A Pakistani news source has reported that a delegation of Jamaat-e-Islami (JEI) Pakistan will be visiting China at the invitation of the Chinese Communist Party. According to a MEMRI translation :
According to a report in the Urdu-language newspaper Roznama Mashriq, a high-level delegation of Jamaat-e-Islami Pakistan has left for China on a week-long visit. The visit came at the invitation of the ruling Communist Party of China. Senior Jamaat-e-Islami leaders, including its Emir Qazi Hussain Ahmad and his deputies Liaqat Baloch and Munawwar Hasan are part of the delegation.
Source: Roznama Mashriq, Pakistan, February 9, 2009
The JEI was founded in 1941 and is Pakistan’s oldest religious party. The party had it’s origins in the thoughts of Maulana Sayyid Abul A’la Maududi (1903-79), the most important Islamist intellectual in the history of Southeast Asia. Maududi was also a major influence on the global Muslim Brotherhood with whom the JEI has long enjoyed close relations. In the United States, the Islamic Circle of North America (ICNA) is generally considered to represent the JEI.
A recent post discussed a 3-day Islamic conference held in late October in Lahore that brought together leaders of the JEI with leaders in the global Muslim Brotherhood. Previous posts have discussed various anti-American, anti-Indian, anti-Israeli, and anti-Semitic comments made by JEI leaders.