A CONTROVERSIAL Muslim Brotherhood-linked cleric who is banned in the US and Britain has cancelled plans to attend a conference of Islamic scholars in Ireland next week due to ill-health.

Yusuf al-Qaradawi, an Egyptian-born religious scholar who is based in Qatar and is considered a spiritual guide of the Muslim Brotherhood, was due to attend the annual meeting of the European Council for Fatwa and Research. The event, which rotates between countries, takes place in Dublin this year.

Mr Qaradawi, who presents a popular TV programme on al-Jazeera’s Arabic language channel, has prompted controversy in the US and Europe for his pronouncements, including the sanctioning of Palestinian suicide bombing.

The octogenarian cleric returned to Egypt in February after decades in exile, and led tens of thousands in prayer in Cairo’s Tahrir Square.

In the late 1990s, Mr Qaradawi established the council – a group of scholars that issues religious opinions, or fatwas, on practical matters specific to Muslims in Europe. The council is headquartered at the Islamic Cultural Centre of Ireland in Clonskeagh, Dublin, and the imam there, Egyptian-born Hussein Halawa, is the council’s secretary.

“With the [cultural centre] hosting the secretariat of this leading body of Islamic jurisprudence, Ireland has become the centre of one of the most influential ideological and intellectual trends of the contemporary Muslim world,” Dr Oliver Scharbrodt, who is leading a research project on Islam in Ireland at University College Cork, wrote in a recent volume on the country’s new religious movements.

The role of the centre as headquarters of the council has drawn the attention of the US embassy in Dublin. In a 2006 diplomatic cable released by WikiLeaks, then ambassador James Kenny concluded the council was “little more than a paper tiger”.

Mr Qaradawi has visited Ireland several times due to his links with the council. Its last annual meeting to be held in Dublin took place more than five years ago.

More than 30 religious scholars from Europe, the Middle East and Africa will attend next week’s conference at the Clonskeagh centre. The theme of the five-day event is “The Islamic Attitude towards Other Religions”. Delegates will discuss the question of dialogue with non-Muslims on a range of issues. Those present will include former government ministers from Sudan and Mauritania. The head of Mauritania’s constitutional court is also expected to attend.

Source : Irish Times