I FULLY agree with Jo Morris (Echo, June 7) and Ifty Rafiq (Echo, May 30). Hambleton District Council’s response to the request to welcome a small number of refugees was dismal and mean-spirited.

Muslim refugees from war-torn areas in Africa and the Middle East are likely to be fleeing terrorism, not plotting terrorist attacks themselves. It seems it can never be stated often enough that more than 90 per cent of the victims of so-called “Islamist” terrorism are Muslims.

Recent terror attacks in Britain are, as Mr Rafiq says, heinous crimes, which dominate the headlines. But suicide bombings of mosques, market places and other crowded areas in Afghanistan, Pakistan, Iraq etc have become so commonplace that they get little mention in the British press.

Innocent Muslims are being slaughtered because they are seen as apostates (the “wrong” kind of Muslims) or as collaborators with regimes which the terrorists seek to overthrow.

Furthermore, the escalation of bloody conflicts in the Middle East, and the exponential growth of jihadist militancy, are mainly the consequence of ill-considered Western interventions.

Surely we have an obligation to offer sanctuary to the victims of our disastrous foreign adventures?

Pete Winstanley, Durham