London, Asharq Al-Awsat- Islamic extremist Omer Bakri, who fled Britain after the July 7th bombings in 2005, has denied that he has advocated an attack on Dublin airport.

In a telephone interview with Asharq al-Awsat from Beirut, Bakri said that he visits chat rooms like “Al-Sirdab”, “Ummat al-Haq”, and “Ahl al-Sunna wa al-Jama’ah” under aliases and sometimes under his real name to answer the participants’ questions on Islamic jurisprudence issues. He stressed that he does not incite violence or terror through these chat rooms because he does not know who he is corresponding with, pointing out that security service agents and adventurers enter these rooms to follow up the fundamentalists’ news.

Bakri, the former leader of “Al-Muhajiroun” in Britain which disbanded itself in October 2005, told Asharq Al-Awsat that “when chatting in internet chat rooms, you do not know who you are interacting with because all of them use aliases, numbers, or false names from various countries.” He expressed his belief that security services’ agents and Western journalists entered these chat rooms to provoke him with questions about jihad and mujahidin in an attempt to entrap him.” He admitted that a participant asked him few days ago for his opinion about attacking Ireland’s airports but, according to him, he answered him: “If you want to do this, go away from us.”

“I visit chat rooms when I am called to them from time to time on general Islamic questions that do not include any incitement of violence or terror, like divorce, the rites for the dead, beating with the hands, and the relationship between man and woman from an Islamic perspective.” He added.

Regarding the 14,000 pounds sterling that the British authorities seized from his son Abdul-Rahman recently, Bakri said that the birstish courts have given Scotland Yard three months to investigate the source of the money and pointed out that a group of Muslim businessmen who were his pupils signed a statement in London confirming that these funds were a present from them to Bakri to buy a car. He expressed his belief that the money would be returned to its owners again and said: “I am confident that they will find that the source of the money is legal and has nothing to do with tax avoidance or terror and not some kind of money laundering because Muslims’ money are pure and honest.”