Miss Australia attacked for being Muslim responds: 'Life is too short for negativity'

'I forgive them... I feel it comes from a lack of understanding,' she said

“I am hoping to break down the barriers by just being me.”

Miss World Australia 2017 winner Esma Voloder has responded to those who claim that she is not representative of the country because of her Muslim beliefs.

“I forgive them... I feel it comes from a lack of understanding,” Voloder told Australian newspaper The Daily Telegraph on Thursday.

“Life if too short for negativity,” the 25-year-old added.

“I am hoping to break down the barriers by just being me.”

Since Voloder was crowned Miss World Australia last Friday, the organisation has received numerous “awful and mean” calls demanding the choice be revoked, according to the organisation's national director Deborah Miller.

“We have had lots of calls, people saying terrible things,” Miller told The Daily Telegraph.

“People have said: ‘How did you let a Muslim win?’. We believe Esma is a strong woman and represents a multicultural Australia,” Miller added.

Born in a refugee camp during the Bosnian war, Voloder now works as a criminal profiler in Melbourne. In an interview with The Morning Show, Voloder said that her parents’ experience as refugees has helped her to “exercise my gratefulness for the fact that I have this opportunity that they didn’t.”

“We’re people from around the world, and obviously there has to be quite a strong reason for people to need to leave their country,” she added.

Voloder has called for tolerance and more understanding in response to her critics.

“A lot of things have been misconstrued about Islam,” she said. “‘I feel that a category has been created that is not really what the Quran actually promotes. I believe Islam is about peace, unity, prosperity and inclusion.”

“The Islam that I know, that is in the Koran, I don't associate that with any acts that are occurring around the world,” Voloder said after accepting the crown.

“People tend to blame religion for the atrocities that are happening, but if we do that we take responsibility away from the individuals,” she added.

Voloder said that she believes her “hurtful” detractors come from a place of misapprehension. Many people can “fall into a trap into a trap of believing what they are told,” she explained.

Voloder added the negative calls will not deter her plans to travel to China to compete for the Miss World title in November.