WADOOD AHMED DAUD, a youth leader with the Ahmadiyya Muslim Youth Association North-East, has offered to teach Ukip activist Tony Nixon the “peaceful way of Islam” (Echo, May 3).

How I wish I could believe him.

One has only to look around the globe.

Shia and Sunni Muslims happily murder each other in Iraq and other countries with car bombs, the Taliban murders its fellow Muslims in Afghanistan, Muslims and Hindus are in constant conflict in India, while in Mali, militant Muslims seek to impose their beliefs on non- Muslims by wholesale murder.

If a member of a Muslim family renounces their beliefs then they too can be killed. This is hardly a religion of peace.

Mr Daud suggests that the Prophet Muhammad preached peace but, as I understand it, the Koran has a multitude of statements regarding the murder of “infidels” with high praise for those who die as martyrs advancing the cause of Islam.

Like all religious tracts, such as the Bible, the Koran contains a range of statements. Anyone can pick and choose the phrases they need to justify their activities.

Eric Gendle, Middlesbrough.