From June 25th - 29th AFPC hosted a delegation from Indonesia’s Nahdlatul Ulama (NU) movement in Washington, DC. The delegation was led by Yahya Staquf, General Secretary of the NU Supreme Council, and included Abdul Rochman, the General Secretary of the NU’s youth wing and C. Holland Taylor, the NU’s Emissary to the United Nations and the Americas. With as many as 50 million members, the NU is the largest Islamic organization in the world.
In Washington, the delegation was given the opportunity to meet with a wide range of U.S. experts and policymakers to explain the NU’s version of “humanitarian Islam” and explore ways in which the NU can contribute to the “battle of ideas” now underway in the Muslim world. At meetings with the State Department, on Capitol Hill, and with a wide variety of U.S. think tanks and policy institutes the NU was given an opportunity to articulate its inclusive, tolerant interpretation of Islam and the intensifying battle underway in Indonesia against more radical elements of the faith financed and supported by Saudi Arabia.