Muslim Council of Wales

Yusuf Islam opened, the Cardiff University’s ground-breaking Islamic research centre which aims to promote "scholarly and public understanding" of Islam and the life of Muslim communities in Britain.

The Centre for the Study of Islam in the UK is the first of its kind in Britain hoping to lead research on Muslims in the UK.

Speaking at launch on Tuesday at Cardiff University, he said the centre was a "symbol of opportunity" to bridge the gulf of understanding he thought there was between Muslims and wider society.

He said: "Now is a chance, I think, to have a partnership, an academic understanding also, of how Islam impacts on the sociological behaviour of people, Muslims and non-Muslims."

"I think it’s important for non-Muslims to walk a little bit closer towards understanding Islam, and for Muslims to come closer to explaining it in a better, more academic and understandable way."

"It’s a two-way partnership. And (the centre) is a great symbol of opportunity, in the background that we have today, to go forward and perhaps make Islam a bit more integral to the British society, which it is capable of doing."

Islam, chair of the Islamia Schools Trust, was among some 400 people attending the launch, including leading figures from the British Muslim minority, the Muslim Council of Wales, ambassadors, scholars and children from the Taibah School.

Centre director Sophie Gilliat-Ray said Cardiff was an ideal location for the venture because the city was home to one of the oldest Muslim communities in Britain.

"Few people know that the first mosque in the UK was established in Cardiff in 1860," she said.

"From this early history, there is now a sizeable and well-established Muslim population in the city, making Cardiff one of the best places to fully appreciate the full and dynamic history of Islam and Muslims in Britain."