David Cameron has made an eleventh-hour intervention to postpone the publication of a controversial report into the Muslim Brotherhood in an attempt to avert a potential row with Saudi Arabia and Egypt.
The long-awaited report was due to be published on Monday afternoon but Mr Cameron’s move now means it is unlikely to be released before the UK general election on May 7, if at all.
It was expected to conclude that the Muslim Brotherhood should not be proscribed as a terrorist organisation, although its activities in Britain should be more transparent and kept under review.
The Brotherhood has been banned by Saudi Arabia and the UAE; some ministers say the two Gulf countries pressured Mr Cameron into setting up the investigation in the first place.
Just hours before its scheduled publication, Mr Cameron pulled the report, saying it should instead be released alongside the coalition government’s new counter-extremism strategy. Some officials in the Foreign Office had expressed concern the report could undermine Britain’s relations with key Gulf allies.
Downing Street said publication would happen “as soon as possible” but gave no guarantee this would take place before the House of Commons is dissolved at the end of this month. Sir Malcolm Rifkind, former Conservative foreign secretary, said the delay was “bound to raise eyebrows”, adding: “It’s not a very impressive example of how to handle a sensitive subject.”
Mr Cameron’s Liberal Democrat coalition partners on Friday agreed to the publication of the report and were taken by surprise to learn the prime minister had changed his mind.
According to those who have seen the report, it will not offer policy prescriptions but instead name a network of linked organisations, some of which are implicated in extremist activity.
The review, led by Sir John Jenkins, Britain’s former ambassador to Saudi Arabia, was set up almost a year ago to consider the activities of the Muslim Brotherhood, which has a strong presence in the UK.
Mr Cameron’s allies say the prime minister commissioned the report after being badgered by Saudi Arabia and UAE. He concluded the government did not know enough about the Brotherhood’s activitiesin Britain.
The political sensitivities of the report are considerable: ministers are aware that if it is too tough it could annoy Qatar, which has backed the Brotherhood. Qatar has also just signed an intelligence sharing agreement with the UK.
The organisation also has support from Turkey, where some Brotherhood leaders fled after a 2013 coup in Egypt ousted the Brotherhood-led government in Cairo.
Steven Merley, editor of Global Muslim Brotherhood Watch, said: “Britain is the command and control centre for the Brotherhood in Europe. Nowhere else comes close — that is undeniable.”
When Mr Cameron announced the inquiry in April last year, he said: “We want to make sure we fully understand what this organisation is, what it stands for [and] what its links are. It is an important piece of work because we will only get our policy right if we understand what we are dealing with.”
But Whitehall officials said at the time that the Foreign Office was concerned the inquiry could radicalise what is otherwise a peaceful and relatively moderate organisation.
One senior government figure said: “This cuts against what the FCO has already been doing in this area, both domestically and in the Middle East. It risks turning supporters of a moderate, non-violent organisation that campaigns for democracy into radicals.”