Chinese envoy calls for curbing online spread of religious extremist ideologies

A Chinese envoy to the United Nations called on Friday for reinforcing regulations of the cyber space and combating the use of the internet and social media to disseminate ideas of religious extremism.

The spread of religious extremism ideologies should be firmly curbed as they are "the ideological foundation of violent extremism," said Wu Haitao, China's deputy permanent representative to the UN, at UN General Assembly's High-level Conversation on Religions for Peace.

Noting that "violent extremism and terrorism are global threats," the envoy called on the international community to apply the same standards consistently worldwide and to treat violent extremism and terrorism with zero tolerance and without differentiation.

"When we combat violent extremism, we must refrain from associating it with a particular faith or ethnicity," Wu added.

Under the topic religions for peace, Wu also pointed out the exchange among civilizations played a positive role in promoting understanding and sustaining world peace.

In particular, he said that China has worked to promote the Silk Road Economic Belt and the 21th century Maritime Silk Road with an aim to help facilitate dialogue and interaction among different civilizations. Endit