http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/40082730/ns/politics-white_house"JAKARTA, Indonesia — President Barack Obama said on Tuesday that Washington's effort to reach out to the Muslim world would help improve U.S. security, although he acknowledged that there was still more work to do.
Obama arrived on Tuesday on a twice-postponed trip to Indonesia, the world's most populous majority-Muslim state. Before leaving on Wednesday, he plans a major speech reaching out to the Muslim world that would tout Indonesia as an example of an emerging democracy and tolerant society.
Indonesia was Obama's home for four years as a child.
"With respect to outreach to the Muslim world, I think that our efforts have been earnest and sustained," he said at a joint news conference with Indonesian President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono. "We don't expect that we are going to completely eliminate some of the misunderstandings and mistrust that have developed over a long period of time, but we do think that we're on the right path."
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Obama still enjoys strong support in Indonesia, even as confidence in him has dropped in other Muslim states since he made a first major speech in Cairo in June 2009 reaching out to the Muslim world.
The long U.S. wars in Muslim nations Afghanistan and Iraq have cost him support. A hardline Islamic group in the mostly moderate Muslim Indonesia has protested against his visit.
The president said he wants to make sure America is "building bridges and expanding our interactions with Muslim countries."
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Obama described a range of efforts the United States is making to reach out to Muslims, including education and business initiatives, such as a meeting Obama hosted this year that brought Muslim entrepreneurs from around the world to Washington.
"By broadening the relationship, that strengthens it, it builds trust, creates more people-to-people contact," Obama said. "That will be good for our security but it will also be good for the larger cause of understanding between the United States and the Muslim world. I think it's an incomplete project we've got a lot more work to do. It's not going to eliminate or replace some tough dialogue around concrete policy issues."
'Extra effort'
Around 15,000 police and military personnel have massed to maintain security, in a city that saw bomb attacks on hotels last year but that has made progress in tackling Islamic militancy.
At his news conference, Obama also expressed deep concern that Israelis and Palestinians aren't making the "extra effort" to secure a breakthrough for achieving Middle East peace.
Obama said he hasn't seen the kind of progress in negotiations that "could finally create a framework for a secure Israel living side by side in peace with a sovereign Palestine."
Asked about Israeli settlement construction in East Jerusalem, Obama said, "Each of these incremental steps can end up breaking that trust between these parties."
-MSNBC-
To be honest I'm kind of glad he is doing this because it keeps decreasing his chances in 2012. This kind of thing makes him look more and more like a Muslim.
Topic: "Building Bridges" Obama courts Muslims (Read 806 times)