Radio Station Claims Cliff Richard Song Prompted 'Extremist Threat'

A local radio station has claimed it was targeted by extremists after playing a track by Cliff Richard in the run up to Christmas.

Radio Basingstoke owner Astrid Haigh-Smith said the station's website was hacked by Islamic extremists on Monday (January 5th) and Wednesday (January 7th).

She claimed the message was written on behalf of September 11th suspect Ahmed Al-Qahtani.

The message read: "Whoever thinks of insulting Islam or Muslims will suffer the same fate. We are the nightmare of western websites in the cyber war."

Haigh-Smith said she believed the station had been hacked for playing Richard's cover of Leonard Cohen's 'Hallelujah'.

"I just thought maybe it was because we had commented that we hoped our troops would be safe over Christmas,” she told the Daily Mail.

“We’ve also played the Cliff Richard version of 'Hallelujah', but we would never dream of running down any religions."

Despite the alleged thereat, Haigh-Singh, who is also a DJ, added that she had no intention to amend the station's playlist.

“If we start doing things like that then the terrorists will have won,” she added.