Two Birmingham universities have rubbished claims made by the Home Secretary of “complacency” in tackling radicalisation and Islamic extremism at UK universities.

Theresa May has criticised the establishments for their complacency and said they were “unwilling to recognise” that radicalisation could take place on campus. Her comments come ahead of the publication of the government’s revised Prevent counter-terrorism strategy, which is due to be released today.

The report is expected to name Birmingham as one of the 25 boroughs most “at risk” from Islamist extremism, along with areas of London, Leeds, Bradford and Manchester. It is also believed that the Government has identified 40 English universities where there could be a “particular risk” or radicalisation or recruitment on campus.

Mrs May’s claims were roundly rejected by Birmingham City University and the University of Birmingham, which said it took the threat of extremism “very seriously”.

A spokesman for the University of Birmingham said it worked with the police, student societies and community organisations to promote “good campus relations”. The spokesman said: “We respect the right of all individuals to exercise freedom of speech within the law. However, we will continue to actively challenge discrimination of any kind and strive to strike a balance that protects these freedoms and ensures vigilance against any forms of potential extremism.”

A Birmingham City University spokesman said: “We are confident that extremism is not a problem at this University; we offer a safe community for students, staff and visitors. We are fully informed on Home Office advice in this area and work closely with local agencies.”

A spokesman for Aston University said: “We feel fostering mutual respect and providing opportunities to discover more about different faiths and cultures is an extremely important step to helping avoid extremes of views.”

Birmingham Mail, 7 June 2011

You may recall the spat within the US Right back in January when mad Frank Gaffney, who has played a leading role in the promotion of anti-Sharia paranoia in the United States, claimed that the Conservative Political Action Conference had been infiltrated by the Muslim Brotherhood with the assistance of right-wingers like anti-tax campaigner Grover Norquist.

Over at Religion Dispatches Sarah Posner reports on a discussion panel at this weekend’s Faith and Freedom Coalition conference in Washington which featured a confrontation between Frank Gaffney and another conservative, Marshall Breger, who has been critical of Gaffney’s anti-Sharia scaremongering. Posner writes:

Ironically enough, the panel followed one on alleged anti-evangelical bigotry, though few if any seemed to grasp that irony, with the possible exception of Breger. He led off, reiterating his position that shari’ah is not the threat some of his fellow conservatives assert. The moderator, neo-conservative conspiracy theorist Kenneth Timmerman, cut Breger off when he tried to defend himself against Gaffney. Gaffney, who insisted that even conservatives fail to understand the threat of a political, legal, and military takeover by shari’ah, at one point shouted “Rubbish!” in reaction to Breger. Gaffney’s fear-mongering knows no bounds, as he asserted that “if we don’t wake up, we will soon be like Britain . . . or even Saudi Arabia.” He had support on the panel, too, with the Christian Broadcasting Network’s Erik Stakelback calling him “the Paul Revere of calling out the Muslim Brotherhood.”

The audience was clearly in Gaffney’s camp, with murmurs of approval and even amens. One woman said she was from Minnesota, where “we practically have a Muslim state,” and fretted that Rep. Keith Ellison, who is a Muslim, adopted a Scandanavian name to mask his Muslim identity. She asked about something she’d “heard” about a “Muslim flag” being raised over the White House; Gaffney affirmed her paranoia, saying, “it is certainly possible we’d have a Muslim flag flying over the White House.” After laying into others in the conservative movement and accusing Norquist of being a Muslim Brotherhood sympathizer, Gaffney expressed hope that the Faith and Freedom Coalition would “take up the fight against shari’ah.”

Posner spoke to Marshall Breger afterwards. He accused US conservative leaders of not “clamping down on extremists on their side”, adding: “They should be saying it’s not American to oppose an entire religion.”

Think Progress examines the origins of a bill to ban Sharia law.