Muslim leaders in Bradford have defended a counter-extremism programme which a committee claimed had “stigmatised and alienated” Muslims.

A report by the Communities and Local Government committee said the Government’s Prevent strategy, which aims to address the root causes of radicalisation and protect vulnerable individuals, had tainted many positive projects in communities.

The report said many Muslims feared the programme was an attempt to spy on them, but Muslim leaders in Bradford have said overall, the city had benefited from the strategy.

Ishtiaq Ahmed, spokesman of the Bradford Council for Mosques, said: “In some areas of the country I think it may alienate and obviously initially there were areas of concern about the Government’s Prevent strategy – the fact that it was very much targeting some Muslim communities.

“But I think in Bradford we have been able to do some very useful pieces of work looking at the issues around Prevent and how different sections of the community can come together.

“And some of those projects have been directly started within the community and we have been at the forefront of it.

“Initially there was a lot of concern particularly within the Muslim community, that it’s targeting our community, it’s stigmatising the image of the Muslim community and a lot of people were concerned that the Government’s blanket naming of the Muslim community was not a good thing.”

Dr Mohammed Iqbal, president of the Ahmadiyya Muslim Association in Bradford, said: “If the Prevent strategy honestly and truly looks at the root causes leading to extremism then I think it is a great initiative.”

“Clearly large scale radicalisation of Muslim groups is happening in the Muslim world and this needs to be addressed by the Muslim world and by countries like the UK, which have close links with some of these countries.

“A lot of this radicalisation in the Muslim community is to do with the confused foreign policy the UK and the US are pursuing in areas like the Middle East.”