Kuala Lumpur  - The spiritual leader of Malaysia's hardline Islamic party has slammed Muslim smokers as being worse than defecating cows, a news report said Friday.

Smoking is banned in Islam because it is hazardous to one's health, said Nik Aziz Nik Mat, the respected chief minister of the northern state of Kelantan and spiritual leader of the opposition Parti Islam SeMalaysia.

"A cow which defecates in the middle of the road, [we] cannot take legal action against it because it has no brain and cannot think," Nik Aziz was quoted as saying by the official Bernama news agency.

"But human beings, who have brains, for them to do something which is wrong in religion and healthwise, what more when they are in an attire which symbolizes Islam, they can be regarded as being more despicable than cows," he said.

His comments were unlikely to cause a drop in cigarette smokers anytime soon after government counts of the number of smokers in 2007 showed at least 4 million in Malaysia, double the number from 2006.

Despite campaigns underlining the medical risks of smoking, government agencies said the trend is increasing, especially among young people. (dpa)