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Press TV has conducted an interview with Jahangir Mohammad, director of the Center for Muslims Affairs, to talk about the violence in the Central African Republic.

- Why do you think we’re seeing this amount of violence with such brutality directed against the Muslims even though, as I said, former [Central African Republic (CAR) President Michel] Djotodia stepped down?

- Well, I think the attitude towards Muslims existed, the hatred towards Muslims existed within the population, but as long as the Christian community were in power and in control, that wasn’t an issue. But as soon as a Muslim rebel group took over for the first time, you had a Muslim president, the issue became one of both power and religion and what’s happening here is there is an intricate link here in the whole of Africa to do with resources.

We’ve seen this played out in Sudan, in the South where the leaders were backed by corporate interests and large corporations, John Garang, and eventually that led to a breakup of the Sudanese state and the separation of the South, even though it wasn’t majority Christian.

And what we’re seeing is the former leader Francois Bozizi and an alliance of international forces and capitalist interests who are trying to regain control and to eliminate and ethnically cleanse the Muslim population, because for some reason they perceive them as a threat to their interests even though the Muslim leader stepped down and stepped aside to try to hold the country together.

It’s actually unleashed a hatred that was latent within the community towards Muslims. And in a lot of parts of Africa, the type of Christianity that is preached, the evangelical type of Christianity that comes from the United States that comes from some parts of Britain as well, is deeply anti-Muslim and preaches hatred towards Muslims and actually is very extremist and that’s what we’re seeing now. We’re seeing that hatred.

- Do you think this is about cleansing Muslim from the country?

- Well of course it is true that there have been rebel forces throughout the history of this country, mainly from the Christian side and other groups. But that hasn’t provoked this kind of response and there have been atrocities. Nobody is defending what happened by the Seleka.

The fact is that this whole thing has been turned into an anti-Muslim revenge, as it were and there has to be deep hatred that is producing this destruction of mosques, religious symbols, whole-scale butchering of civilians. This doesn’t happen because of this type of conflict. This is deep-seated hatred here that is being played out, and whatever has produced it, that doesn’t justify what’s actually happening and there is an attempt to cleanse Muslims.

- A lot of people have been saying that the French presence in CAR has not been helpful and a lot of observers have gone as far as saying that they have ulterior motives in CAR, their former colony, saying that commercial interests are involved. What do you think?

- Well of course I said in the beginning, a lot of the trigger for this violence is the outside interests. The French have always been there. Their troops have nearly been there throughout this time and their commercial interests have always been there and the religious violence has been stoked, if you like, by the commercial interests. And you know, the French are there, the UN is there. Muslims are only 15 percent. They live in certain small areas. Of course it is possible to protect them if they wanted to. The French have become the policemen of the African countries at the moment. They seem to intervene everywhere, they're going to Mali, and when they want they can get rid of people.

So, I fail to see why they can’t stop the violence that is taking place and the displacement that is taking place of Muslims. And of course, they have their own interests in the region, which as you rightly pointed out, has to do with the mineral wealth and the oil wealth and the timber there in that country, but I think there is strong African Union presence there and I think some of the Muslim neighboring countries need to get involved, otherwise Muslims in Central African Republic will be ethnically cleansed from the state.

- As we were mentioning there Mr. Mohammad, a lot of people are saying that the problems that Africa has faced is the legacy of the European presence, but others are saying they’ve got aid being approved by these countries for Africa and they are sending troops now because they feel their responsibility to help. So how should we look at this? Should we trust this international mission or shouldn’t we and why?

- Well, of course aid is needed. There is no infrastructure effectively in the country and people desperately need medical aid and humanitarian aid. But often Western aid comes with an agenda and the forces that they send usually come with an agenda. And as you rightly pointed out, the French have actually carved up Africa as well as the other Western European countries, for their own commercial interests. Since they left, those commercial interests dictate what they do in those countries and really there needs to be some presence, but whether that European presence can actually deal with it.

Don’t forget we’ve had these different regimes in the Central African Republic since the French left there and really, the state has not functioned effectively because these competing interests have played out and they back one side or the other as you’ve heard, the gentleman in Washington said the Seleka rebels were claimed to be backed by the French.