Holding midfielder currently plays for Lokomotiv Moscow.
Former Arsenal midfielder Lassana Diarra has been forced to deny that he is now an Islamic warrior fighting in Syria, according to reports in the Daily Mail.
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Reports on Twitter began to emerge over the weekend claiming that the one-time France international had gone to Syria to take part in the civil war there after an extremist appeared in video on Russian website FiSyria.com claiming to be the former Arsenal player.
However Eric Dupond-Moretti, a lawyer acting on the 29-year-old’s behalf, has since responded to those claims by saying that the plater: “denies in the most formal, the most categoric, the most absolute fashion that he has gone to Syria.
“He has never set foot in Syria. It’s absurd. He is not a jihadist, he is a footballer with Lokomotiv Moscow.”
The footage in question shows a man calling on Muslims in the West to travel to the war-torn region and fight with radical militants.
The man, whose face is hidden by a balaclava and is seen clutching a AK47 rifle, is identified as Abu Isa al-Andalus.
According to FiSyria.com, the site that posted the video, the man moved to London from his native country to play for Arsenal after growing up alongside a world-famous footballer.
“We have conquered many cities and we are now implementing the Sharia. We have areas where the kaffirs (non-Muslims) are paying us the tax,” he then adds.
“If we stay in the kaffir countries we have to pay (taxes) to them. Do you want to be humiliated by this? Think about it.
“If you have family in these (Western) countries it’s a must for you to put your children in the kaffir schools. ‘Who is going to teach your children?’ It’s going to maybe be a gay, maybe a drug dealer, maybe a paedophile.
‘”It’s very important for you to protect your children. Allah says they are the worst of creatures.”