He reported that in June 1974, commandos of Salah Sirriya, the former chief of the military wing of the Hizb ut-Tahrir division in Egypt, attacked the military technology institute with a view to laying hands on its weaponry and to being able afterwards to commit a coup d'etat.
The Al-Azhar imam harshly criticized the extremists' inhuman activities and declared his support for Uzbekistan's irreconcilable position against religious extremism and terrorism contradicting the very essence of the holy Islamic religion.
Various terrorists and extremist groups are seeking under the cover of provocative slogans, like "the revival of Islamic caliphate", to achieve their anti-human purposes, according to Tantawi.. When the extremists talk about caliphate, they imply the unification of all Moslem peoples for spreading Islam all over the world and taking over all other countries.
The sheikh dubbed all appeals to setting up a caliphate as a conspiracy of people who have sidetracked from the righteous path.
Moslems should distinguish between true Islamic tenets and slogans by various groups, including Hizb ut-Tahrir who put on Islamic garb to implement their criminal schemes.
Hizb ut-Tahrir (the Islamic Party of Liberation) has been outlawed in Russia and some other countries as a terrorist organization.
