A council of mosques has stated KFC chicken cannot be termed 'halal’ even though it is claimed it is.

Members of Lancashire Council of Mosques met with representatives of Kentucky Fried Chicken (KFC) this week after concerns were raised about the restaurant’s halal status.

It follows an expansion of KFC halal restaurants in the northwest of England.

As exclusively reported in Asian Image last month, the KFC has chosen the Halal Food Authority (HFA) as it’s certification authority.

The HFA claims it is the largest food certification body in the UK and certifies thousands of shops, butchers and stores across the UK. The HMC certifies just over 300 food businesses. They claim to take a more proactive approach in ensuring food is halal. The LCM claim to have its own halal criteria and state the HMC criteria fulfils that.

The HMC itself has come in for criticism from some businesses for their extra prices they charge for their certificates and for creating doubts amongst customers.

This week Lancashire Council of Mosques (LCM) Halal Sub Group met with KFC representatives.

In a statement sent out to mosques the LCM said, “The Sub Group had a detailed discussion about the source of Halal products, the audit mechanism and the slaughter process adopted by KFC. It was confirmed at the meeting that the KFC chickens are stunned and mechanically slaughtered.

“The Sub Group presented the LCM Halal criteria to the KFC representatives, which stipulates a condition of Halal to be slaughtered manually by a Muslim invoking the name of God.

“The Sub Group expressed concerns about mechanical slaughter and informed KFC that the Muslim Council of Britain (MCB), the largest umbrella organisation in the UK, supports LCM’s position.

“The conclusion of the Sub Group is that the KFC Halal Supply Chain does not fulfil the LCM Halal criteria and therefore cannot be termed as Halal.”

Last month when Asian Image contacted the LCM they said it would allow people to make their own minds.

A spokesperson for KFC said: “We recently met with the LCM to explain our position, that we are simply responding to demand from Muslims for a halal offering in certain areas.

“We understand that there are many different interpretations of halal criteria, which is why we have consulted the Halal Food Authority, the UK’s largest and oldest halal certification body, which accredits hundreds of UK businesses and is recognised by the World Halal Council.

“The HFA has visited our stores and suppliers, and is satisfied that our entire supply chain meets its criteria.”