The Archbishop of Canterbury, Dr Rowan Williams, has suffered a serious setback in his attempts to foster Muslim-Christian dialogue after the Malaysian Government banned an interfaith conference he was due to be chairing this week.

Christian and Muslim scholars from around the world had bought air tickets, written papers and begun to pack their bags for the Building Bridges conference, the sixth in a series intended to foster dialogue between the two religions. It was cancelled with just two weeks notice.

The three-day conference was set up in the wake of September 11 and meant to be an annual get-together of Christian and Muslim academics in an attempt to find theological understandings that might help prevent future terrorist attacks.

At the first conference, at Lambeth Palace in London six years ago, Lord Carey, the former Archbishop of Canterbury, fêted Tony Blair. In return, the Prime Minister invited the Muslim and Christian scholars to a high-profile reception at Downing Street.

Since then the scholars have met in New York, Qatar and Sarajevo. This year’s seminar in Malaysia was to signal a breakthrough in Muslim-Christian relations in a region where they are particularly delicate.

However, it is understood that some influential Muslims believe that Christianity is “not a heavenly religion” and therefore they frown on interreligious dialogue.

Although the Malaysian Government allowed Dr Williams into the country to preach at the consecration of a new Anglican bishop, it said that it would not permit the interfaith dialogue to take place.

Instead Dr Williams is taking part in a hastily convened visit to Sri Lanka. Preaching a sermon there yesterday, he outlined the “terrible consequences” of fear caused by division. He said: “We must keep our bridges in good repair, the bridges for listening and sympathy, hearing the truth from one another, learning what the other’s experience is like.”

Earlier this week it emerged that there are plans for Mr Blair to head a global interfaith initiative when he leaves office.

Canon Guy Wilkinson, the Archbishop’s secretary for interfaith relations, who has spent nine months organising the Malaysia conference, said that he hoped that it would still take place, albeit in another country.

“All the papers will be used in other ways,” he said. “The situation [in Malaysia] is delicate. A whole series of interreligious cases are in front of the constitutional court and awaiting judgment. The view was that it would be better not to have an international gathering of Muslims and Christians at the moment in that context.”

The cases include that of Lina Joy, whose birth name is Azlina Jailani, who has filed an appeal to have the word “Islam” removed from her identity card. She wants a declaration that Article 11 of the Federal Constitution gives her the right to convert to another religion. She is understood to have become a Christian.

Islam is the official state religion in Malaysia and Muslims are subject to sharia. Alongside this is a system of civil law that protects Christians and people of other faiths, and the constitution technically allows some freedom of religion. But there are internal tensions over conversions to other religions and over whether Malaysia is an Islamic state or a secular one. NonMuslims represent about 40 per cent of the 26-million strong population.

Angry protesters shut down one human rights event in May last year organised by Article 11, a coalition of 13 religious and human rights groups named after the constitutional article that guarantees the right of every Malaysian citizen to “profess and practise his religion”.

Professor Mona Siddiqui, director of the Centre for the Study of Islam at Glasgow University, who had been due to attend, said the conference was formally cancelled with just two weeks notice.

“Many of us were rather distressed about it,” she said. “These conferences are important on many levels. Malaysia would have been a litmus test to see how the mix of different religions and different ethnicities worked. I do not know exactly what happened, except there was contention at the highest level in Malaysia.”

She said that past conferences had been “invaluable” in enabling Christian and Muslim scholars to explore their different understandings of texts in the Bible and the Koran.

Canon David Marshall, former chaplain to Dr Williams, said it was hoped that the conference would still take place, possibly at Canterbury. “It has a very specific contribution to make and it is important that it continues,” he said.

The British participants

Michael Ipgrave Archdeacon of Southwark and an interfaith adviser to the Archbishop of Canterbury. Edited a collection of papers from at least one previous Building Bridges seminar.

Hugh Goddard Professor of Christian-Muslim Relations at Nottingham University. Fluent in Arabic, he wrote his thesis on modern Egyptian Muslim perceptions of Christianity.

David Marshall Former chaplain to Dr Rowan Williams and his predecessor, he is an expert on Christian-Muslim dialogue. He organised the first four Building Bridges seminars and was due to attend this one as a consultant.

Michael Northcott Reader in theology and Christian ethics at the University of Edinburgh’s divinity school, he taught practical theology at the Seminari Theologi Malaysia in Kuala Lumpur before going to Scotland in 1989. He is also Associate Rector at St James, Leith, and Canon Theologian of Liverpool Cathedral.

Mona Siddiqui, left Professor of Islamic studies and public understanding and director of the Centre for the Study of Islam at Glasgow University. She attended the previous seminars and writes regularly for the specialist and national press, including The Times and is an expert on classical Islam