Former Tory minister, who knows the family of the alleged 17-year-old suicide bomber, criticises a policy of ‘disengagement’ with Muslim communities

Lady Warsi, the first Muslim to serve in cabinet, has warned that radicalisation of British Muslims represents a “generational challenge” that the government is failing to tackle amid fears for three sisters and their nine children who are believed to have travelled from West Yorkshire to Syria.

Speaking on BBC Radio 4’s Today programme, the former Conservative minister for faith and communities said her ex-colleagues were fuelling the problem by “disengaging” with Muslim communities.

Warsi, who is from the West Yorkshire town of Dewsbury and knew the family of 17-year-old Talha Asmal, who killed himself in a suicide attack in northern Iraq, according to the extremist group Islamic State.

She said it was important to keep the problem of radicalisation in perspective, but added: “Having spoken to Talha’s father, one person is one person too much.”

She added: “Let’s first of all be very clear about finding the evidence base of what are the drivers to radicalisation. It may make for uncomfortable reading but it is only when we start to have that honest conversation that we unpick what is now becoming a generational challenge.”

Appeal issued for three sisters and their children missing after Saudi Arabia trip Read more

She urged ministers to reach out to Muslim communities rather than disengage with groups as she said they have been doing for the past seven years.



Warsi said: “We continue to hear these calls for the Muslim community, quite rightly, to do more with dealing with this issue of radicalisation. But the British Muslim communities will be able to do that better with a government stood alongside it and collaborating with the community … Sadly over the last six or seven years there has been a policy of disengagement with British Muslim communities.”

She added: “It is incredibly odd and incredibly worrying that over time more and more individuals, more and more organisations are considered by the government to be beyond the pale and therefore not to be engaged with … Unfortunately the coalition government carried on that policy. It is now time to end that policy of disengagement and start speaking to the British Muslim communities, and empowering them to do more.”

Her comments follow the launch of an urgent appeal to track down three sisters and their nine children who travelled from Britain to Saudi Arabia for an Islamic pilgrimage and did not return.

The 12 members of the Dawood family from Bradford, West Yorkshire, are aged between three and 34 and had been due to come back to the UK last Thursday, having left for Saudi Arabia on 28 May.

Balaal Khan, a solicitor, said there were serious concerns that they may be heading for Syria and it was possible they had travelled there via Turkey. “The suspicion and main concern is that the women have taken their children to Syria,” he said. “One of the possibilities is they travelled to Turkey to travel to Syria.” This is understood to be one line of inquiry being pursued by police.

Sadly over the last six or seven years there has been a policy of disengagement with British Muslim communities Lady Warsi

A spokeswoman for the Foreign Office said: “We are in contact with West Yorkshire police and Turkish authorities and are ready to provide consular assistance.”

Naz Shah, the Labour MP for Bradford West, said she had spoken to two of the fathers of the children and said they had had no contact with the women or children. She told BBC Breakfast: “I asked them if there was any indication and they said absolutely not – it was a shock to them, it came out of the blue. The men are very, very distraught. They are confused and did not know what was happening or why it was happening.

“At this time there is no contact, absolutely zero contact with the women or children. The last contact was a few days ago when they were due to leave [Saudi Arabia].”

The group were supposed to fly to Manchester following their pilgrimage but the fathers reported them missing when they did not return, Shah said.

A resident on the street where the Dawood family used to live said they were normal and quiet. The man, who did not want to be named, said: “They were a big family and you never had any trouble from them. They were just nice and normal.

“I’m just so shocked to hear the news. Three women and nine children – it’s unbelievable.”

