Eric Adams, mayor of Brooklyn, met with representatives of the Uzbek community in new York after the terrorist attack on Manhattan, which killed eight people. Recall that the suspect in the case is Sayfullo Saipov, a 29-year-old native of Uzbekistan.
As stated by Stefan Ring, currently in new York there are approximately 50 thousand Uzbeks. At the moment the authorities are trying to prevent radicalization in the Uzbek community in Brooklyn.
Abdullah Khawaja, President of the Turkestan Association, noted that every time some Muslim commits a terrorist act, this is immediately blamed Islam: «Terrorist attacks have nothing to do with Islam. Islam does not teach to kill innocent people. According to Islam, if you kill an innocent person, you’re going straight to hell.»
Adams said that we should not associate the attack with the Uzbek community in General. He also added that it plans to allocate funds to create a community center — the place where the Uzbeks will be able to «maintain their culture and to join the American way of life».
Adams and the leaders of the Uzbek Diaspora also discussed a number of other initiatives. Plans to introduce bilingual signs, signs in local establishments, as well as closer cooperation with the American-Turkish cultural center, Eyup Sultan mosque, which is visited by many Uzbeks.
This meeting was not the first such meeting. Ringel said that the authorities maintain a constant dialogue with the Uzbek Diaspora since then, three of them Uzbeks, residing in Brooklyn, was charged with the attempted cooperation with ISIL in 2015.
according to the materials Bklyner.
