London, April 13 (IANS): A man has been detained on suspicion of murdering a Syrian cleric who was found with bullet wounds in a car here, a media report said on Monday.

According to police reports, Abdul Hadi Arwani, 48, was found in a Volkswagen Passat on April 7 with gunshot wounds to his chest.

The car was found at a street in Wembley, London.

Metropolitan Police said a 46-year-old man was arrested in Brent, London, on Sunday night, BBC reported.

Police said he was being held in custody at a London police station.

Counter-terrorism detectives have been carrying out the investigation into the death of the former imam, a father of six.

Arwani was a preacher at the An Noor mosque in Acton, west London, from 2005 to 2011.

Arwani was born in Syria and attended protests against Syrian President Bashar al-Assad's regime outside Syria's embassy in Britain in 2012.

He had claimed that he was forced to flee Syria in 1982 because the country's regime sentenced him to death for photographing damage in his home city of Hama.

He had recently complained of death threats, sources said.