Australian Imams to sign up to new values code

CANBERRA, Sep 18 (Reuters) Muslim clerics in Australia will deliver more sermons in English and set up a training programme for Imams in a move aimed at stopping radical preachers from promoting violence.

A weekend meeting of Imams and Muslim community leaders also resolved to speak out more against violence and militancy, to better explain their religion to non-Muslims and to set up a national board of Imams to oversee the nation's mosques.

Prime Minister John Howard welcomed the measures, saying the changes would make the Muslim community more open and would help curb the small number of Muslims who preached violence.

''We continue to worry that there is a section of the Islamic community, a very small section, that is not serving the interests of anybody with some of the things that they've had to say,'' Howard told Australian radio today.

Australia has about 280,000 Muslims, making up about 1.5 per cent of the nation's population. Most live in the two largest cities, Sydney and Melbourne.

Howard has regularly called on the Muslim community to do more to condemn radicalism, saying a small number were resisting integration in Australia and risked stoking religious fanaticism.

The meeting of Imams coincided with a fresh push by the government to ensure all immigrants have a solid grounding in the English language and can pass a test about Australian values before they can become citizens.

In a communique issued after the conference, the Imams said they were committed to promoting a better understanding of Islam, promising more open days at mosques and doing more to distance themselves from violence and militancy.

''The Imams have condemned all forms of terrorism, hatred and extremism in the past and will continue to do so,'' the communique said.

They agreed to set up a national centre for Islamic studies in Australia, which would be open to Muslim and non-Muslim students, but said they did not want to exclude future Imams from training overseas.

Federation of Islamic Councils chairman Ameer Ali said today the new national body would help local Imams keep track of potentially radical preachers.

''There are lots of Imams claiming to be Imams. We don't know their credentials and we can't monitor what they are doing in their mosques,'' Ali told Australia radio.

''If you have an organised structure at a national level, then the Imams themselves will be able to monitor these people, and they will know who is who and where they are operating. So they will be responsible to monitor what happens in any mosque.'' REUTERS PB HS1110