PEACE TALKS More than 30,000 Muslims converge for Britain’s largest annual Islamic gathering to reject hate

The proud British community accuse extremists of ‘inventing their own poisonous religion’

MORE than 30,000 Muslims joined together in the Hampshire countryside to raise the Union Flag and reject violence and extremism.

The Worldwide Caliph of the Ahmadiyya Muslim community led the thousands in a vow of peace at Hadeeqatul Mahdi (Oakland Farm), Alton, on the last day of their three-day convention.

His Holiness Hazrat Mirza Masroor Ahmad spoke to delegates during the Pledge of Allegiance ceremony in which those present confirm their loyalty to the UK.

The Ahmadiyya Muslim community has led a peaceful revival of Islam from the time it was founded in India in 1889.

The organisation built London’s first mosque, The London Mosque, in Putney, in 1926.

It now has 129 branches across Britain and has opened a number of mosques, including the Baitul Futuh mosque in south London, the largest in western Europe.

Speaking ahead of the 50th convention last week, His Holiness said: “The only thing the terrorists are achieving is to completely violate the teachings of the Holy Quran and of the Holy Prophet Muhammad.

“Let it be clear that they are not practising Islam, rather it seems as though they have invented their own hate-filled and poisonous religion.”

The address last week was broadcast live globally on satellite TV from Britain’s biggest mosque in Morden, Surrey.

In it, the global Ahmadiyya Muslim leader also backed up the Pope Francis’s recent comments that whilst ‘the world is at war, it is not religious war.’