The king of Saudi Arabia has handed his country's most-prestigious prize to a preacher who has previously said the Koran allows Muslims to have sex with female slaves.
Indian cleric Zakir Naik, who has also said 9/11 was an inside job, was handed the King Faisal International Prize for Services to Islam at a glittering ceremony in Riyadh.
A physician by training, the Mumbai-based 49-year-old has carved out a career as a charismatic television preacher, but his controversial views have led to him being banned from entering the UK.
Dr Naik was one of five winners presented a gold medal, a certificate hand written in Arabic calligraphy and an endowment of more than £130,000 by Saudi King Salman during a ceremony at a luxury hotel yesterday.
The president of the Islamic Research Foundation in India, Dr Naik was honoured for being one of the most renowned non-Arabic speaking promoters of Islam.
He founded the Peace TV channel, billed as the world's only channel specialising in comparative religion, which now reaches an estimated English-language audience exceeding 100million, according to his award citation.
'Islam is the only religion that can bring peace to the whole of humanity,' he said in a video biography aired at the ceremony. It was on a broadcast on Peace TV that Dr Naik suggested that Muslims men may rape their slaves. » | AFP and Damien Gayle for MailOnline | Monday, March 02, 2015
