Mar 2 2010, 07:30 AM

Tomorrow morning, on 2 March, the renowned, mainstream Muslim scholar Shaikh Dr Tahir ul-Qadri will issue a comprehensive fatwa (religious ruling) prohibiting terrorism and suicide bombing at a press conference in Westminster, London.

Founder of the international Minhaj-ul-Quran movement, his fatwa is significant because:

- Minhaj-ul-Quran is a major grass-roots organisation with hundreds of thousands of followers in South Asia and the UK. - Shaikh Dr Tahir ul-Qadri is a widely recognised and respected authority on Islamic jurisprudence.
- The fatwa condemns suicide bombers as destined for hell, which helps remove extremists’ certainty of earning paradise after death.
- The 600-page fatwa is arguably the most comprehensive theological refutation of Islamist terrorism to date.
- Dr Tahir ul-Qadri’s fatwa will set an important precedent and will allow other scholars to similarly condemn the ideas behind terrorism.

A Quilliam spokesperson said:

“This fatwa has the potential to be a highly significant step towards eradicating Islamist terrorism. Fatwas by Wahhabi-influenced clerics and Islamist ideologues initiated modern terrorism against civilians. Terrorist groups such as al-Qaeda continue to justify their mass killings with self-serving readings of religious scripture. Fatwas that demolish and expose such theological innovations will consign Islamist terrorism to the dustbin of history.”