Remember Together aims to unite people from different faiths and ethnic backgrounds to mark armistice centenary

A campaign to recognise the people from different faiths and ethnic backgrounds who fought for Britain in the first world war, including 400,000 Muslim soldiers, has been launched ahead of the armistice centenary.

Politicians from all parties, faith leaders, former military chiefs and charities are supporting Remember Together, an initiative to highlight the often forgotten service and contribution of Muslims and other faiths.

“Most people, Muslims included, don’t know that thousands of Muslim solders from present-day Pakistan fought for Britain in the first world war,” said Imam Qari Asim, the chair of the Mosques and Imams National Advisory Board. “It’s important that they do. This shared history of contribution is something that we can all commemorate in Britain, whatever our ethnicity or faith.”

Imams in mosques across the country will give remembrance-themed services at Friday prayers.

Among those the campaign will highlight is Khudadad Khan, a Muslim from what is now Pakistan who was the first Indian soldier to be awarded the Victoria Cross, the highest military award for gallantry. He was a machine-gunner in a regiment supporting the British Expeditionary Force to prevent German troops taking the ports of Boulogne in France and Nieuport in Belgium.

Despite being overwhelmed, Khan’s team held off the German forces for long enough to allow reinforcements to arrive. All were killed by bullets or bayonets except Khan, who despite being badly wounded, continued working his gun. He was left for dead, but managed to crawl to safety.

Remember Together is a joint initiative by the integration thinktank British Future and the British Legion as part of its Thank You campaign.

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The campaign also highlights the fact that the backgrounds of the soldiers who fought for Britain in the first world war had much in common with those of Britain in 2018.

Sunder Katwala, the director of British Future, said: “We have seen extremists, both Anjem Choudary and Britain First, try to turn our cherished symbols of Remembrance into ammunition in their culture war. Both rely on an ignorance of our shared history when they tell Muslims and other minorities that they have no place in Britain.

“So it really matters that we commemorate the soldiers from all backgrounds who served a century ago, as more mosques, gurdwaras and other places of worship mark Remembrance this year.”

Rabbi Laura Janner-Klausner, the senior rabbi at Reform Judaism, said: “The bullets on the battlefields … did not discriminate between Sikhs, Muslims, Hindus, Christians, Jews and others. One hundred years later, we honour those who fought together by remembering them together.”

The campaign was launched in a letter to the Sunday Telegraph, signed among others by the former chief of the defence staff, Gen Lord Richards; the mayor of London, Sadiq Khan; the former Liberal Democrat leader Paddy Ashdown; the transport minister Nusrat Ghani and the Labour MP Dan Jarvis.