'Changing attitudes': Iman Chairman welcomes German Vice Chancellor's criticism of Saudi Arabia

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'German Vice Chancellor warns Saudi Arabia over Islamist funding'

REUTERS

German Vice Chancellor Sigmar Gabriel urged Saudi Arabia on Sunday to stop supporting religious radicals, amid growing concern among some lawmakers in Berlin about the funding of militant mosques by the world's biggest oil exporter.

The unusual criticism of the Gulf state follows a report by Germany's foreign intelligence agency which suggested that Saudi foreign policy was becoming more “impulsive".

The German government rebuked the BND agency for making such suggestions about Saudi Arabia, an important business partner that is involved in international talks to find a political solution to the Syria crisis.

"We need Saudi Arabia to solve the regional conflicts," Sigmar Gabriel, the head of the Social Democrats (SPD) who share power with conservative Chancellor Angela Merkel, told the mass-circulation newspaper Bild am Sonntag.

"But we must at the same time make clear that the time to look away is past. Wahhabi mosques are financed all over the world by Saudi Arabia. In Germany, many dangerous Islamists come from these communities," he said.

Ribal Al-Assad, Chairman of the Iman Foundation, welcomed Gabriel’s comments but suggested that more could be done.

“Vice Chancellor Sigmar Gabriel’s statement is a good sign and suggests that attitudes about Saudi Arabia in the Western world might be beginning to change,” he said.

“At least, such a change is long overdue. For too long Western governments have turned a blind eye to the Saudi authorities’ support for Islamic extremism. As a consequence we have witnessed an explosion of sectarianism and violent extremism in the Middle East and indeed across the world.

“To say that Saudi foreign policy is impulsive is putting it nicely. The Saudi government is proving to be more of a liability than an asset to its allies, and it is high time policymakers in Western capitals recognised this.”