The Dutch Ministry of Foreign Affairs has contacted the Australian authorities over the visa application by Freedom Party leader Geert Wilders.
It is unclear why the visa has not yet been granted. The anti-Islam politician applied for a visa three weeks ago in order to give a series of lectures next month. The employees who would accompany him have already received their visas and the group which invited Wilders to Australia has accused the government of stalling over his application.
The Senate has rejected a Greens motion calling on parliament to condemn the “hateful anti-Muslim views” of controversial Dutch politician Geert Wilders, who is seeking an Australian visa for a speaking tour.
Greens senator Richard Di Natale [pictured] said on Thursday it was “critically important” his motion be supported, particularly after last week’s protests in Sydney by members of the Muslim community angry about a US film on Islam.
Five men arrested in dawn raids by counter-terrorism officers on suspicion of posting race hate material will not face any charges, The Northern Echo can reveal.
The suspects – including two men from the North-East – were detained in April when dozens of plain-clothed and uniformed officers swooped on several addresses across the UK. Computers, laptops and mobile phones were seized during the operation.
But last night, the North-East Counter Terrorism Unit revealed that, following discussions with the Crown Prosecution Service (CPS), it had been decided no charges would be brought.
A man accused of using Twitter to send racially and religiously offensive messages will appear at crown court on October 29.
Ricky Davies, 20, of St Leger Crescent, Swansea, faces two charges of causing religiously aggravated harassment, another two of racially aggravated harassment and a charge of sending an indecent message.
Veteran neo-Nazi Richard Edmonds at the NF rally
The company behind a controversial Halal abattoir say they want to be a large employer for the coast.
Premier Halal Meats, who are behind an application to open up a Halal abattoir on Heath Road industrial estate in Skegness, hope to create between 40 and 70 jobs for the town.
A spokesman from the company, who would not give his name, said: “About 50 people have applied for a job with us and we expect more applications to come in. We will be employing a lot of people and hope to be one of the biggest employers in Skegness.”
Geert Wilders, who has compared the Koran to Hitler’s Mein Kampf, has been invited by the Q Society to give speeches in Melbourne and Sydney.
The Federal Government has not yet made a decision but Multicultural Affairs Minister Kate Lundy described Mr Wilders as “an extreme-right politician promulgating views that are out of step with mainstream Australia”.
A Federal Government inquiry into multiculturalism has been swamped with anonymous Islamophobic and racist submissions. The draft report is due out soon and will be released as tensions run high from recent protests in Sydney and around the world.
Of 513 submissions many are anonymous and contain lines such as: “I do object to the current policy on immigration allowing predominately (sic) Muslim so called refugees into this country they are the biggest manipulative group around, are lying deceitful and dangerous.”
Many of them have very similar themes; that multiculturalism has failed, that Muslims are to blame, that they threaten democracy in Australia and refuse to assimilate.
The submissions have been accepted by the inquiry into the “economic, social and cultural impacts of migration (which will) make recommendations to maximise the positive benefits of migration”.
‘We have nothing to do with Nazi-ism’ – SDL supporters on a demonstration
Far right extremist group the Scottish Defence League has been banned from a proposed march amid claims an attempt had been made to recruit football casuals.
Edinburgh City Council’s licensing sub-committee ruled that the demonstration – set to be attended by around 150 people – should not go ahead. A spokesman for the SDL has vowed to appeal the decision in court, saying it could not control what was posted on its Facebook site.
Bradford man Ali Shaan, a spiritual leader who was born and grew up in the city, is one of dozens who have reported being the victim of a racist attack in the area this year. The number of unreported incidents is feared to be much higher.
Recently he was walking down Canal Road on his way to prayers, when three young men in a car shouted abuse and spat on him. “It was quite horrible and I was very upset after that,” the 20-year-old Bradford College student said. “Nothing like that had ever happened to me before. That is the kind of thing that seems to becoming more directed towards the muslim community.”
The English Defence League may have hit the skids in the UK, but that hasn’t prevented the EDL leadership from still being feted by their fellow anti-Muslim racists in the “international counter-jihad movement”.
Last week EDL leader Stephen Lennon (“Tommy Robinson”) and his sidekick Kevin Carroll were in New York to attend the grandly titled International Freedom Defense Congress organised by mad Pamela Geller’s Stop Islamization of Nations to mark the eleventh anniversary of 9/11. Geller’s enthusiasm for her British guests and their heroic stand against the Muslim takeover of Britain was unrestrained, and she reproduces a report that hails Lennon and Carroll in the following breathless terms: “These brave gents refuse to leave their homes in spite of the fact that their country is now in the second stage of Islamic transformation.”