PARIS: French President Nicolas Sarkozy praised Islam on Wednesday at a ceremony with Saudi Prince Al Walid bin Talal to lay the first stone for a new Islamic art section at the Louvre museum. This will be an opportunity for the French and all visitors to the Louvre to see that Islam is progress, science, finesse, modernity, and that fanaticism in the name of Islam is a corruption of Islam, Sarkozy said at the ceremony. The new exhibition space is due to open in 2010 after the ?86 million renovation project is completed at the Louvre, which draws more than seven million visitors per year. The Saudi prince, one of the world s richest men, is contributing ?17 million, while oil giant Total and Lafarge will put up ?8.5 million each, with the remainder to be covered by the government. The new display will open in the Louvre s Cour Visconti, moving closer to the museum s rooms devoted to art and artifacts from the late Antiquity and the Mediterranean region. Sarkozy also underscored the importance of the new Mediterranean union launched by more than 40 leaders including Arab heads of state at a Paris summit on Sunday to foster cooperation. France is a friend of Arab countries, said Sarkozy. France wants peace, France does not want a clash of civilizations between the West and the East , which he said would spell catastrophe for the world. It is in the Mediterranean that everything will be won or lost, said Sarkozy. France is committed to ensure that all will be won. Sarkozy's comments coincide with the inauguration of a Saudi-sponsored inter-faith conference in Madrid, in which Saudi King Abdullah appealed for constructive dialogue to end disputes between the world s major religions. We all believe in one God... We are meeting here today to say that religions should be a means to iron out differences and not to lead to disputes, he said in an inaugural speech at the three-day World Conference on Dialogue. The conference is organized by the Muslim World League from an initiative by King Abdullah, whose country hosts Islam s two holiest shrines in Mecca and Medina. Around 200 participants are attending, including representatives of the world s major religions. Among them are the secretary general of the World Jewish Congress, Michael Schneider, and Cardinal Jean-Louis Tauran, who is responsible for dialogue between the Vatican and Muslims. Most of the dialogue (between religions) has ended in failure... King Abdullah said in the speech, delivered in Arabic. To succeed we must emphasize the common link between us which a belief in God. He said religion could combat many of the problems of modern society. Terrorism...the breakdown of families, drugs, exploitation of the weak - all these are the consequences of a spiritual void. After Wednesday s inaugural session at the Pardo Palace outside Madrid, four closed-door round tables will be held before a final communiqué on Friday. The event takes place against a backdrop of tensions between the Islamic world and the West. They range from restrictions on the use of the veil by Muslim women in some European countries to cartoons regarded as blasphemous by Muslims and the unresolved Israeli-Palestinian conflict. The secretary general of the Mecca-based Muslim World League, Abdullah Al-Turki, said the aim of this inter-faith conference is for us to get to know each other and to look for ways to cooperate. He said common issues between religions such as ethics, family, the environment would be raised, but not religion or politics. The president of the World Jewish Congress, Ronald Lauder, said the conference was a significant and timely development. It is the duty of religious leaders to work together to restore respect for ethical values and to avoid a clash of civilizations, he said in a statement ahead of the event. The Vatican has described it as an act of great courage, Cardinal Tauran said. The staging of the conference in Spain, rather than in Saudi Arabia, provoked some debate in Spain. But the Saudi ambassador to Madrid, Saud bin Naif, said the country is a natural place of this type of dialogue... Spain has hosted for centuries the three major religions, they coexisted in harmony. The newspaper El Pais interpreted the choice of Madrid as an attempt to avoid a real debate in the Saudi kingdom where no one (among the non-Muslim participants at the conference) would have been able to practice their religion. Saudi Arabia remains the only Arab Muslim country to ban all non-Islamic religious practices on its soil, even though it has a large community of expatriates professing other faiths. Last November King Abdullah met Pope Benedict XVI during the first official visit to the Vatican by a monarch from the ultra-conservative Saudi kingdom.
