Cat Stevens: I was framed for backing Iran’s fatwa on Rushdie

‘Not prepared or equipped’

YUSUF Islam, who found worldwide fame as Cat Stevens, has said he was ‘cleverly framed’ to look like he supported a fatwa against Salman Rushdie.

The author lived in hiding for many years after Iran’s Ayatollah Khomeini called for his execution over his 1988 book The Satanic Verses. Islam was accused of backing the fatwa.

Appearing on BBC Radio 4’s Desert Island Discs, the 72-yearold said: ‘I was certainly not prepared or equipped to deal with shark-toothed journalists and the whole way in which the media spins stories.

‘I was cleverly framed, I would say, by certain questions... I never actually ever supported the fatwa. I even wrote a whole press statement very early on, which the press ignored.’ While appearing on Australian television in 1989, Islam said that if Sir Salman turned up at his door he’d ‘try to phone the Ayatollah Khomeini and tell him exactly where this man is’. He later clarified that comments he made on the programme were jokes made in bad taste.

Islam was born Steven Demetre Georgiou but converted to Islam in 1977 after nearly drowning in California. As Cat Stevens he released hits including Moonshadow and Father and Son, before retreating from the industry to devote himself to religion. He returned to music in 2006 with the album An Other Cup.

He said of his conversion: ‘At one point I was an icon of the majority and now I am part of the minority who are looked down upon and certainly, to a large extent, misunderstood.’