LONDON, July 26: Muslim religious parties have strongly criticized the police raid on a mosque to detain an Afghan couple whose asylum bid had failed.

The Muslim Parliament, an Islamic religious party of Britain, has expressed shock over the raid on a mosque to detain two failed asylum seekers.

Ghayasuddin Siddiqui, the Parliament’s leader said:” I don’t think the police would have gone in wearing riot gear if these people had been taking refuge in a church or a chapel”.

He said if they wanted to arrest the couple they could have done so in a simple and quiet way, after seeking the co-operation of the mosque committee and its Imam.

Shahid Malik, a Labour Party activist and former member of the Commission for Racial Equality, likened the police raid on Ghousia mosque in Midlands with “cracking a nut with sledge hammer”.

Masood Barakzai told Dawn that both the police action on the mosque and the couple’s bid to seek sanctuary in a mosque, “are quite wrong.”

He said the holy places should not be used to seek political asylum. The Home Office said police had the power to enter into a mosque or church or any other place of worship if search warrant had been applied for and officers had reasonable grounds to believe that an arrestable offence had been committed.

Farid and Feriba Ahmadi had taken refuge in the Ghausia Jamia mosque in Lye, Stourbridge, in West Midland since last month when the Home Office ruled they had no case to stay in Britain on compassionate grounds. The couple was forcefully removed from the mosque on Thursday.