Tony Blair attacked "crude portrayals" of Muslims by the media as the Government promised £1 million yesterday to fund better teaching of Islamic studies in British universities.
The Prime Minister emphasised that most British Muslims "seek to play a part as loyal citizens" despite the attention given to extremists. At an international conference on Islam in Central London he also said that his decisions to invade Iraq and Afghanistan must not be seen as being motivated by religion.
His words came as Bill Rammell, the Higher Education Minister, announced that Islamic studies are to be designated as "strategically important" for community cohesion and the prevention of violent extremism. The move, in response to a review by the senior government adviser, Ataullah Siddiqui, will guard the subject against cuts and allow official scrutiny of courses.
Dr Siddiqui's review was critical of existing courses for concentrating too much on the Middle East while ignoring the realities of Islam in modern multicultural society.
The Department for Education set up a project to address these concerns, for which the Higher Education Funding Council for England has committed £1 million.
University leaders said yesterday that it must be for individual institutions to decide on the content of their courses.
Drummond Bone, the president of the vice-chancellors' organisation, Universities UK, said: "It is important that all academic disciplines follow the normal quality procedures that ensure critical intellectual rig-our and openness."
Mr Blair also called for better links between state schools and institutions that offer religious education. He denied that such moves were designed to "screen out a healthy rigorous debate about the controversies of foreign policy", saying that many Christians disagreed with his decisions to invade Afghanistan and Iraq, and that the Muslim faith of these countries was "irrelevant". He said: "Leave aside for a moment whether they were the right or wrong decisions. What is damaging is if they are seen in the context of religious decisions."
Muslims wanted to play a full part in the complex and diverse societies in which they found themselves, he said, in contrast to "the often crude portrayals in the media or by those who deal only in stereotypes".
"The voices of extremism are no more representative of Islam than the use, in times gone by, of torture to force conversion to Christianity represents the true teaching of Christ," he said.
Speaking on the BBC Radio 4 Today programme, Lord Ahmed, the Labour peer, accused Downing Street of hand-picking delegates to "exclude those Muslims who disagree with government policy".
However, a spokeswoman for the University of Cambridge's Inter-Faith Programme, which organised the event, denied that there had been political interference.
David Cameron, the Conservative leader, and Ruth Kelly, the Communities Secretary, will both address the final day of the conference today.