Union members at The Guardian were holding a meeting at the newspaper's Farringdon Road offices today to discuss what action to take over the treatment of Dilpazier Aslam, the trainee reporter who was dismissed last week when he refused to resign from the Islamist party, Hizb ut-Tahrir.

The meeting of the chapel, or local branch, of the National Union of Journalists was expected to discuss concerns that the usual disciplinary procedures had not been followed in Mr Aslam's case.

Mr Aslam, 27, a Yorkshire-born Muslim, had written widely on Islamic news stories for the newspaper while on a one-year trainee contract.

Following the July 7 terrorist bombings in London, he contributed an opinion piece for The Guardian's comment pages which did not carry any declaration of his affiliation to Hizb ut-Tahrir, an organisation banned in Holland and Germany and under scrutiny in Britain by the Home Office. The National Union of Students has been so concerned about the party's activities, it has banned it from using its union premises.

When Mr Aslam's membership of Hizb ut-Tahrir was exposed by internet bloggers, he was summoned to meetings with Alan Rusbridger, the editor, and Carolyn McCall, the chief executive.

According to a Guardian statement: "On Monday July 18 Aslam was advised that the Guardian considered that Hizb ut-Tahrir had promoted violence and anti-semitic material on its website and that membership of the organisation was not compatible with being a Guardian trainee.

"The following day Aslam told the editor, Alan Rusbridger, that he was not willing to leave Hizb ut-Tahrir and that, while he personally repudiated anti-semitism, he did not consider the website material to be promoting violence or to be anti-semitic."

The newspaper also maintains that Mr Aslam never declared his affiliation on his 15-page application for the one-year traineeship "despite being invited to describe any participation in public affairs or political campaigning". Mr Aslam had written for Hizb ut-Tahrir publications for some time before joining the newspaper

Today, the Guardian said that it had not been contacted by Mr Aslam, or his representatives, in connection to any possible legal action over his dismissal.

Some Guardian staff are understood to have expressed their unease at working with Mr Aslam because of his views, while sources suggested that while Mr Aslam only recently joined the NUJ, he did not have any representation present at his disciplinary meetings, something subsequently denied by the Guardian chapel.

The Guardian's statement on the subject read: "The matter was subsequently treated under the paper's grievance and disciplinary procedure. Aslam was invited to a meeting with GNL's chief executive, Carolyn McCall, at which he repeated his refusal to leave the organisation or repudiate its material."

Read Times Online's report on Aslam here.

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