Maajid Nawaz is a Muslim who was sent to prison in Egypt for abandoning his Islamic values. He was soon released and launched a campaign to counter Islamist ideology.

He is contributing to a political fight against islamism, making him known as a ‘traitor to some, and a truth-teller to others.’ How some of his family members broke their contact with him, and how he overcame such a transformation, is all explained in BBC’s HardTalk.

Nawaz is the chairman of Quilliam, which is an organisation that counter’s extremism. Why Nawaz made that political change is all explained in his interview, including how he overcame his harsh imprisonment in the prisons of Hosni Mubarak. “When you arrive at a liberal political thinking, it basically accommodates all views as long as these views respectfully tolerate each other” claims Nawaz. “There isn’t one official version of Islam.”

Image provided by Chris Boland

Sourced: QuilliamFoundation

Curated: @KatherineNader, an online editor at Arbitrage Magazine, and the author of The Deadly Mark. She is a student of Biology, English, and Professional Writing at the University of Toronto.