Sarah Mullally, Archbishop of Canterbury, awarded the Hubert Walter Award for Reconciliation and Interfaith Cooperation to Pakistani cleric Hafiz Muhammad Tahir Mehmood Ashrafi at Lambeth Palace.
Ashrafi chairs the Pakistan Ulema Council. While In 2007 he announced that his council would give Osama bin Laden the title Saifullah (“Sword of Allah”) as “the highest title for a Muslim warrior,” describing him as a mujahid who had been “fighting for Islam against the Russians, Americans and British.” He has also defended Pakistan’s blasphemy laws (which carry the death penalty), opposed their repeal, and made comments in 2013 that suicide attacks in Afghanistan were lawful because NATO forces were “invaders” — remarks he later said were taken out of context. He has criticised Israel and, on 7 October 2023, described Hamas’s attack as a response to Israeli “atrocities.”
After the 2007 comments resurfaced and drew widespread criticism — including from 9/11 and UK terror-attack survivors — the award was withdrawn on 17 September.
The Lambeth Palace stated that the remarks “have come to light” and led it to reconsider.”
British hypocrisy is unparalleled; I do not know how the British Parliament and the Foreign Office will explain how Sarah Mullally—the British Archbishop of Canterbury—came to present an award to a supporter of the September 11 attacks.
By Fr. Spyridon Tanous
