Turkey’s President, Toyyip Erdogan and his Nigerian counterpart, Muhammadu Buhari have condemned Islamophobia, xenophobia and hate speeches on the rise across the world.
Erdogan, while addressing world leaders at the 2019 United Nations General Assembly in New York, described hate speech as a disease turning into a “raging insanity”.
President Muhammadu Buhari, on the other hand, highlighted the growing threat and hatred towards Muslims, citing the Christchurch mosque attacks earlier this year.
He said the world was shocked by the massacre in New Zealand carried out by a lone gunman taking the lives of 50 worshippers, adding that, “this and similar crimes which have been fuelled by social media networks risk seeping into the fabric of an emerging digital culture.”
President Buhari charged major tech companies to be alive to their responsibilities. “They cannot be allowed to continue to facilitate the spread of religious, racist, xenophobic and false messages capable of inciting communities against one another and leading to loss of many lives. This could tear countries apart.”
