Bogus cop is stoking up race row (UK)

A BOGUS police officer is operating in and around Worksop telling people to remove their England shirts and take down their flags.

A probe was launched after the Guardian revealed that a woman in the town had been asked to take down her England flags by what she thought was a genuine police officer.

It has now emerged that someone is posing as a Police Community Support Officer (PCSO) and was in Clumber Park last weekend asking people to remove their England shirts.

Chief Superintendent Dave Wakelin said: "I am aware of last week's publicity regarding the story that one of my staff members advised a local Worksop resident to remove her flag from her balcony as it was upsetting foreign residents."

"We are now absolutely certain that these were not bona-fide members of Notts Police, and this, linked to reports that over the weekend similar incidents occurred with people in Clumber Park being told remove their England shirts, leads me to believe that there is someone in our local community intending to cause unease."

My staff and I respect the right of local people of whatever nationality to display their flags over the coming months and beyond."

"Only if the behaviour of anyone leads us to suspect they are intending to incite racial hatred will the police become involved."

"The mere showing of a flag or the wearing of a football shirt will not attract, on its own, any form of intervention by my officers."

"In relation to the incidents at Clumber Park over the weekend, I am keen to establish the identity of a white man, aged 40 to 50, 5ft 8" to 5ft 10" tall, of medium build, with stubble. He was wearing trousers and a shirt that gave him the appearance of a PCSO."

"If anyone knows of this man's real identity I would be grateful for his details to be passed either direct to us on 0300 300 999 or Crimestoppers 0800 555 111."

He also urged people to drink responsibly during the World Cup so that alcohol-related violence does not ruin the sporting event,

Bassetlaw MP John Mann said it was of "considerable concern" that someone was impersonating a police officer.

"Someone is trying to cause trouble when the whole of the community wants to get behind our England cricket, football and rugby teams. Particularly with the World Cup coming up everybody wants to get behind the England football team," he said.

"We want to see flags up everywhere"
 
Worksop Guardian

BNP man’s poll form had forgeries (Wales, UK)

A man has been cautioned after signatures on the nomination forms of a defeated BNP candidate in the General Election were found to have been forged.

South Wales Police received a number of complaints from members of the public concerned that their details had been used on Richard Barnes’ nomination form.

Mr Barnes stood for Merthyr Tydfil and Rhymney in the recent election, but received only 1,173 votes.
Before a prospective candidate is allowed to stand, he or she must obtain 10 signatures: a proposer, a seconder and those who signed the nomination papers.

Police investigated the claims and as a result a 30-year-old man was arrested and later cautioned for tampering with ballot nomination papers after he was found to be responsible for forging signatures.

A South Wales Police spokesman said: “Mr Barnes was unaware of the actions and the man was cautioned on May 16.”
Ronald Fealey, of Penydarren, was one of those who had his name used to forge a signature.

He said: “Someone told me my name was on the nomination form and I thought they were taking the Mick about it.
“My son downloaded the nomination form and there my name was. I reported it to the returning officer and they informed the police.

“I don’t know why my name was chosen, it possibly could have been out of a hat for all I know.”
Katy Meredith, of Church Street, Penydarren, was also a victim of the deception. She did not sign the nomination papers and said she did not vote BNP.

The Echo contacted the BNP but received no response.

Merthyr Tydfil Council was unable to help the Echo contact Richard Barnes, but did say: “Fraudulently signing election nomination papers is a criminal offence.

“Therefore, when Merthyr council was officially made aware that there was a potential issue with one of the candidates’ nomination papers the week after the election, the matter was referred directly to South Wales Police for investigation. Merthyr council has no further role.”

Wales Online

Anti-Roma attacks continued in Hungary, says AI 2009 report

Violent attacks against Roma continued in Hungary last year, Amnesty International said in its latest global report on human rights published on Thursday morning. The world's largest human rights organisation said that 2009 was marked by "political and economic upheaval" in Hungary that led to the resignation of Prime Minister Ferenc Gyurcsany. The document said that the "radical right-ring organisation" Magyar Garda (Hungarian Guard) staged a series of marches in towns with a Roma population in eastern Hungary. The report notes that Jobbik, which it describes as "an extreme right-wing political party with a strong anti-Roma and an increasingly anti-Semitic agenda" gained three seats in the European parliamentary elections in June. AI said that a Hungarian court banned Magyar Garda, an organisation linked to Jobbik, arguing that it overstepped its rights as an association and curtailed liberties of the Roma. In July, however, Jobbik announced the relaunch of the Guard and one of its newly elected MEPs wore the Guard's uniform in the first parliamentary session in Brussels. In October the Council of Europe's Commissioner for Human Rights expressed concern about the rise of extremism in Hungary, and appealed to all political party leaders to ensure that no xenophobic or anti-Roma statements be made in the 2010 parliamentary election campaign. The report discusses in detail the fatal attacks against Roma people in Tatarszentgyorgy, Tiszalok and Kisleta. AI notes that "about 400 Romani women initiated legal proceedings" against Oszkar Molnar, then an MP of the Fidesz party, over his allegedly defamatory remarks on Roma women. He was also widely criticised by NGOs, other politicians and the media for his anti-Semitic comments during a TV interview. In September the LGBT pride march took place in Budapest with adequate protection and no incidents were reported during the March, the report says. However, a young woman was allegedly attacked by two or three anti-gay protesters after the march, sustaining injuries to her head and arms. The Budapest Police Department started an investigation of the incident, having classified it as "violence against a member of a social group" despite the amendments made in February to the Criminal Code introducing new crimes of homophobic and other rate related attacks.
Politics Hu

EDL WALSALL DEMO CANCELLED

The controversial English Defence League have called off a planned demonstration against a proposed mosque in Walsall after learning that the biggest single group opposed to the scheme are Muslims. George Makin reports.

The anti-Islamic EDL had announced they would hold a demonstration on June 19 against a scheme to build a new place of worship in Vicarage Close which had previously been denied planning permission by the Walsall council.

Proposers of the development have announced their intention to appeal the decision.

The EDL’s proposed demonstration led to a joint statement by the leaders of all three party leaders on Walsall council, fearful of a repeat of violent clashes which have occurred at other EDL events, that the rightwing group was not wanted in the town.

During negotiations with police EDL organiser were surprised to learn the original planning application had been opposed by many Muslims in Walsall who claim there are enough mosques in the borough already.

The EDL are now planning for a demonstration in Dudley on June 19 and for another in Alum Rock in Birmingham at a later date

The Stirrer

SPANISH TOWN TO BAN BURQA IN MUNICIPAL BUILDINGS

Spain's northeastern town of Lerida is to vote Friday to ban the wearing of the burqa in municipal buildings, the mayor's office said, in an apparent first for the country. A proposal was being drawn up and the majority socialists were behind the push to ban the face-covering Islamic veil in the municipality's buildings, a spokesman for the mayor's office said Wednesday. The town had asked its legal services to look into the possibility of banning the garment in all public spaces in the name of the fundamental rights of women, the official said. "We cannot regulate the usage of the burqa in the road, but we can do that in municipal buildings," he said. Few women wear the full veil in Lerida, a town in the Catalonia region that has about 140,000 residents, one-fifth of whom are immigrants including from North Africa. The garment has sparked intense debate in many European countries, with Belgium deputies last month backing a draft law banning the garment in all public places, including on the streets, in a first for Europe. The text must be adopted by the upper house Senate before it can come into effect. France's cabinet has also approved a draft law to ban the full-face veil from public spaces, opening the way for the text to go before parliament in July. Spain's socialist government is opposed to legislating against the burqa.

Expatica

Zimbabwe police arrest gay rights activists

Two members of a Zimbabwean gay rights association are in custody, their lawyers say.

They say the two are facing charges of possessing pornographic material and insulting President Robert Mugabe.
Ellen Chadian - administrator of the group, Gays and Lesbians of Zimbabwe - and Ignatius Muhambi - an accountant - were picked up during a raid.
Homosexual acts are illegal in Zimbabwe, but the group has been allowed to operate openly.

Dzimbabwe Chimbga, a lawyer representing the pair, said they had been arrested on Friday.

"The initial charges are that they were found in possession of pornographic material," Mr Chimbga said.

"Now the police want to add a charge of insulting the president," he added.
Police told by AP news agency say that they had found a letter undermining President Mugabe during the raid.
Mr Mugabe has in the past described same-sex partners as "lower than dogs and pigs", but arrests of gays are rare in Zimbabwe, correspondents say.

Homosexual acts are illegal in most African countries.

Last week a judge in Malawi sentenced a gay couple to 14 years in prison with hard labour after they held a traditional engagement ceremony.

BBC News

SLOVAKS RETALIATE OVER HUNGARIAN CITIZENSHIP LAW

Hungary's decision to allow ethnic Hungarians living abroad to apply for dual citizenship has sparked an angry response from neighbouring Slovakia. Slovakia has voted to amend its own citizenship law, stripping anyone of their Slovak citizenship if they apply for Hungarian nationality. Southern Slovakia is home to roughly 500,000 ethnic Hungarians, about a tenth of the country's population. Slovak leader Robert Fico has called Hungary's move a "security threat". Aside from the Hungarian case, dual citizenship is generally allowed in Slovakia. The two EU members have repeatedly sparred over the treatment of the substantial Hungarian minority in Slovakia, most recently about a new language law which Hungary says hurts minority rights.

Tit-for-tat moves
The amendment to Hungary's citizenship law passed almost unanimously in the Hungarian parliament on Wednesday. Slovakia retaliated by passing its own measure later in the day. The Hungarian measure is due to come into effect in 2011, while the Slovak one, which still needs approval from the president, would come into force in July, Reuters news agency reported. The Hungarian law will allow ethnic Hungarians living abroad to apply for Hungarian citizenship, if they speak Hungarian and have Hungarian ancestry. This was one of the campaign pledges of incoming Prime Minister Viktor Orban and his centre-right Fidesz party, which won a landslide majority in elections in April. Of Hungary's neighbours, only Slovakia has objected to the move. Mr Fico told the Slovak parliament on Tuesday that Hungary was attempting to revise history, and accused Hungary of gross ignorance of the bilateral friendship treaty, the BBC's Nick Thorpe reports from Budapest. Hungary ceded two-thirds of its territory under the 1920 Treaty of Trianon, after being on the losing side in World War I. As a result, large Hungarian minorities now live in neighbouring Slovakia, Romania and Serbia. Bratislava is particularly upset that Hungary did not seek talks before passing the amendment, our correspondent says. Slovakia will hold parliamentary elections next month, and Mr Fico is battling for the nationalist vote, he adds.

BBC News

Ex-BNP webmaster confirms Jim Dowson owns the BNP

The British National Party learned the hard way that exploiting and cheating its own supporters has unpleasant consequences, when two days before polling day its webmaster removed the BNP website from the internet.

Simon Bennett replaced the site, which received more visitors than any other political party website, with a brief statement accusing the party of “several attempts of theft today with regards to design work and content owned by myself”. He also claimed that Arthur Kemp and Jim Dowson, two close aides to Nick Griffin, the BNP leader, had threatened violence against him and his family.

Bennett’s action meant that supporters could no longer make online donations or membership applications. For the first time for many months, BNP e-news bulletins came without a donation button.

Bennett had been in dispute with Dowson, the convicted criminal who in effect owns the BNP, for a year, but matters came to a head when Griffin insisted, against Bennett’s advice, on adding an image of a jar of Marmite to a version of the BNP’s television election broadcast pre-released on the party website.

According to a longer statement by Bennett, this “very deliberate copyright infringement” was a stunt by Griffin and Dowson to provoke a reaction from Unilever, which owns the Marmite brand, and so “create publicity and a fund raising opportunity”. In the event, Bennett claimed, website traffic, donations and membership applications barely increased at all.

After Unilever responded by launching proceedings over copyright infringement, Griffin and Dowson realised they had underestimated the severity of the legal and financial consequences and came up with pathetic excuses, such as a claim that a “joker” had amended the film. When Unilever’s lawyers refused to believe them, Bennett says he was expected “to go to court and lie through my teeth in order to bail them out of a ridiculous hole they had dug themselves into”.

Griffin and Dowson had misjudged Bennett. Unlike they themselves and their more sycophantic supporters, Bennett “was not prepared to spend five years in prison for perjury just to protect the financial interests of fools” and told Unilever’s lawyers the truth.

Bennett had refused to do their bidding so Griffin and Dowson wanted him out. Bennett was prepared to go but wanted to be paid for his website design work. Claiming he had invested around £40,000 into the site, he said he was not prepared simply to hand it over to Griffin and Dowson so that they could use it to make more money. “It was my bloody hard work, commitment and money that developed that site into the success it became,” wrote Bennett, “and for Dowson to try and force control of it for his own advantage made me feel sick.”

Money is what it is all about – not for Bennett but for Griffin and Dowson, who, Bennett claims, is paid £120,000 a year by the party. As Searchlight already knew from other sources, Bennett’s dispute with Dowson started over the fact that the telesales staff at Dowson’s call centre earned commission from subscriptions and party memberships and so were telling party members not to renew their membership on the website because it was “unsafe and had been hacked”.

Bennett complained to Griffin who said he would look into it. Shortly afterwards he was contacted by the call centre manager, Kate Hunt, and Dowson. A heated exchange ended with Dowson threatening: “I am a Glasgow/Belfast man as you are about to find out. I was patient simon [sic] but you crossed the line sir, its time some manners were put on you.”

Bennett had crossed Dowson and could not win. As Bennett says in his statement, confirming the conclusions of Searchlight’s investigations: “Jim Dowson now controls just about every aspect of the party structure (including the recently acquired print services) and also the party’s finances with one exception. You’ve guessed it – the website!”

By the Sunday after election day the BNP had a new website up and running, set up by Chris Barnett who, Bennett says, used to run a web server for an online pornographic studio in Birmingham. But the story was not over. Bennett also had control of the party’s Facebook site, with its nearly 26,000 members, and its Twitter feed. He now linked them to a new website of his own on which he exposed Dowson’s financial dealings with the BNP and called for reform of the party.

As well as setting up his own site Bennett posted on various far-right internet forums, disclosing the nefarious ways the BNP operates. On one he revealed that Kemp, the BNP’s website editor who had moved through a variety of party posts, had also threatened Bennett and had once opposed Griffin.

“He threatened to drive to Cornwall, rip my head off off and shove it up my @rse,” wrote Bennett. “I expected better of him too, but I noticed the change in his anti-griffin attitude once he started ‘fund-raising’ for our best friend Jim. From that day on he became very pro-Jim and pro-griffin, even though he knew they planned his downfall at the EU election planning meeting in 2008. They humiliated him, stripped him of his position, income and dignity. He suffered it for over a year until he was offered a scrap of food which he grabbed with both hands and stabbed me in the back to get to it.”

Bennett also removed Griffin’s personal MEP’s website though not the similar websites he runs for Andrew Brons, the BNP’s other MEP, and Richard Barnbrook, the party’s London Assembly member, with whom he has no dispute.

The BNP has taken legal proceedings against Bennett, presumably paid for out of members’ donations, but that has not silenced him. Bennett is gradually adding to his new website, which is likely to become a centre for any moves to oust Griffin from the BNP leadership in the coming months.

Searchlight