REFUGEES who fled Islamic extremism are being sent back into harm's way, says a Huddersfield pressure group.

The Human Rights Centre said the Home Office had tried to send back at least a dozen asylum seekers in Kirklees who had opposed fundamentalism in their home countries.

Among the cases that the Queen Street-based group mentioned was that of a Pakistani businessman who recruited workers for US bases in Kuwait.

He fled to the UK after being threatened by al-Qaida. But he was refused asylum and threatened with removal from his Dewsbury home.

To avoid the humiliation he returned to Pakistan voluntarily.

In another case a Palestinian father from a refugee camp near the Lebanese city of Sidon ended up in Huddersfield after he fell foul of Hamas.

HRC spokesman Alan Brooke said: "Shots were fired at his house after he refused to let Hamas take his children off for military training."

The man, a highly skilled engineer, has been refused asylum and cannot work as a result.

And a Lebanese man who opposed Hizbollah was also refused asylum after arriving in Huddersfield.

The centre said the Home Office had been trying to deport him before the July war between Israel and Hizbollah in Lebanon.

Mr Brooke said: "It's been put on the back-burner now, but the first chance they get they will try to send him back. The war demonstrated that Hizbollah is very, very powerful in Lebanon."

Mr Brooke criticised the Home Office for not protecting these people. He said: "They have confronted fundamentalists - but the UK refuses to protect them.

"This short-sighted policy can only benefit the terrorists who are seeking to tighten their grip on Muslim societies.

"We want the Home Secretary to protect those people who have risked their lives on the front lines of the battle for hearts and minds."

But a Home Office spokeswoman rejected the criticism.

She said: "We are committed to protecting genuine refugees who seek asylum in the UK.

"We assess cases on their merits, providing protection to those who need it and seeking to remove those who do not. This is essential if the system is to be both robust and fair.

"People who meet the definition of a refugee in the 1951 Geneva Convention are granted asylum if they can demonstrate they have a well- founded fear of persecution.

"If they do not qualify for asylum, but there are other circumstances that make them particularly vulnerable, they are granted humanitarian protection or discretionary leave."