Dozens of heads of state, as well as the U.N. secretary general, are gathering in Senegal’s capital, Dakar, for the Organization of the Islamic Conference, which opened its 11^th summit Thursday.

The OIC summit aims to plan a campaign against “Islamophobia” in the West and to strengthen the solidarity between its 57 members. Several leaders have called for the campaign against Islam’s negative image following the attacks on the United States in September 11, 2001.

The OIC wants to draw attention to anti-Islamic gestures such as the publication of cartoons mocking the Prophet Mohammed in Denmark and the anti-Islamic film by Dutch MP Geert Wilders.

The member states of the OIC are also set to agree on methods to reduce poverty and solve the great imbalance in wealth between rich and poor Islamic countries.

“What is important here is that [the 57 member states of] the OIC are amongst the richest and the poorest in the world,” Senegalese Foreign Affairs Minister Cheikh Tidiane Gadio said at a press conference on 11 March, as AllAfrica.com informs.

“The plan is not just to provide 'zakat' [charity] to poor states but a genuine mechanism by which the wealth of Islamic states can be more equal,” he said.

Foreign Minister Gadio also considered that the OIC should discuss African development.

"The holding of this summit in Senegal must be remembered as a landmark for Africa, just as the summit held in Malaysia [in October 2003] was a landmark for Asia," he said.

The OIC was created in 1969 and this is the first year the United States sent an envoy to the conference. Sada Cumber, a Pakistan-born Texas entrepreneur, was appointed by President Bush to attend the summit, in order to prove that the United States is a friend.