The creeping Muslim-Buddhist tension and the recent alliance forged among hard-line Buddhist nationalist movements in the “saffron crescent” countries of South and South-east Asia will undermine inter-religious relations in the world today. Islam and Buddhism have always co-existed throughout history and enjoyed a special relationship.

PEOPLE OF religion have few reasons to rejoice as the new year begins. According to the Institute for Economics and Peace, global peace as measured by the Global Peace Index has been deteriorating over the last seven years in 111 countries and improving only in 51.

One primary cause is the increase in the scale of terrorist activities, especially by terrorist groups like Boko Haram, Al Qaeda and now ISIS which committed crimes against humanity, erroneously in the name of Islam. An earlier report by Pew Research Centre showed that social hostilities involving religion had increased and that a majority of them involved Muslims and Christians.

…Mohammad Alami Musa is Head of the Studies in Inter-Religious Relations in Plural Societies (SRP) Programme at the S. Rajaratnam School of International Studies (RSIS), Nanyang Technological University.