A SAUDI dissident who is said to be at the top of the Government’s list of extremists to be deported is an adviser to an Islamic group which is regularly consulted by the Home Office.

Muhammad al-Massari, who has been condemned by MPs from all parties for showing the murder of three British soldiers by an Iraqi suicide bomber on his website, is understood to be among the prominent radicals facing imminent arrest.

Government officials also knew that Dr al-Massari, 58, was involved in secret negotiations to help to free British hostages, including Kenneth Bigley, held in Iraq last year. Campaigners will use his role — as an adviser with the respected Islamic Human Rights Commission (IHRC), which has worked with police and government officials — to oppose any attempt to expel the Saudi dissident.

The IHRC says that the Home Office is still seeking its advice even though it knows of Dr al-Massari’s connections. The group liaised with Scotland Yard over safety in the Muslim community.

Lawyers for the Home Office are understood to be looking again at Dr al-Massari’s file as the expected round-up of so-called preachers of hate has been delayed. Police and immigration officials were allegedly briefed on the first targets for arrest, but the operation was postponed. No new date has been set for the round-up of Muslim radicals.

As Tony Blair returned to work yesterday he was briefed on what has become of the crackdown that he announced before going on holiday. Charles Clarke said last week, when he announced the new grounds for deportation, that the first arrests would follow “within days”.

One reason for the delay is that Home Office officials say that they have been “inundated” with names of alleged undesirables whose backgrounds and behaviour have to be checked to ensure that the Government has grounds for deportation. A spokesman for the Home Office would not say last night when the arrests will begin. Mr Clarke also said last week: “We have got names that are widely in the public domain at the moment.”

This was believed to refer to the likes of Dr al-Massari.

Senior officials in Whitehall are still hoping that he and other well-known dissidents will leave Britain rather than spend possibly years in detention during the inevitable legal wrangle over the attempted deportations. One official said last night: “He can pack his bags if he wants. We won’t try to stop him.”

It will be easier to ban Dr al-Massari if he leaves Britain, as Mr Clarke did with the radical cleric Omar Bakri Mohammad. The IHRC insisted yesterday that it will not drop Dr al-Massari from its advisory board. Massoud Shadjareh, chairman of the commission, said: “He is one of many advisers we have. Having an adviser in one particular area does not mean we endorse all activities that an individual believes in or does. If any advisers are involved in any criminal or immoral act they will be dealt with and removed from the board.”

Dr al-Massari has been an unpaid adviser since 1994, when he was first granted asylum.

Mr Shadjareh is among the growing number of Muslim leaders concerned with who is drawing up the list of alleged undesirables. All mainstream groups have refused to name names despite pleas from the Home Office to co-operate.

“I am very concerned at what the Government is trying to do. There was support for their efforts to get rid of radical preachers from abroad who could not speak English and were radicalising our youth. Now they are talking about expelling people who run websites,” Mr Shadjereh said.

Downing Street yesterday dismissed claims that new EU rules on deportation due to be announced today will block British attempts to expel Islamic extremists. A spokesman said that Britain, under a long-standing deal, only ever “opts in” to EU directives on asylum and immigration and that, in any case, other countries would probably object to restrictions on deportations.

A poll of Britain’s Muslim students found that 95 per cent oppose Britain’s foreign policy in Iraq. The Federation of Student Islamic Societies also argued that the media needs to change the image of Muslims.

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