The script for the special hour-long episode was drawn up by Fair City programme makers, and presented to senior management in RTE in the past week. The decision was then made to pull the storyline.

"Fair City was considering running a special episode involving Muslim extremists and the proposed storyline did involve a Muslim terrorist attack, " said RTE spokeswoman Tara O'Brien.

"Senior management decided it was not appropriate to go ahead with the programme because there are no Muslim characters currently in Fair City and the script did not represent or reflect the experience of Islamic communities in Ireland."

O'Brien said the programme-makers had done extensive research before drawing up the script, including consultation with the Muslim community in Ireland.

"They had spoken with a lot of different Muslim groups, who were made aware of the content of the script, " she said.

However, O'Brien could not confirm that the Irish Muslim community had given its approval to the terrorist storyline.

The special episode was due to be broadcast later this year and it is as yet unknown whether a revised version will now contain any Muslim references. "This decision has only just been made, so there are no plans yet for the new script, " said O'Brien. "As far as I know, the new storyline will not involve any Muslims."

Fair City's one-hour specials have traditionally involved controversial storylines on topical issues. Scripts from past episodes have seen characters involved in clerical sexual abuse, while another episode covered the issue of teenage suicide.