Richard Peppiatt, the journalist who resigned from the Daily Star, not least because of its disgraceful role in stoking the fires of bigotry against Britain’s Muslim population, gives an account of his experiences as a reporter on that paper.
Category Archives: UK
Muslim leader says Flintshire mosque still a priority
The man behind proposals for an Islamic Cultural Centre at a disused social club destroyed by fire says he is uncertain what the site’s future holds.
Mohammed Munchab Ali, chairman of the Flintshire Muslim Cultural Society, told the Leader that plans to establish a centre with a mosque in Flintshire remain in place despite Shotton Lane Social Club being burned to the ground early on February 4.
But he said any possibility of developing on the former social club land is out of the group’s hands and they remain in the dark over what the likely future of the site is.
Police yesterday confirmed they are continuing to investigate the cause of the blaze, although they have said they are treating it as suspicious.
Mr Ali, who reached an agreement for the society to move into the social club shortly before the fire, said: “What happens with the site in Shotton is beyond our control. We are still waiting to hear from the police about the fire. The situation has not really changed since the fire but we still want to create an Islamic Cultural Centre in Flintshire.”
The group is continuing to use Queensferry Community Centre but retain hopes they can expand by moving into a larger facility despite the fire and protests against the proposed development. Their hopes for a new centre include inviting all members of the Flintshire community to come and learn more about Islamic culture and to provide more facilities for women and children.
“Although we are still able to use the community centre, it is a limited facility,” added Mr Ali, owner of the Bengal Dynasty chain of restaurants. “We are finding difficulties because of the small space available and we wanted to expand our activities. “The reasons why we wanted to move are still in place.”
The site is now in the hands of receivers, with the remains of the building having been demolished. Community leaders earlier this week called for action to be taken quickly over the future of the land and clear up the “eyesore” of rubble that remains.
Mr Ali said he felt people had stopped talking about the fire during the past seven weeks but added there has been plenty of support for his organisation’s aims. He said: “A lot of people have written to us since the fire. We have had people wiring and saying they were very sorry about what had happened. If there is a positive over what happened, it has been the support we have received from people.”
EDL supporter jailed for causing criminal damage
A Mansfield man has been jailed for eight weeks for causing criminal damage during English Defence League and Unite Against Fascism protests in the Leicester. John Kavanagh, 22, of Fritchley Court, pleaded guilty at Leicester Magistrates’ Court to two charges of criminal damage.
The incidents happened on October 9 last year, when damage was caused to windows at Fabrika Bar at the Arts Centre in Humberstone Gate East. Damage was also caused to police barriers placed on Humberstone Gate.
Stoke-on-Trent mosque fire suspects charged with arson
Two men have been charged in connection with a fire at a mosque in Stoke-on-Trent.
Emergency crews were called when live CCTV footage showed smoke coming from the mosque in Regent Road, Hanley, at about 0630 GMT on 3 December, 2010.
Two men from the city, aged 23, and 28, have been charged with arson with intent to endanger life. Staffordshire Police said the men were due to appear before North Staffordshire magistrates on Friday.
See also The Sentinel, 25 March 2011
Update: See “Hanley mosque arson attack suspects bailed for crown court”, The Sentinel, 26 March 2011
Further update: See also “English Defence League activist charged with arson & intent to endanger life”, Exposing the English Defence League, 28 March 2011
Blackburn unites to reject English Defence League
Asian Image reports that in the run-up to the EDL protest in Blackburn on 2 April some of the town’s most prominent individuals and organisations have signed a joint statement highlighting community cohesion in the town and calling for support for the We Are Blackburn event celebrating multiculturalism. The statement reads:
Islamophobia is as unacceptable as any other form of racism. It divides and weakens our society by making scapegoats of one section of the community.
Since their inception, wherever the EDL have marched, their supporters have attempted verbal and physical abuse on Asian people, their friends and their property. This has no place in a civilised society and it has no place in Blackburn.
In difficult economic times, when jobs are being lost, services cut and communities as a whole suffering, racism only serves to undermine the basic solidarity we all need to have with one another.
There is also the cost of this march to the local council tax payer to be considered, both in terms of the massive police operation needed because the EDL have a well-earned reputation for thuggish behaviour, on similar marches in other parts of the country, and, the potential loss of trade for town centre businesses.
The cost to the town will be in the hundreds of thousands of pounds and Blackburn simply cannot afford this expense.
Our response therefore to the English Defence League presence in our town is to affirm our community values – based on mutual respect, tolerance and unity.
We do not wish to see our town become the venue for the latest display of EDL intimidation and violence, which is the hallmark of all of their public activity.
On Saturday April 2nd at 1:00pm on Sudell Cross Blackburn, people will to come together under the banner of Blackburn and Darwen United Against Racism.
Please come along and join in our Celebration. There is far more that unites us than divides us.
The following people have publicly stated their support for our Celebration of multiculturalism:
• The Bishop of Blackburn – Mr Nicholas Blackburn • Sir Bill Taylor • Michael Hindley former MEP Lancashire East; Leader of Hyndburn Council; Lancashire County Councillor • Kate Hollern Leader of Blackburn with Darwen Borough Council • Councillor Mohammed Khan • Councillor Tony Humphrys • Councillor Pat McFall • Councillor Dave Harling • Councillor Jim Shorrock • Peter Billington Lancashire TUC • Shaukat Hussain Labour Party Local Government Committee Chairman • Karen Narramore Secretary UNISON East Lancs Branch • Peter Dales UNISON East Lancashire Health Branch Chairman • Simon Jones Secretary Blackburn with Darwen National Union of Teachers • Paul Hogan Assistant Secretary Blackburn with Darwen National Union of Teachers • Liz Beaumont Natiuonal Union of Teachers • Cath Ford Independent local artist • Maurice Ffelan • Tom Howard • Anne Davies Hospital Volunteer • Anjum Anwar Director of Womens Voice • Phil Riley Secretary Blackburn Labour Party • Adil Babar UNISON • Dave Fleming • Tricia Gleave University & College Union Blackburn College Safety Rep • Colin Crabtree University & College Union Union Blackburn College Rep • Craig Hammond University & College Union Blackburn Branch Chairman • Ashley Whalley University & College Union Blackburn Branch Secretary • Alan McShane University & College Union Blackburn College Senior Safety Rep • John Murphy University & College Union Blackburn College Vice-Chairman • Councillor Salim Sidat • Councillor Andy Kay • Councillor Faryad Hussain • Councillor Abdul Samad Patel • Councillor Maureen Bateson • Councillor Eileen Entwistle • Councillor Naushad Surve • Councillor Mike Johnson • Hansa Canon UNISON Black Members Officer • Pat Maudsley Blackburn Labour Party • Frances Bradley Senior UNISON Steward • Dave Bradley UNISON Steward • Ian Gallagher Blackburn & District TUC • Gareth Roscoe BwDBC Local Government Branch Secretary • Dee Shuttleworth Unison Branch Administrator/Steward
England First Party to contest council seats in Stoke
The implosion of the BNP can be expected to open up some political space in which other right-wing xenophobic parties will be able to grow.
While the main beneficiary will probably be UKIP, small parties of the far right may also find their political prospects have improved with the decline of effective competition from the much larger BNP. In that context it is worth noting a piece by Tony Whalley on the Stoke-on-Trent blog Pits n Pots about two former BNP members who are are expected to stand for the fascist England First Party in the local elections in Stoke this May.
The EFP was founded in 2004 by Mark Cotterill (pictured), the former chairman of American Friends of the BNP which served as a financial conduit to the BNP from its supporters on the US far right. After being banned from the US and forced to return to the UK, Cotterill fell out with the BNP leadership and left to join the White Nationalist Party, before breaking from that too and launching the EFP. His party had some initial political success in Lancashire and managed to get Cotterill and another EFP candidate elected to Blackburn With Darwen council in 2006. In the 2010 council elections, however, the EFP was able to stand onlyseven candidates nationally, three of them in Stoke-on-Trent.
One of the prospective EFP candidates for this year’s council elections in Stoke is Mark Leat, who was elected as a BNP councillor for the North Longton ward back in 2004, winning 956 votes and narrowly defeating Labour. In the general election the following year he was the BNP parliamentary candidate for Stoke-on-Trent South where he got 8.7% of the vote. By 2007 Leat had left the BNP for reasons that remain obscure and in 2008 he stood for re-election in North Longton as an independent. However, the BNP put up their own candidate and the far-right vote was divided, allowing Labour to regain the seat.
Leat subsequently joined the EFP (denounced by Nick Griffin as a “Searchlight-run phoney nationalist party” whose objective was “to split the BNP vote in Stoke”). He contested the same North Longton ward in 2010 as an EFP candidate, but with the turnout boosted by the general election he lost heavily to Labour, although he still managed to come third with 606 votes (10.3%).
So Leat does have a public profile in Stoke-on-Trent as a result of his earlier electoral activity and therefore possesses some sort of political credibility among that not insignificant section of the white majority population there who have shown themselves willing to vote for a far-right party in the form of the BNP.
The other individual to feature in the Pits n Pots piece, Craig Pond, was the Stoke BNP branch secretary before breaking away two years ago to launch his own far-right group, the innocuous-sounding but politically poisonous Potteries Community Federation. In September 2009 Pond announced that he had finally “resigned from the BNP over Griffins [sic] ruinous behaviour” and had joined the EFP, on the grounds that it is “an already founded party which has in place all the basics, but is small enough to be molded and shaped into a nationalist fighting machine”.
While Pond may lack Leat’s political profile – his one foray into electoral politics was when he stood unsuccessfully for Stoke city council in 2008 – he far outdoes Leat in the vehemence with which he expresses his racist views, particularly with regard to Muslims. The favourite quote on Pond’s Facebook page reads “Extreme islam is an insane death cult. Moderate islam is the trojan horse that will bring it to your door” and among his list of activities and interests we find links to such causes as “NO MORE MOSQUES IN BRITAIN” and “Fck the asylum seekers give the british citizens in need a hand!”.
Tony Whalley quotes from a couple of the anti-Muslim rants that have appeared on Pond’s Potteries Community Federation blog, but even worse is to be found on Pond’s other blog, that of the EFP Stoke-on-Trent Division. Here the response to the arson attack on a Stoke mosque in December last year was to applaud the perpetrators: “If the politicians will insist on withholding our rights to democracy, then people will take matters into their own hands, and bloody good on ’em!” The establishment politicians so hated by Pond were also threatened: “these lying, thieving deceitful gits that masquerade as leaders either give us our entitlement under the rules of democratic principles, or they can expect a lot more of this kind of behaviour, some of which will hopefully be targeted at them!”
Redbridge mosque attacked by racist thugs
Redbridge mosque attacked by racist thugs
Redbridge Islamic Centre press release, 25 March 2011
Worshippers were terrified when a group of six to seven young men tried to smash their way through the front door, breaking windows causing criminal damage to the building. The attack on the Eastern Avenue mosque took place at approximately 7.45pm, just before the final evening prayer.
The thugs shouted racist and islamophobic abuse as they tried to smash their way through to the main prayer hall of the mosque throwing bricks at worshippers and staff. The imam of the mosque sustained some injuries as a result of the attack, but thankfully is not serious. Neighbouring residential properties and cars were also damaged during the ensuing carnage.
EDL supporter who burnt stolen Qur’an and shouted anti-Muslim abuse was ‘protesting against Muslim extremists not Islam as a faith’
A Carlisle man who burnt the Koran in the city centre could be facing up to two years in jail. Andrew Ryan, who claims to be a member of the English Defence League, appeared at Carlisle Magistrates’ Court today. He pleaded guilty to religiously aggravated harassment and theft – of the Koran from Carlisle Library.
The court heard he had burnt the Koran on January 19 because for the Muslims, the book is their “Holiest of Holy”. He said he had been viewing internet clips of extremist Islamic preachers and protesters earlier in the day then “lost it”.
NAMP among police groups to lose funding
Hundreds of thousands of pounds of taxpayers’ cash doled out to fringe police groups representing homosexuals, women and Muslims is to be axed.
Home Office chiefs said they could no longer afford to fund the minority police groups. These also include in-force associations that support transsexuals, Sikhs, Christians, disabled and black police officers. Last night beat bobbies were “over the moon” at the decision.
But bosses at the staff associations slammed the decision, warning it could lead to their collapse. Zaheer Ahmed, president of the National Association of Muslim Police, said cutting funds would deprive the police of “important religious and cultural voices” and could see policing thrown back to the 1970s.
Funding will stop from April 1.
Update: The National Secular Society has predictably come out in support of the withdrawal of funding from NAMP. NSS president Terry Sanderson is quoted as saying: “The rise of these minority groups within the force has been a dangerous development, and we are very pleased that the funding has come to an end, albeit on grounds of cost rather than desirability.” Another of these “minority groups” is the Gay Police Association, and we look forward to Sanderson explaining to the LGBT community why he applauds the ending of funding for that group.
‘Race hate has no place in Reading’ say political leaders
Three political leaders in Reading have united to condemn a march by the English Defence League (EDL) through the town centre.
About 200 supporters of the organisation took part in a demonstration against the “Islamification of England” on Saturday afternoon. Political leaders on Reading Borough Council have accused the group of trying to stoke up hatred and division.
Reading Council for Racial Equality (RCRE) sent member George Mathew to observe the demonstration after police advised them not to demonstrate themselves. Mr Mathew said:
“We went there with the assumption there would be between 30 and 50 people so we were really shocked by the sheer number of them. It was really scary and there were people around who were trying to do their normal shopping who were shocked by it. For me, the most disappointing, or scary, thing was that there were people who were not part of the demo who came from the crowd and joined them. That was unexpected and it made us feel very uneasy.”
Conservative Reading Borough Council leader Andrew Cumpsty said the town has excellent relations between its varied communities. He said: “Hatred and division have no place in civilised political debate and I condemn the activities of this small minority.” Deputy council leader Cllr Kirsten Bayes said: “The antics of a marginalised, discredited group such as this have no relevance to Reading. They should go home.”
And Labour group leader Cllr Jo Lovelock said: “People who come to Reading with the sole intention of stirring up racial hatred and driving a wedge between different communities must be given a clear message that they are not welcome and their hateful approach will be rejected by all who value tolerance and diversity.”