'Anger growing' among young Asians

Considerable antagonism to the conflict is building among young British Muslims in London, an Opposition MP warned today.

Simon Hughes, the Liberal Democrat home affairs spokesman, said it was essential that young Muslims were dissuaded from becoming even more hostile to the campaign.

Mr Hughes, MP for North Southwark and Bermondsey, said he had talked to "very responsible young Asians" who are British-born but whose families come from Pakistan. "There is a considerable amount of antagonism," he said. "It is absolutely imperative we understand the growing resentment and get into the communities and work to dissuade them from coming to a hard-line, extremist view."

Former Home Office minister Ann Widdecombe said today that British Muslims who go to Afghanistan to fight British troops should be charged with treason. She said: "Any British citizen who fights against British forces, in my view, has committed treason and certainly, if they come back to this country, they shouldn't imagine they can just enjoy the democratic freedoms and rights of a free society, when they have fought against it. Prosecution and criminal proceedings should follow."

As she made her comments, Leader of the Commons Robin Cook made it equally clear that it was impossible to stop Britons from travelling to Afghanistan to volunteer for the fundamentalist regime.

He said: "People are free to leave this country. They are not obliged to be completely honest with us when they do about what they are going to do."