The most ghastly serial bomb blasts in Sri Lanka’s Churches and hotels on Easter Sunday have shocked the entire civilized society all over the world. We, the undersigned, condemn unequivocally these dastardly acts. The persons and the groups responsible for the serials blasts are anti-human, anti-civilization and anti-God. They are the incarnation of the most heinous forces on the earth. To associate them with any faith would be most sacrilegious to the faith itself. Therefore, the people of all faiths must disown and condemn such barbarous individuals and groups. It is our duty to expose them and banish them from civilized society.
(1) The terrorist attacks become all the more gruesome if launched under the garb of religion and holy mission. Besides causing great loss of innocent lives, peace and harmony is destroyed. It is the prime duty of all faith leaders to stand up and use all our resources and to cleanse society of this evil.
(2) Attacks on religious places and during religious festivals such as Easter are perpetrated with a design to cause a divide between people of various faiths and communities. Therefore we feel it all the more necessary that we stand together with our Christian brothers everywhere and assure them that we share their sorrows and pains and express our solidarity with them.
(3) We appeal to the government and law-enforcement agencies all over the world to be more vigilant and take effective precautionary measures making it impossible for any terrorist groups to play havoc with the life and property of civil society anywhere.
(4) Sri Lanka being our closest neighbour, we are ready with an offer of help to enable the victims to get over the unprecedented crisis in their lives. We propose to depute a high level delegation of various faiths to Sri Lanka to explore the possibilities of cooperation and also to offer our sincere condolence to the bereaved families.
(5) We sincerely hope that media and peace-loving citizens of this country will extend their fullest cooperation for our endeavour against terrorism. We express our resolve to continue our struggle against terrorism and for global peace. We appeal to everyone irrespective of their religion, caste and creed to come forward to save humanity and to maintain social harmony and peace.
Maulana Mahmood A. Madani + Oswald Cardinal Gracias
General Secretary Archbishop of Bombay
Jamiat Ulama-I-Hind President, Catholic Bishops’ Conference of India