The Archbishop of York has sent an uncompromising message to the Islamic extremists bringing terror to the streets of Britain.

Dr John Sentamu spoke out in an interview as West Midlands Police continued to question nine people arrested in Birmingham over an alleged plot to kidnap and murder a Muslim soldier.

He said neither a sense of alienation nor religion can be an excuse for killing. Radical Muslims here must cherish British traditions and respect the law.

The second most senior cleric in the Church of England said: "If you are in Britain and you're British, you should really cherish the traditions that are here.

"In a (democratic) country like this to then say: I am going to kidnap somebody, I'm going to kill somebody, I will blow people up - for whatever ideology that is about - it isn't good citizenship.

"If you don't actually subscribe to the things that make Britain, you're going to be in trouble."

But it is a two-pronged attack. He also condemns the Government's detention of terror suspects without charge and the Home Secretary John Reid's attempt to extend the period suspects can be held.

He said the UK is close to becoming a police state in the wake of the arrest of suspected terrorists in Birmingham.

Dr Sentamu, who fled Uganda in the 1970s, criticised 90-day detention, likening it to the tyrannical rule of Idi Amin.

He said: "If you detain people, you must have good enough reason for detaining them and have a chance for there being a successful prosecution. (The Home Secretary) has not produced the evidence that shows that in 90 days you're capable of getting somebody prosecuted.

"Why does he want these days, so the police do what? Gather more evidence? To me that becomes, if you're not very careful, very close to a police state in which they pick you up and then they say later on we'll find evidence against you. That's what happened in Uganda with Idi Amin."

Dr Sentamu, who is the first member of an ethnic minority to serve as an Archbishop in the Church of England, also touched on matters further afield.

He said: "I think people in Guantanamo Bay should be put before a court of law and if they've got no evidence, they should release them."

The cleric also spoke about his views on racism in Britain - why he would like to have tea with Jade Goody to talk about her behaviour in the Big Brother house.

"We need to rediscover a bigger vision of what it is to be British.

"We have to make sure that people are making their home here and together we want to build a big enough tent to include everybody," he said.

"You know what I'd love to do one day, is to have a conversation with Jade, have a cup of tea, and talk about what is it that makes a person in a show like that use such language, be so aggressive, when actually it's purely a television show. This shouldn't produce that kind of behaviour."

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