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1st Muslim woman takes front seat in UK parliament

* No Muslim woman has so far been elected into House of Commons

LONDON: Human rights lawyer Sayeeda Warsi has become the first Muslim woman to take a front-bench post at cabinet level in the British parliament.

The 36-year old mother of one took her seat in the House of Lords as Baroness Warsi. She is also the youngest member of Britain’s upper parliamentary chamber and the first female Muslim for the opposition Conservative Party.

“I am delighted to take up my seat in the House of Lords and look forward to the hard work ahead and contributing to the excellent debates the House of Lords is renowned for,” she said. Warsi said it was a “great honour” to be asked by Conservative leader David Cameron to join his cabinet as shadow minister for community cohesion.

Warsi said community cohesion is about “how we all live together with ease, how we feel comfortable in our communities and ways in which we bind together as a nation”.

She joins two other Muslim women in the House of Lords, Baroness Uddin, who was given a peerage to represent the ruling Labour Party in 1998 and Baroness Falkner, who was elevated to the upper chamber as a Liberal Democrat in 2004.

No women: There have been no Muslim women so far elected to the 646-member House of Commons, which includes only four Muslim male MPs, who are all from the Labour Party. There are also four Muslim men already in the House of Lords, three Labour and one Conservative.

Warsi formally takes up her post after being appointed by Cameron in a cabinet reshuffle in June, when he said he was creating a new post to demonstrate his party’s commitment to tackling challenges faced by modern Britain. ppi

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