MOSCOW — Islamic leaders from across the Commonwealth of Independent States (CIS) have opened a two-day forum in Moscow on religious developments since the end of the Soviet Union 20 years ago, RFE/RL’s Tatar-Bashkir Service reports.
The second day of the forum will be held in the Russian city of Nizhny Novgorod on November 15. Islamic leaders from Russian regions and former Soviet states will hold a week-long seminar after the forum.
Religious achievements in the post-Soviet countries since the collapse of the USSR in 1991 will be discussed and attendees will mark the 15th anniversary of the establishment of Russia’s Council of Muftis.
The chairman of the Council of Muftis’ department for international relations, Rushan-Hazrat Abbasov, told RFE/RL that several panel sessions will also be held at the forum, including “Russia and the Islamic World — The Vector of Modernization in the CIS,” and “Changes in the Islamic World: Reforms Instead Revolutions.”
Abbasov added that Islamic scholars from Moscow, Kazan, Orenburg, and St. Petersburg, as well as Islamic leaders and scholars from Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Tajikistan, and other former Soviet states will take part in the discussions devoted to relations between the Muslim congregations in those countries.
Abbasov said that Russian Islamic leaders from the western city of Kaliningrad to the Far Eastern city of Vladivostok have gathered for the forum.
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