MOSCOW — Moscow will host the first ever high-profile conference that seeks deepening strategic ties between Russia and its sizable Muslim community with the Muslim world. "It gives a new drive to Arab and Islamic relations with Russia, following remarkable improvements already achieved over the past few years," Ahmed Sakhratullah, one of the organizers, told IslamOnline.

Titled "Russia and the Islamic world: Partnership for the Sake of Stability", the conference will be held from September 24-26 at the Pillar Hall of Unions in the Russian capital.

It is sponsored by Russia Mufties Council, the Organization of the Islamic Conference (OIC) and Russia’s Foreign Ministry.

The gathering, to be launched by a speech from Russian President Dmitry Medvedev, will have high profile attendance representing Russia and Islamic countries.

Organizers affirm that the conference, which comes as part of celebrating five years on Russia's joining to the OIC as observer, would mark a breakthrough for the flourishing ties between Russia and the Muslim world.

It will discuss enhancing of international cooperation between Russia and the Muslim countries as well as the Muslim communities of Europe and America

Other key issues to be tackled include Russian-Muslim partnership in the fields of Islamic finance, science, culture and education.

Russian Muslims   

Organizers say that the international conference would also highlight the evolving role of Muslims in the Russian Federation. 

"Russia Mufties Council, which sponsors the conference, wants to assert Russian Muslims’s role in establishing closer ties with the Islamic world," asserts Sakhratullah

The conference will be the largest event held by the Muslim society of Russia in the new millennium.

Part of the conference will focus on the role of Russia’s Muslim groups and organizations in developing and strengthening the ties with co-believers from other countries.

Other than the Mufties Council, official partners of the gathering include the Islamic Cultural Centre of Russia and the Russian Fund for Support of Islamic culture, science and education.

The Russian Federation is home to some 23 million Muslims in the north of the Caucasus and southern republics of Chechnya, Ingushetia and Dagestan.

Islam is Russia's second-largest religion representing roughly 15 percent of its 145 million predominantly Orthodox population.