Prime minister, who only started using term Daesh for terrorist group last month, chides Radio 4 presenter

This article is more than 4 years old

This article is more than 4 years old

David Cameron has criticised the BBC again for using the term “Islamic State”, saying Muslim people would be holding their heads in despair.

The prime minister made the comments when he was asked about Islamic State by presenter Sarah Montague during an interview on the BBC Radio 4 Today programme on Monday.

“I think Muslim families around the country would have held their heads in despair this morning when once again you just called it Islamic State. You didn’t even say ‘so-called Islamic State’. It’s so important,” he said.

When Montague said he should take it up with those who set BBC editorial guidelines, he said: “I will.”

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The prime minister only started using the term Daesh on 2 December, having previously talked about Isil (an acronym for Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant). It was a victory for MPs who had frequently pressed him to change his usage, including Angus Robertson, the Scottish National party’s Westminster leader.

Cameron criticised the BBC last year for its use of Islamic State.

“It is a perversion of the religion of Islam and many Muslims listening to this programme will recoil every time they hear the words Islamic State,” he said in June. “I wish the BBC would stop calling it Islamic State because it’s not an Islamic State; what it is is an appalling, barbarous regime.”

A cross-party group of MPs, including the London mayor, Boris Johnson, the Labour chair of the home affairs select committee, Keith Vaz, and the former SNP leader Alex Salmond, urged the BBC and other broadcasters to use the name Daesh for the group.

The BBC rejected the call, but frequently prefixes references to the terrorist group with the words “so-called”.