Rushdie calls on Major to stand by him

SALMAN RUSHDIE yesterday appealed to the Prime Minister to appear with him in public to emphasise the Government's support for his struggle to lift the four-year death threat against him by Iranian religious leaders.

'It's crucial to show Iran that we mean business and in a way nothing will do that other than the head of the Government standing next to me and saying we will protect our citizens,' Mr Rushdie said on BBC television's Breakfast with Frost programme.

Downing Street said it had not formally received Mr Rushdie's request, which was supported yesterday by Paddy Ashdown, the Liberal Democrat leader. But ministers confirmed last night that the Government had changed its approach to Mr Rushdie by adopting more 'high-profile' support for the lifting of the death- threat or fatwa against him.

'It's a change of presentation, not policy. We decided to give a higher profile to Mr Rushdie because we reassessed our policy and concluded it was in his interests to give it a higher profile', said one source. 'We have always supported him but until fairly recently we thought if we didn't give too high a profile there was a chance that the Iranians would moderate their policy on this.'

The Foreign Office has, in effect, admitted it miscalculated on the Rushdie affair, with a policy which mirrors its widely criticised 'softly softly' approach to terrorists and states in the Middle East over the holding of hostages.

The Foreign Office now believes it may force the Iranian leadership to drop the death threats by using international diplomatic pressure. That change was signalled earlier this month when the author of The Satanic Verses was invited to the Foreign Office for talks about government help to lift the fatwa.

It was reinforced on Friday when Douglas Hogg, Minister of State at the Foreign Office, summoned Tehran's top London envoy to protest against the fatwa's reiteration with a dollars 2m ( pounds 1.3m) reward for Mr Rushdie's murder.

Mr Rushdie, a Labour voter, last week criticised the 'silence' from that party. He says that he has now had a strong letter of support from Jack Cunningham, the shadow spokesman on foreign affairs, and a 'weak' letter from John Smith, the Labour leader.

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