2010-03-04 Britain

An influential Muslim scholar in Britain has issued a fatwa banning terror attacks and bombings, insisting that there is no justification for terror acts in the name of Islam.

At a news conference attended by officers from London's Metropolitan Police, lawmakers, charitable organizations and think-tanks, Muhammad Tahir-ul-Qadri said that acts of terrorism cut people off as true followers of Islam.

"They can't claim that their suicide bombings are martyrdom operations and that they become the heroes of the Muslim Ummah. No, they become heroes of hellfire, and they are leading towards the hellfire," he said.

In his 600-page decree, the founder of the internationally popular Minhaj-ul-Quran movement said there was no place for martyrdom through acts of terror and that such acts had nothing to do with jihad.

The scholar ruled out any excuses or pretexts for justifying acts of terror in supposed efforts to "convert an evil into good."

"Terrorism is terrorism," Qadri insisted. "Violence is violence and it has no place in Islamic teaching and no justification can be provided for it, or any kind of excuses or ifs or buts."

He reiterated that Islam is a religion of peace that promotes beauty, "betterment," goodness and "negates all form of mischief and strife."

The fatwa is not the first by a senior Muslim scholar against extremism, but Qadri's is expected to carry more weight as it will be one of the few available in English and online.