Balkan religious heads urge harmony

The move came against the background of tensions between the Macedonian government and ethnic Albanian rebels that have threatened for weeks to explode into full-scale civil war.

The statement -- months in the making -- was released at the close of a three-day meeting of Macedonian religious leaders organized in Switzerland by the World Congress of Churches.

In the statement, the leaders acknowledged -- but at the same time sought to distance themselves from -- the strong role that religious identity plays in ethnic conflict.

"Our churches and religious communities are not involved in the conflict, and we strongly reject any effort to allow ourselves to be involved and to be manipulated, as well as any misuse of religious symbols and language for the purposes of violence," it said.

Calling for dialogue, the statement said peace "is too important to leave only to the efforts of politicians. Peace is also a responsibility of the churches and of the religious communities.

"We call on religious communities around the world to pray with us and to support our efforts for peace."

The statement was issued just days after religious leaders from Bosnia, meeting in Rome, called upon people of faith to help consolidate the peace and reconstruct that country, which was wracked by ethnic warfare in the 1990s.

"There is nothing in the Balkans that does not include both political and religious components," Mizrachi said.

"We feel that the only way to prevent intolerance or conflict is education," he added. "If everything one group does is perceived as a mystery to another group, it could also be perceived as a threat, and politicians can manipulate this."