I hesitate in agreeing entirely with the idea that it's certainly not justified in our sacred scriptures, but within all our traditions, there is something that leads people to violence. And until we accept that and as mainstream religious leaders take responsibility for it, rather than saying they're not really Christians who killed the people at Srebrenica, so it's not my problem. If we do that, we can never face it. If we're willing to take responsibility, we can begin to address it and we will not de-radicalize until the mainstream faiths provide a sufficiently convincing, integrated narrative that is more powerful than the narratives that are parasitic on our traditions, rather than being a mainstream part of them, but overwhelm the materialism and the failure of the West to address the third part of the crisis, it's global and it's generational. It is also ideological and theological. And until we address that, we will fail. Dr Iravani, do you agree? I mean, that's a pretty blunt acceptance of responsibility on the Archbishop's side. Do you take responsibility in terms of the wider Shia or Muslim faith? You represent the Shia here right now, the Muslim faith. In the name of God, the merciful, the compassionate. Let me thank you and thank you, Rehf, for providing this opportunity. I'm very honored to be here among you respected ladies and gentlemen. Before I answer your question, again, I would like to emphasize on the issue of extremism in general and violent extremism in particular. Both of them, I can call them a kind of mental epidemic disease that goes everywhere. No, doesn't recognize border and doesn't recognize or doesn't limit to any ideology or religion. So I agree that we as a Muslim also should take responsibility of what's happening in the name of Islam, although we all say that Islam is the voice of peace, but as a reality, there are some kind of cancers and diseases that is happening now within the Muslim community that must be addressed in the larger level and must be fight against when it comes to the violent. You know, it's great to hear you say that sitting on this stage. We almost never hear that when we interview leaders on television or when they're public debates. It's all so heated that we never hear a leading cleric, a religious leader, for instance, the grand mufti of Egypt, actually saying there is a cancer in part of our society and part of our religion. So how do you, if you accept that and I assume you accept that too, how do you then start to deradicalize in Britain? The Prime Minister has just said that he's going to give more money to teach Muslim women how to speak English, to stop them being isolated, to allow them to have more influence over their children. The whole sort of idea of enlisting Syrian mothers, even in Britain, to persuade other mothers not to allow their children to go to fight for ISIS. Where do you start deradicalizing? Do you have an idea? Where do you start deradicalizing? I should like to say the following. This serious disease I think has three different levels. First of all, we need prevention. That's the first level. And this is something we can work on. We can take measures for prevention. On the second level, we need real treatment. And then a third level needs to be completely eradicated if we create the analogy with cancer, then sometimes you need to take out the tumor, remove it. When it comes to treatment, I don't think that any one party bears the responsibility. I think that there should be coordination and cooperation between all of the institutions. Religious institutions, religious leaders bear a great deal of the responsibility, obviously. We try to correct incorrect concepts that have been spread. Some ideas have been distorted and spread in their distorted form. So we try to correct some ideas and concepts and go back to the real ideas. There's also a political and an economic responsibility. There's a responsibility when it comes to education. Some school curricula need to be reformed and changed. So the responsibility is a joint one. We're all responsible. Not one party is responsible. And therefore, we call upon all parties, upon individuals, and at the international level, we call upon everyone to join the fight. Adding to what Granmofi said, as we agreed, the violent extremism or extremism in general is a kind of disease, it's not a cause. We have to find the causes of this kind of extremism. So there is no one cause, or therefore there wouldn't be one solution. Now, for that, different causes that I just want to say, a few of them, the most important one from my perspective, that create kind of extremism. There are external elements. For example, let's take the Middle East case. Now, the intervention of the countries by non-Muslims and superpowers, the issue of injustice and poverty, missing of hope for the future, the double standard policies of different regional players, the political corruption of the governments. And these are the elements that... The governments, the governments in the region. In the region, of course. The government in the region, not participation or taking in account the role of the people within their political system seriously, all of these are adding to the growth of extremism. Now, how to prevent the people to join to this group? How to stop violent extremism? So all these issues must be somehow addressed. But from a clergyman, from a man of religion, from a student of religion, also we have responsibilities. From the people of faith. Now I don't want to talk about others' responsibilities. So now, if it comes to us as a man of religions, so we have different huge kind of responsibilities among ourselves, as Muslim, that usually, unfortunately, in wrong way, divided between Shia and Sunni, and they try to bring everything on every problem towards the Shia Sunni, which is not true, that the leaders of both sides, especially Al-Azhar, with a very rich history of engagement if intraface dialogue, and also the Islamic Seminary of Qom and Najaf and Grand Ayatollahs there, at first step, they should come together and have a dialogue. Well, I want to follow up with Archbishop Welby on that because here's the problem. First of all, do you accept Archbishop Dr. Iravani's contention that, yeah, we have responsibility, but it's pretty much external causes? And do you worry that there is no one Islamic leader? I'm awfully sorry, gentlemen, but there is no Islamic Pope. We have a Catholic Pope. We have an Anglican Archbishop. We have leaders, at least in the religion that you represent, who can lay down the law. But there's so many different interpretations when it comes to your religion. Not interpretations, but leaders. They're sort of like a pyramid. Where is the one leader? So I just want to ask Archbishop Welby if you think that is one of the problems. Well, I think your question starts with a false premise. I'm very careful never to give orders because if I do, nobody ever obeys them. So I don't think that is a central problem. No. And to your other question, I think it's a complexity, but it's a complexity of real life. And it's no use saying we'd like the world to be different so it was easier to deal with. It isn't. We have to deal with it as it is. Secondly, your other question, I didn't hear the atola. I heard him using his words very carefully. He said responsibility and outward outside effects. He didn't say it's all the fault of the outside effects. And so I agree with him. It is both and. And I'm very struck by his comments on local government, the corruption issues there. I think those are courageous comments that need listening to. And what that demonstrates is the importance of a careful and on the whole, not like today, utterly confidential dialogue. We've started doing that at Lambeth Palace. One of the ways in which religious leaders take responsibility is saying we will be honest with each other until we start doing that we won't make progress. Let me ask you and maybe all of you can jump in. The Pope is going to meet with the Iranian president this week. President Hassan Rouhani will meet with the Pope at the Vatican. And just on this stage a day or so ago, the president Rouhani's chief of staff, Mr. Nahavandian, said that this was going to be a very important meeting because Rouhani has said over and again recently that we must end the abuse of our religion to excuse or to legitimize violence. So I wonder if you have any short views on whether the Pope and Rouhani's visit could be any way a game changer. I praise God that they've had the courage to do it. I think that exemplifies a really courageous step and the words that have been used in advance are encouraging. It is a time for prayer and for hope. What do you think, Sheikh Alam? Do you think it's important that the Pope meets the president of Iran? I think that any meeting or any forum or conference like the forum we are attending today, any meeting is an attempt and any attempt is important and we encourage it and we support it. Anything that will put an end to bloodshed, we support. You know, I was talking about the internal responsibilities for religious leaders. Now there is an external or interfaith dialogue responsibilities and I consider the trip of President Rouhani to Watikan, not only as a political leader but as a religious figure, a very, very important step that two important entities in the whole world are taking forward by talking to each other, by praying to each other, breaking bread to each other, hoping that would be the beginning of further cooperation between Christianity in general and Catholics in particular and Muslim in general and Shia in particular. Let me ask you more about the de-radicalization process and to build on what you have both said, that this is a cancer in certain elements of our faith and it has to be removed. I went to speak to the grand mufti of Paris, Mr. Boubacar, after the Charlie Hebdo massacre at the beginning of last year and after the Friday 13th massacre at the end of last year and he said the following, we tell our young people not to fall into these traps. We explain that this is wrong. But then we're told by the young people that you don't know what you're talking about. You are out of touch and out of date, that you are from a different generation, sir, and leave it to us. He's seeing an increasing hard line and pushing to the extremist version of Islam, even in Europe. And he also said to get rid of this cancer, you have to get rid of ISIS. He said you have to remove their territory, the territory where they are actually growing their cancer. He was for, you know, the military removal of ISIS to remove their ability to do what they're doing. Do you agree with that on both those issues? Yes, I was in Paris immediately one day after the tragic event took place and I was going to Strasbourg to take part in the World Economic Democracy Forum to give a speech there. So that was a very tragic event but made everyone to reflect and think more about the causes of that kind of actions. We realized that and I think many people were agreed that part of the reason is the Muslim, especially in France, has been marginalized and stigmatized. They are looking at them as others. They are not looking at them, the community as one community, as one human being. So dehumanizing this kind of people, that's a kind of natural reaction, they will have it to everyone including us. But again, at the same time, I have to confess that we as a people of religion need to be more educated, more updated about using technology, about the ways that we can also talk to the young generation in somehow they are right that many of our ideas are old, are not updated, so that's the fact as well. But that's not the only reason. I think that young people are an extremely important segment of society. No country can achieve prosperity and growth without its youth and therefore we have to interact with the youth and we have to use the means of their generation and we have to adopt their modern thinking and we mustn't dwell too much on the past. Obviously we need the past for certain rules and traditions and for the scientific methodology but we must adapt to the future and the progress it has made. I will give you an example. We dealt with young people by creating many pages on the internet many sites to warn young people against false ideas and extremism. We created a Facebook page and more than 3 million people visit this page on Facebook and on this page we spread correct ideas with the goal of protecting young people and young people interact with us through this page obviously. We also created a magazine called Insight Basira in Arabic. It is published in English and it tries to respond to Daesh's ideas and it provides a response based on scientific thinking so we have interacted with young people, we interact with young people and religious leaders need to deal with the youth using the means they use. We are rapidly out of time. I just want to ask you Archbishop for a concluding thought in terms of the relationship between Christianity and Islam in the parameters of this extremism dilemma we have and how you think in our western societies we can stop this interface crisis. I think we are making progress. There is a great deal more honesty coming into our conversation than in the past which was where the debate was quite often at the rather banal level of wouldn't it be nice if we were all nice? And I think we are making progress into addressing the issues that affect us. What we have lost the capacity to do and here Muslims and Christians are at one on this is we have lost the capacity in Europe to use theological values to discuss our differences in society generally it's become confined to the religious world which means we no longer have a way of answering the challenge of the extremists. We no longer have the vocabulary. We say better materialism will help us. Nobody goes to Syria because they think they'll get a better car next year. It just isn't the way they're thinking. It's a theological and ideological problem and until in Europe we regain the capacity to use theological and ideological vocabulary we will not be able to counter extremism effectively. We've lost our own roots. On that note Archbishop Justin Welby, Dr Iravani and Sheikh Alam thank you very much for this fascinating discussion. Thank you everybody. Shukran. Thank you very much. Thank you very much. Thank you. You too.