Globalisation, globalisation, globalisation. It’s all anyone ever talks about these days. Even in Malaysia, where the theme of  ‘Islam and globalisation’ dominated the first day of the 56-nation Organisation of the Islamic Conference…Islamic nations attending the conference were warned that their countries may be reduced to ‘banana republics’ unless they stop squabbling and unite to face the dangers of globalisation. Malaysia’s Prime Minister, Mahathir Mohamad, put the Internet at the center of the problem, talking of a divided Muslim world under threat from information technology which would be used to destroy Islamic values - unless countries united. The net was being used to spread ‘muck and filth,’ he said, and argued that more than half of all its business transactions were related to pornography. He may well have a point. The Prime Minister went on to urge the 1,000 delegates to heal divisions and focus attention ‘on the acquisition of knowledge to combat the use of information technology to destroy our values, our faith and the remains of our civilisation. ‘We can choose to carry on with our petty rivalries,’ he said, ‘or we can together or even separately turn to face the real threat to Islam.‘Nowhere was that threat felt more keenly, Mohamad argued, than in e-commerce, set to wipe out Islamic importers, distributors and retailers - not to mention government revenues. The Muslim world, he said, was unprepared to face globalisation and the information age because it was ‘technologically backward and poor.’