ROMANI FAMILY IN OSTRAVA SUFFERS MOLOTOV COCKTAIL ATTACK (Czech Rep.)

An unknown perpetrator attacked a Romany family house with a Molotov cocktail in Ostrava's Bedriska neighbourhood at night on Saturday, fortunately injuring no one, the criminal police told reporters yesterday, "Unacceptable, appalling, mad. These are things that have no place in a normal society. I firmly believe the affair will be properly investigated," Prime Minister Jan Fischer said in reaction to the case. The case will be investigated by a special team. "The perpetrator, unknown for now, threw a Molotov cocktail through the window glass...but it did not catch fire," the officer said. The Molotov cocktail did not break after it fell on the floor, therefore the inflammable liquid neither leaked nor flared up. The police are now waiting for the results of an expert assessment that is to be completed by the end of the week. The attack occurred at night from Saturday. The Molotov cocktail flew into a children's room where a 14-year-old girl was sleeping. She woke up at the noise. Local Romanies now say they fear for their safety. Last April, arsonists attacked a Romany family house in Vitkov, elsewhere in north Moravia, with three Molotov cocktails. Three people were injured by the fire, including a 2-year-old girl who suffered burns on 80 percent of her body. The trial of the four suspects in the case, all right-wing extremists from north Moravia, is to start on May 11. They have been charged with attempted racially motivated murder targeting several people, including a child. They face up to 15 years in prison, if found guilty, but a longer sentence or even life imprisonment cannot be ruled out.

praguemonitor

FAR-RIGHT WORKERS' PARTY APPEALS ITS BAN (Czech Rep.)

The Czech far-right Workers' Party (DS) yesterday sent through e-mail an appeal against its dissolution to the Constitutional Court (US), challenging the decision, party leader Tomas Vandas told CTK. The proposal has the postponing effect that will last throughout the proceedings at the US. The DS has announced it will run in the May elections under the name Workers' Party of Social Justice (DSSS). DS lawyer Petr Prchal who has drafted the complaint said the conditions for the dissolution of the party were not fulfilled. Prchal said if the evidence were relevant, it would be sufficient to discontinue the activities of the party, not to dissolve it. The Supreme Administrative Court (NSS) passed the verdict on February 17. It said the DS's programme contains xenophobia, chauvinism, homophobia and racism. It spreads fears of foreigners and creates the feelings of danger. The DS's logo, a red cogwheel on a white field and with black letters DS inside, strikingly reminds of the emblem of the German Labour Front (DAF), a kind of a Nazi union organisation. A similar logo was also used by the now defunct Free German Workers' Party (FAP), a party of neo-Nazis dreaming of a Fourth Reich, the NSS concluded.

praguemonitor

ANTI-SEMITISM COMMON IN NORWEGIAN SCHOOLS

Jewish schoolchildren in Norway are being subjected to anti-Semitic harassment, forcing some families to move. Amongst calls for action come allegations of staff turning a blind eye to what is happening.

“They say that all Jews should be killed, and use nicknames such as “Jewish pig” and “fucking Jew”. It’s blatant anti-Semitic harassment that escalates both verbally, and physically,” a mother, who wishes to remain anonymous, tells NRK. She says her son has been harassed for several years by fellow students with a Muslim background. A father of another boy says his son was stopped by a gang of older youths on the way home from school, and that were going to take him into the woods and hang him because he is Jewish. The boy managed to break free, but is still affected by what happened. His father goes on to say harassment by Muslim boys became so severe, they decided to move somewhere else.

But it appears as though some teachers are either indifferent, or unwilling to act on anti-Semitism in schools. “They say they can’t do anything about it. Neither the teachers nor the principals care about it at all. They don’t want to talk about the problem because it is too sensitive,” says the anonymous mother. She goes on to describe a teacher who said “this type of thing happens us all” when informed that her Jewish son had received death threats. Kari Helene Partapuoli, leader of the Norwegian Centre against Racism, alleges it’s a common problem. “Unfortunately, we also see that Norwegian schools often don’t take racism and anti-Semitism seriously. They’d rather look away when racism occurs. Even painting a Swastika on house walls isn’t treated with the seriousness it demands,” she tells NTB.

Anne Sender of the Mosaic Religious Community in Oslo says she believes part of the problem is schools’ lack of opposition to many Muslim youths’ prejudices. “It’s a specific problem, without wishing to stigmatise any particular group,” she says. Whilst Shoaib Sultan, Secretary General of Islamsk Råd – an umbrella organisation umbrella organisation for the Islamic religious community and organisations in Norway – tells NRK they’re shocked. “What is most interesting is to find out how we can combat this hatred,” he tells NRK. Sender has already contacted Kristin Halvorsen, the Centre Party’s (SV) Minister of Education, to discuss anti-Semitism in Norwegian schools. “The Norwegian authorities must map out both the problem and who it concerns,” she tells NTB.

Halvorsen says anti-Semitism in Norwegian schools is unacceptable, and was unaware of the extent of problem before NRK broke the story. Some Jewish children have yellow stars stuck to their backs. “It’s clear this has some additional dimensions that make some people reluctant, but teachers and principals have a responsibility to crack down on these types of attitudes. I don’t think most people realised it could have such a serious outcome,” the leader of one of the parties in the red-green coalition government tells NRK.

The Foreigner

Break the law and your new online 'friend' may be the FBI (USA)

The Feds are on Facebook. And MySpace, LinkedIn and Twitter, too.

U.S. law enforcement agents are following the rest of the Internet world into popular social-networking services, going undercover with false online profiles to communicate with suspects and gather private information, according to an internal Justice Department document that offers a tantalizing glimpse of issues related to privacy and crime-fighting.

Think you know who's behind that "friend" request? Think again. Your new "friend" just might be the FBI.

The document, obtained in a Freedom of Information Act lawsuit, makes clear that U.S. agents are already logging on surreptitiously to exchange messages with suspects, identify a target's friends or relatives and browse private information such as postings, personal photographs and video clips.

Among other purposes: Investigators can check suspects' alibis by comparing stories told to police with tweets sent at the same time about their whereabouts. Online photos from a suspicious spending spree — people posing with jewelry, guns or fancy cars — can link suspects or their friends to robberies or burglaries.

The Electronic Frontier Foundation, a San Francisco-based civil liberties group, obtained the Justice Department document when it sued the agency and five others in federal court. The 33-page document underscores the importance of social networking sites to U.S. authorities. The foundation said it would publish the document on its Web site on Tuesday.

With agents going undercover, state and local police coordinate their online activities with the Secret Service, FBI and other federal agencies in a strategy known as "deconfliction" to keep out of each other's way.

"You could really mess up someone's investigation because you're investigating the same person and maybe doing things that are counterproductive to what another agency is doing," said Detective Frank Dannahey of the Rocky Hill, Conn., Police Department, a veteran of dozens of undercover cases.

A decade ago, agents kept watch over AOL and MSN chat rooms to nab sexual predators. But those text-only chat services are old-school compared with today's social media, which contain mountains of personal data, photographs, videos and audio clips — a potential treasure trove of evidence for cases of violent crime, financial fraud and much more.

The Justice Department document, part of a presentation given in August by top cybercrime officials, describes the value of Facebook, Twitter, MySpace, LinkedIn and other services to government investigators. It does not describe in detail the boundaries for using them.

"It doesn't really discuss any mechanisms for accountability or ensuring that government agents use those tools responsibly," said Marcia Hoffman, a senior attorney with the Electronic Frontier Foundation.

The group sued in Washington to force the government to disclose its policies for using social networking sites in investigations, data collection and surveillance.

The foundation also obtained an Internal Revenue Service document that instructs employees on how to use to use Internet tools — including social networking sites — to investigate taxpayers. The document states that IRS employees are barred from using deception or creating fake accounts to get information, a directive the group says is commendable.

Covert investigations on social-networking services are legal and governed by internal rules, according to Justice Department officials. But they would not say what those rules are.
The Justice Department document raises a legal question about a social-media bullying case in which U.S. prosecutors charged a Missouri woman with computer fraud for creating a fake MySpace account — effectively the same activity that undercover agents are doing, although for different purposes.

The woman, Lori Drew, helped create an account for a fictitious teen boy on MySpace and sent flirtatious messages to a 13-year-old neighborhood girl in his name. The girl hanged herself in October 2006, in a St. Louis suburb, after she received a message saying the world would be better without her.

A jury in California, where MySpace has its servers, convicted Drew of three misdemeanor counts of accessing computers without authorization because she was accused of violating MySpace's rules against creating fake accounts. But last year a judge overturned the verdicts, citing the vagueness of the law.

"If agents violate terms of service, is that 'otherwise illegal activity'?" the document asks. It doesn't provide an answer.
Facebook's rules, for example, specify that users "will not provide any false personal information on Facebook, or create an account for anyone other than yourself without permission." Twitter's rules prohibit its users from sending deceptive or false information. MySpace requires that information for accounts be "truthful and accurate."

A former U.S. cybersecurity prosecutor, Marc Zwillinger, said investigators should be able to go undercover in the online world the same way they do in the real world, even if such conduct is barred by a company's rules. But there have to be limits, he said.
In the face-to-face world, agents can't impersonate a suspect's spouse, child, parent or best friend. But online, behind the guise of a social-networking account, they can.

"This new situation presents a need for careful oversight so that law enforcement does not use social networking to intrude on some of our most personal relationships," said Zwillinger, whose firm does legal work for Yahoo and MySpace.

Undercover operations aren't necessary if the suspect is reckless. Federal authorities nabbed a man wanted on bank fraud charges after he started posting Facebook updates about the fun he was having in Mexico.
Maxi Sopo, a native of Cameroon living in the Seattle area, apparently slipped across the border into Mexico in a rented car last year after learning that federal agents were investigating the alleged scheme. The agents initially could find no trace of him on social media sites, and they were unable to pin down his exact location in Mexico. But they kept checking and eventually found Sopo on Facebook.

While Sopo's online profile was private, his list of friends was not. Assistant U.S. Attorney Michael Scoville began going through the list and was able to learn where Sopo was living. Mexican authorities arrested Sopo in September. He is awaiting extradition to the U.S.

The Justice document describes how Facebook, MySpace and Twitter have interacted with federal investigators: Facebook is "often cooperative with emergency requests," the government said. MySpace preserves information about its users indefinitely and even stores data from deleted accounts for one year.

But Twitter's lawyers tell prosecutors they need a warrant or subpoena before the company turns over customer information, the document says.
"Will not preserve data without legal process," the document says under the heading, "Getting Info From Twitter ... the bad news."

Twitter did not respond to a request for comment for this story.

The chief security officer for MySpace, Hemanshu Nigam, said MySpace doesn't want to be the company that stands in the way of an investigation.

"That said, we also want to make sure that our users' privacy is protected and any data that's disclosed is done under proper legal process," Nigam said.

MySpace requires a search warrant for private messages less than six months old, according to the company. Facebook spokesman Andrew Noyes said the company has put together a handbook to help law enforcement officials understand "the proper ways to request information from Facebook to aid investigations."

The Justice document includes sections about its own lawyers. For government attorneys taking cases to trial, social networks are a "valuable source of info on defense witnesses," they said. "Knowledge is power. ... Research all witnesses on social networking sites."

But the government warned prosecutors to advise their own witnesses not to discuss cases on social media sites and to "think carefully about what they post."

It also cautioned federal law enforcement officials to think prudently before adding judges or defense counsel as "friends" on these services.

"Social networking and the courtroom can be a dangerous combination," the government said.

Times Argus

Waffen SS veterans hold official memorial march in Latvian capital Riga

Latvian Waffen SS veterans have been parading in the Latvian capital Riga to honor their comrades who died fighting on the German side during the Second World War.
The event, which is held annually, never fails to stir controversy, causing outrage both in Latvia and abroad, as many consider it a glorification of Nazism.

The authorities in Riga banned the parade earlier this month because of security concerns.
Regardless, on Monday, a Riga court lifted the ban, saying there was no threat to security in the city, although anti-fascist groups are holding a counter-demonstration.

From 1998 to 2000, the 16th of March has been an official remembrance day in the country to pay tribute to the Latvian Legion.

The Legion was created in 1943 on the order of Adolf Hitler.

The danger of such events as the march of the SS legionaries in Riga is in making neo-Nazism or racism something that is acceptable, warned Glyn Ford, a former member of the European parliament from the British Labour Party.

Latvia is not alone in its glorification of Nazi collaborators as a way of criticizing the Soviet era, but “one could be critical of the Soviet era without actually getting into bed with neo-Nazis

RT

Wales BNP Deputy Leader now threatens Labours Baroness Uddin on Facebook

Wales BNP’s Deputy Leader in more controversy for threatening Labours Baroness Uddin on Facebook.



Please support the You Tube user's channel Paul McCoch

This is after the death threat phone calls to Mark Wattson that he will now have to defend himself against in court.



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Facebook users warned over stalk-my-profile scam

A bogus application that lures Facebook users by falsely offering to show who has been viewing their profile has been exposed as a scam.

Rik Ferguson, a senior security consultant at Trend Micro, warns he has already identified 25 different copies of the same rogue app but using different monikers such as peeppeep-pro, profile-check-online and stalk-my-profile.
All of the rogue apps are spread by updates seeking to lure the friends of previous victims to give the stalkerware a try. Some even offer a photo montage of a victim's contacts in a bid to add more authenticity. However, none of the apps actually do anything except profit their creators via ad affiliate revenues and deceptive tactics.

"The app itself is designed to look convincing enough, but none of the many 'Continue' buttons it offers will activate some under-the-counter profile checking functionality - they will just push you into another Facebook app earning the scammer advertising revenue in the process," Ferguson explains in a blog post containing screenshots illustrating the scam, which resurfaced over the weekend.

"There is no officially sanctioned Facebook functionality that will allow you to view who has been checking your profile."

for more on this story please visit the Register

Cemetery request risks new racial rifts (Switzerland)

Zurich, Geneva, Bern, Basel, Thun and Lucerne already have special sections in cemeteries set aside for Muslim burials, but requests for such accommodation have been rejected in smaller communes around the country. They say they have too few Muslim residents to justify allocating the extra space. Now the country’s leading Muslim organization is preparing legal action to demand that such sections be made mandatory in every canton. They say it falls under their constitutional right to freedom of religion as Islamic law says Muslims cannot be buried with individuals of other faiths. But some fear legal action is not a very constructive approach, and that it will only fan the flames of growing Islamophobia.

worldradio

Jobbik pledges to be hard on Gypsy crime (Hungary)

Hungary's radical nationalist Jobbik party said on Friday it would focus on fighting "subsistance crime, also known as gypsy crime" if elected to power in the April elections.

Jobbik leader Gabor Vona presented Janos Volner, the spokesman for the banned paramilitary Hungarian Guard, as the candidate to head a new law enforcement ministry, which the party has envisaged in the next government.
Jobbik promotes order and will be determined to persecute all forms of criminal activity, including crimes by politicians or economic crimes, Vona said.

Jobbik announced in February that it is setting up a shadow government. Its members, in addition to Volner, are Marton Gyongyosi for foreign policy, Tamas Gaudi-Nagy for Justice, Lajos Posze for the Prime Minister's Office and Geza Gyenes for health care.

Polls indicate Jobbik as one of three parties to get seats in Parliament after the general elections in April.
politics.hu

Far Right Nationalists the Freedom party unhappy about TV coverage

The Freedom party complains in a press release about a gross disadvantage in the TV coverage of Austrias Broadcasting Corporation “ORF”. Freedom parties general secretary Harald Vilimsky was talking about “agitation programs against his party” and used the turn of expression that such a behaviour of the medias “takes the biscuit.”

The upset politican explains that the ORF always tries to connect his Freedom party with National Socialism. Last time a journalist has ordered Skinheads to a Freedom party event who should scream “Sieg Heil!” into the cameras of the medias, claims Vilimsky and termed that such a business is the atrocity propaganda of the Socialdemocrats.
Harald Vilimsky told that the Freedom party always tried to find a basis of dialogue with the Austrian Broadcasting Corporation, but now all those efforts count as failed. “The ORF presents a journalistic work of the final-rate as never before”, he confirmed.

austrianews

Lesbian air force sergeant discharged after police tell of her sexuality (USA)

A lesbian sergeant in the US air force was discharged after police told her superiors about her sexual orientation.

Jene Newsome, 28, did not violate the US military's Don't Ask, Don't Tell policy on gay soldiers keeping their sexual orientation secret.
But she was outed by police officers who spotted her Iowa marriage certificate when searching for her wife in November.
Ms Newsome, a Rapid City, South Dakota, resident, was discharged in January.
Officers had visited her home seeking her wife, who was facing theft charges for an incident last year in Alaska.
They saw her marriage certificate lying on the kitchen table through a window and informed staff at Ellsworth Air Force Base, where Ms Newsome worked.
She and the American Civil Liberties Union of South Dakota have filed a complaint, saying the officers violated her privacy. They are considering whether to file a lawsuit against the police department.
Ms Newsome told Associated Press: "I played by Don't Ask, Don't Tell.

"I just don't agree with what the Rapid City police department did. … They violated a lot of internal polices on their end, and I feel like my privacy was violated."

She also accused them of retaliating against her and said they knew she would be fired.

The Rapid City Police Department argues that Ms Newsome did not cooperate with them and refused to immediately return home from the base to look for her wife.

Police chief Steve Allender said that the marriage licence was relevant because it demonstrated the relationship between the two women.
He said: "It's an emotional issue and it's unfortunate that Newsome lost her job, but I disagree with the notion that our department might be expected to ignore the licence, or not document the licence, or withhold it from the Air Force once we did know about it."
An internal investigation found the police had not acted improperly when alerting the military to Ms Newsome's sexual orientation.

The military gay ban is currently under review.
Pink News

New Colombian party linked to right-wing gangs

A new party accused of ties to far-right criminal bands has emerged as a surprising force in Colombian politics, adding to worries that President Alvaro Uribe has failed to weaken drug-funded paramilitaries in the provinces.

Voters made the Party of National Integration, or PIN, Colombia's fourth-strongest party in Sunday's election to replace a Congress already badly tarnished by lawmaker links to far-right militias.

The party, comprised in a large part by relatives and friends of lawmakers jailed or under investigation for alleged paramilitary links, won nearly a million votes in elections dominated by Uribe allies.

"It is no secret that drug mafias and some remnants of paramilitary groups have penetrated Colombia's political system," said Michael Shifter of the Inter-American Dialogue think tank in Washington. "But their capacity to organize politically in the current context is notable, and deeply troubling."
The vote was a key indicator of Colombians' preferences heading into the May 30 presidential election, providing a measure of Uribe's performance against this Andean nation's twin demons: organized crime and drug corruption. Uribe remains highly popular in Colombia for weakening leftist guerrillas.

While the vote highlighted the popularity of his administration's vigorous U.S.-backed military campaign against the drug-funded rebels, it also underlines the failure to curtail the power of the paramilitaries. The rightist groups emerged in the 1980s to counter leftist rebels but evolved into drug-trafficking gangs blamed for well over 20,000 murders.

Ariel Avila, a researcher with the independent Arco Iris Foundation, said the governing party has obtained loyalty through political patronage - doling out ambassadorships and other posts in exchange for loyalty - as few other Colombian governments have.

He accused the outgoing Uribe administration of being "one of the most corrupt governments ever" in Colombia.
Colombia's next president - a February court decision disqualified Uribe from running for a third straight four-year term - will have to decide whether to include PIN in the governing coalition.
The current front-runner, former Defense Minister Manuel Santos, ducked the question Monday.

"We're not at the moment planning to make mechanical alliances," he told reporters.

His National Unity party - Uribe's former standard-bearer - won the most votes Sunday, followed by the allied Conservative party. Together they fall just short of a majority in Congress and will need allies. The opposition Liberal party was the third-largest vote-getter, PIN was fourth and the Uribe-allied Radical Change party finished fifth.
Some of the Uribe-allied parties won seats with candidates who are relatives or friends of politicians jailed for ties to the paramilitaries. But PIN, which was created in November, had the most.

Its candidates won eight of the Senate's 102 seats.

They include Teresita Garcia. Her brother Alvaro Garcia, an ex-senator, was convicted and sentenced last month to 40 years in prison for ordering a 2000 massacre of 15 peasants in the remote northern town of Macayepo.
Also prominent among PIN's senators-elect is Hector Julio Lopez, son of Enilce Lopez, a jailed lottery entrepreneur known as "La Gata" who has been on trial on charges of murder and money-laundering.

Vote-buying, nothing new in Colombian politics, apparently remained rampant outside the cosmopolitan capital of Bogota, where a nascent anti-corruption Green Party emerged Sunday.

One of the spots cited by Organization of American States election observers was Lopez's stronghold of Magangue near the Caribbean coast. They said votes were paid for there Sunday "at the very voting table." Veteran columnist Maria Jimena Duzan says the going rate in the region is about $50-$70 per voter.

PIN's legal representative, Alvaro Caicedo, disputed the claim of critics that PIN's success provides compelling evidence that right-wing criminal bands involved in drug trafficking continue to plague Colombia's countryside.

"Under no circumstance does the party have anything to do with the guerrillas, or with paramilitarism or drug-trafficking," he told The Associated Press in his office at Bogota's city council, to which he was elected two years ago.
He insisted he assiduously vetted each of the more than 80 congressional candidates the party ran.

Caicedo also denied published reports that the true power behind PIN is former Sen. Luis Alberto Gil, who has been jailed since 1988 on criminal conspiracy charges for alleged collusion with paramilitaries.
But Caicedo, a self-described peasant from the southern state of Narino, acknowledged he regularly visits Gil, whose wife ran unsuccessfully for the Senate on the PIN slate, and other jailed politicians at La Picota penitentiary.

More than 40 members of the outgoing Congress have been arrested since 2006 on criminal conspiracy charges for allegedly benefiting from ties with paramilitaries, and a similar number are under investigation. That's roughly a third of Congress.

ledger-enquirer

Aylesbury Muslims call for meeting with EDL

Muslim group in Aylesbury has offered an olive branch to a far right organisation which plans to descend on the town in May.

Calls have been mounted for an open debate amid fears that a demonstration by 1,500 English Defence League (EDL) members on May 2 could lead to violence and disorder.

Opponents from Unite Against Fascism (UAF) plan to stage a counter protest on the same day, and both sides have clashed whenever they have met in the past.
This week an open letter was sent out by Aylesbury Muslims, an informal group of young people, inviting EDL for a chat.
It concluded: "By the end of our meeting, perhaps we will dispel misconceptions of each other.

"And if we can't leave the hall as friends, then perhaps we can leave without being enemies."

Yesterday the founder of Aylesbury's EDL division said he welcomed the opportunity to hold a proper debate, and claimed any demonstration in the town would be non-violent.

Originally posted in bucksherald

LewsiRight-wing BNP grandmother to run for mayor (UK)

A “VILE” and racist party has announced its candidate for Lewisham borough’s mayoral election.

Tess Culnane, who previously ran unsuccessfully for the far-right National Front at the London Assembly, has now been named as the British National Party (BNP) candidate for Mayor of Lewisham.

Ms Culnane, a long-term resident of the borough, has also spoken at a meeting of the British People’s Party (BPP), an extreme-right group which supports repatriation of immigrants and banning abortion.

The party sells busts of Adolf Hitler for £15 on its website, along with books on the Klu Klux Klan.

In a speech on the internet, Miss Culnane talks of people being “infected” with multiculturalism and speaks about an “invasion” of Britain.
She goes on to claim “we can no longer trust foreign doctors” and urges her supporters to “unleash the British Bulldog”.

The grandmother told News Shopper: “The indigenous British people will be airbrushed out of existence. That’s what’s happening now.”
Ms Culnane, who refused to tell us her age, claims she will be tough on crime and council bureaucracy and that she will make Lewisham “a borough where British interests and people are put first”.

She said: “The crime level has gone beyond all reason now. I don’t care what the statistics say.”

When asked about her speech at the BPP meeting, she said: “I’ve got no time for them.”

In 2008, Ms Culnane unsuccessfully tried to sue Lewisham Liberal Democrats over an election leaflet which alleged some leading members of the BNP had criminal convictions.

She was ordered to pay more than £100,000 in costs.
Current Lib Dem leader Councillor Chris Maines, who is also running for mayor, pointed out Ms Culnane was “hammered” by his party when she stood in a Downham by-election last year, getting just 287 votes.

He said: “Previously when she stood we exposed her vile party.

“We’ll continue to fight the BNP who offer nothing to the people of Lewisham.”

News Shopper

Racist thug jailed over attack in Oldham (UK)

A drunken thug who left a man with a bleed on his brain after launching a racist attack on him in Oldham has been jailed.

Graham Paul Smith, 23, of Acre Lane, Oldham, admitted one count of racially aggravated grievous bodily harm and was jailed for 18 months at Minshull Street Crown Court in Manchester on Wednesday.

The court head that the 53-year-old victim was on Shrewsbury Street just before midday on October 31, 2009, when Smith began verbally abusing him.
The victim confronted Smith, and was then punched in the face and fell to the floor.

The victim got up and was once again punched to the ground by Smith, who then made racist comments towards the victim.

He was taken to hospital for treatment to a bleed on his brain.

Detective Sergeant Ian Webb, of Oldham CID, said: "The fact Smith was drunk before midday and prepared to randomly launch tirades of verbal abuse against complete strangers tells you exactly what type of person he is.

"His level of aggression indicates he was clearly looking for a fight and his actions left his victim critically ill as a result.

"While he has made a remarkable recovery the consequences could have been far worse, even fatal.

"There is no place for this type of behaviour on the streets of Oldham and this prison sentence will offer the opportunity for him to reflect on his thuggish and totally unacceptable behaviour."
oldhamadvertiser

English Defence League switch date for Dudley protest

THE controversial English Defence League has rearranged a protest in a Midland town which had been planned for Easter Sunday.
The group, which claims to oppose Islamic extremism and is said to have far-right links, will now take to the streets of Dudley the day before.

Spokesman Steve Simmons said the protest against a proposed new £18 million mosque in the town had been shifted “so as not to disturb people on the religious day”.
A march by the EDL in Birmingham last September saw more than 90 people arrested, as cops battled for hours to keep them away from rival anti-fascist demonstrators.

birminghammail

Neo-Nazis resort to subtler tactics (Germany)

Neo-Nazis in Germany are changing their recruitment strategy to include subtler tactics that target young people, a domestic intelligence expert said on Monday.

According to Burkhard Freier, the deputy head of North Rhine-Westphalia's Verfassungsschutz agency, right-wing extremists are no longer seeking open confrontation. Instead some are attempting to seduce the middle class with their ideology behind closed doors.

Agitation, public appearances and advertising have become “significantly more subtle” and therefore harder to recognise, Freier told daily Neue Westfälische on Monday.

Security experts believe there are signs that neo-Nazis are “eating more crow,” Freier told the paper, explaining that they have taken to targeting young people.

“They're now hidding the dehumanising messages at first,” he said.

Tactics include beginning with a discussion of welfare benefits and globalisation, and end with racist ideology against foreigner, in particular Muslims and Jews, he said.

Representations of the group online have also become more modern, he warned, saying that they are making efforts to avoid being “immediately recognisable.”

This translates to wearing less conspicuous clothing too, he said.


thelocal.de

Sarkozy's facing Defeat while Far Right make Elections gains (France)

Nicolas Sarkozy's centre-right UMP party appears to be heading for defeat in French regional elections.

Initial results suggest the opposition Socialist party has taken a strong lead in the first round of voting.

The outcome will be a major blow for Mr Sarkozy in the last nationwide poll before presidential and parliamentary elections due in 2012.
The far-right National Front looks to have done better than expected, with up to 12% of the vote.

Sunday's election took place with President Sarkozy's popularity rating at an all-time low and unemployment at 10%.

The French leader had sought to play down the importance of the vote, insisting it was only about regional issues.

But many voters used it to signal their disapproval of the president and his government, says the BBC's Emma Jane Kirby, in Paris.
As well as the fallout from the economic crisis, a range of unpopular planned reforms appear to have cost the governing party.

Turnout for the ballot was also poor. The abstention rate was put at some 52%, a record for a regional election.
President Sarkozy did not comment on Sunday night, but Prime Minister Francois Fillon insisted the vote was not over.
Near complete results suggested the Socialists were likely to emerge as the largest single party, and that the centre-left and Greens would get more than half the vote.

The leader of the Socialists, Martine Aubry, said the result was a blow to President Sarkozy's government.
"By this vote the French people have sent a clear and strong message of refusal to a France that is divided, anguished and weakened," she said.

Le Pen triumphant
The Socialist party is deeply divided at national level, but remains strong in the regions.
It already controls 20 out of 22 regional councils in the country and now looks likely to make further gains in the final vote next Sunday.

National Front leader Jean-Marie Le Pen appeared on national television after the vote, holding a poster banned by a court that read: "No to Islamism."

The 81-year-old politician called on voters to back the party again in round two, saying his party was "combative and capable of rebuilding this country, which is in a horrible state."

His party effectively tied for third-place nationally with Europe Ecologie.
The National Front's surprising performance comes against the background of social and racial tensions after the government's public debate on national identity.
Some 44 million voters were registered to elect 1,880 councillors from party lists to control regional budgets on transport, education and economic development.

BBC News

'Apprehension' among Muslim women (Wales, UK)

The French parliament is to vote on a proposal to ban the face covering known as the niqab or burqa. BBC Wales reporter SELMA CHALABI looks at what is happening in France and finds out how Muslims in Wales are responding.

These days it is quite common to see women walking around the part of Cardiff that I live in covered head to toe in a dark colour, usually black.

It is so common that I hardly blink anymore, but I remember a time not that long ago when I would have done a double take.

As the daughter of a practising Christian British mother and a lapsed Muslim Iraqi father, my own values and cultural references have been almost entirely shaped by this country.

But with half of my family being Muslim, I have a natural desire to understand that side of my heritage.
When women started to cover their faces on British streets, my curiosity got the better of me.


I wanted to know who they were, and under what circumstances they chose (or not) to cover.

I also wanted to try the cover for myself to see what it feels like and how people respond.

I got my chance when I was asked by BBC Radio Wales' Eye On Wales programme to find out what Muslims in Wales feel about the proposed ban in France.

My guide was Cardiff-born Aminah Delgado, who converted to Islam at the age of 22, and chose to cover her face two years later in 2001.
For her, wearing her outer clothes such as the abaya (full-length gown) and the niqab (face cover) is like putting on her shoes.

After showing me how to put the clothes on, we ventured out into Cardiff.
Within minutes of stepping out of Aminah's front door, two van drivers beeped and stared aggressively at us.


I thought they only paid attention to women who wore next to nothing.

Striding along covered up in a dark burgundy cover, I felt no different in myself.
The cloth is very light and can hardly be felt, although breathing in air through a piece of cloth was none too pleasant.
What was different was how people reacted. People would stare, sometimes curiously, sometimes aggressively, giggle as if we could not see them, and call us names such as ninjas.

Even the Big Issue seller ignored me. That has never happened before.
However I should point out that on another trip to Cardiff city centre, no-one blinked an eyelid.

There was the occasional stare, especially as I browsed through the rails of a high street fashion store, but the overwhelming impression I had was that people were not bothered.

Nevertheless, this piece of cloth causes feelings to run high, especially amongst politicians and the media.
Misunderstandings are rife. The word burqa for instance has been seized upon by the media - burqa commission, burqa ban. It sounds good, but it is inaccurate.
The burqa is the mesh covered gown that women in Afghanistan wear. In Europe, the Arab-style niqab is favoured, which is the piece of material drawn across the nose and mouth leaving the eyes exposed.


In France, the government is concerned about the growing visibility of the niqab on their streets.
Out of 5m Muslims, only an estimated 2,000 women are covering up to this extent, but the French are worried that this is a growing trend.
Politicians such as the UMP's Jacques Myard are convinced that the face cover is an affront to French values of secularity, dignity and equality, and that it must be nipped in the bud by clear rulings from parliament.

The only way forward, in his view, is to legislate a ban.
Muslims throughout the world, and here in Wales, are watching with keen interest. France will vote on a resolution and possibly a ban after the regional elections which end on 21 March.

Nation's values
France has already banned the hijab (head scarf) in schools in line with its policy on all religious symbols, but this ruling would take things further by singling out the niqab and burqa, and banning it in all public places including transport, libraries and banks.
If Mr Myard gets his way, the niqab will be banned on the streets as well.
It would make France the first Western democratic nation to ban an item of clothing on the grounds that it does not fit in with the nation's values.

In the Muslim world, Turkey, Egypt and Tunisia have already banned the face cover in an effort to crack down on the growing influence of Islamic party politics.
Within these shores, UKIP and the BNP are the only political parties calling for a ban.


Most of the Muslim women I talked to during the making of this programme are apprehensive.
Many of these women wear the hijab, which covers their hair and neck, and they already feel the weight of society's disapproval.
One hijab wearer told me that she does not wear her scarf to work for fear that she will be sidelined and not promoted.
For these women, this focus on a small minority of women who choose to cover their face further alienates and marginalises Muslim women.
Women such as Iman (her name has been changed), who has raised a family in Cardiff and holds down a high ranking professional position, told me: "I think it's symptomatic of something much more serious and profound, that is the notion of trying to create an us and them situation… "

"It's trying to make us out as though we are something completely alien and foreign, that it's completely impossible for us to live as legitimate, contributing citizens within Europe."


Some Muslim women I talked to do not condone a ban, but nevertheless think that there needs to be more debate and dialogue.
Shaista Gohir, of the Muslim Women's Network, told me that she has noticed a visible increase in women choosing to cover their faces, and she worries that such women are putting themselves in a vulnerable position, particularly with regards to job opportunities.
The 2001 census showed that 66% of Muslim women were economically inactive, and Shaista's concern is that this figure will get worse if the trend to cover one's face increases.

Most Muslims agree that the Quran indicates that believing women should cover their hair and chest.
The interpretation that the face should be covered is not agreed by all theologians.

'Working hard'
It is a matter of personal choice, but Shaista thinks that some women are not getting access to the full range of interpretations.
For me, making this programme has been a steep learning curve. What I have felt is lacking in this whole debate is women's voices.
When did you last hear the voice of a woman who wears a niqab, or for that matter a hijab, on television or radio? I am glad to have had the opportunity to seek these voices out.
Iman summed up the feelings of many of the women I talked to: "If women are working hard, if they're bringing up children well, if they're looking after the environment and their neighbours and their extended family… such women are a contribution to society, not a scourge."

These women just want to get on with their lives, and feel that surely there are bigger things facing the world right now.
Not so according to Mr Myard, who told me down the line from the BBC studio in Paris that "this is more important than the economic crisis".
As for niqab wearer Aminah Delgado, whatever is going on in the world, she is adamant that she has the right to cover: "This is what I want to do to get closer to Allah. I'm not harming anyone. I won't take it (my niqab) off. It's very important to me. I won't take it off

BBC News

Huddersfield BNP man says party will be 'driven underground' after legal ruling

A BRITISH National Party (BNP) supporter in Huddersfield warned the party will be “driven underground” after a ruling barring them from taking on new members.

Outspoken BNP member Robert Walker, who has stood for the party at Kirklees Council elections, said: “If you take away the rights of my political party, I’ve no platform.

“It’s a dangerous situation and the feeling of resentment that’s going on in this country is going to go underground.”

The BNP was yesterday banned from taking on new members after a judge ruled its constitution could discriminate against non-white people.

Judge Paul Collins issued an injunction ordering the far right group to comply with race equality laws.

He said: “The membership list will have to be closed until then.

“I hold that the BNP are likely to commit unlawful acts of discrimination within section 1b Race Relations Act 1976 in the terms on which they are prepared to admit persons to membership under the 12th addition of their constitution.”
Last month the BNP scrapped its whites-only policy in an attempt to avoid legal sanctions brought by the Equality and Human Rights Commission (EHRC).

Mr Walker, who runs Great Northern Street Motors at Lower Fitzwilliam Street, said he believed in the rights of the “indigenous” people of Britain.

He said: “I’m a second-class citizen in my own country because I’m a white working-class male.

“We’re not allowed a voice and the BNP is the only party with a voice for indigenous working people.

“The indigenous people in this country have no rights and they’ve had their rights taken away from them.”

Weymen Bennett, national secretary for Unite Against Fascism, said: “The BNP talk about law and order, but they are officially a racist organisation and their constitution supports division and separation and apartheid.

“This is something that hasn’t been seen since apartheid in South Africa and Nazi Germany.

“The leader of the BNP, Nick Griffin, wants taxpayers money to support him.

“Unite Against Fascism believe that democracy involves everyone regardless of religion or race.”

examiner

HOLOCAUST MONUMENT IN POLAND VANDALIZED

Vandals sprayed anti-Semitic graffiti on Holocaust memorials at a former Nazi concentration camp in Poland, desecration that authorities discovered Saturday and are investigating. Words including ''Jude Raus'' -- German for ''Jew Out'' -- and ''Hitler Good!'' in English, were found in red paint Saturday on a large monument at the former Plaszow camp near Krakow. A smaller memorial plaque was also painted with a swastika and ''Jude Raus.'' The vandalism was discovered a day before a planned memorial march marking the 67th anniversary of the liquidation of Krakow's ghetto. On March 13, 1943, German soldiers started a two-day action in which they emptied Krakow's ghetto of its estimated 16,000 Jewish residents, shipping them to Plaszow and to the Auschwitz-Birkenau death camp. The news agency PAP quoted a police official, Anna Zbroja, as saying authorities are on the spot trying to determine when the vandalism occurred. The Plaszow camp featured in Steven Spielberg's 1993 Oscar-winning film ''Schindler's List,'' which chronicled efforts by German industrialist Oskar Schindler to save Jews by having them work in his Krakow factory.
Associated Press

Edmonton shooting suspect a racist: co-workers claim (Canada)

Co-workers say the alleged gunman in a fatal shooting at an Edmonton car dealership on Friday was recently suspended for making racial comments.
Police say a man with a gun walked into Great West Chrysler near Stony Plain Road and 178th Street at about 7:50 a.m. MT and started shooting.

It's believed he shot and killed one man, shot and wounded another and then turned the gun on himself.

Sources have identified the shooter as Dave Burns, 55, an employee who was recently suspended for making racial comments.
Co-workers say he didn't get along well with visible minorities, and some went as far as to describe him as a white supremacist.

They also tell CBC News that Burns had a swastika tattooed on his body and had a very hot temper.

Sources have identified the dealership's parts manager, Garth Radons, as the man pronounced dead at the scene. His wife was one of the first police officers on scene and it's believed she found his body.
A third employee, identified only as Mike, is in hospital with life-threatening injuries.

Condolences pour in for victims

A Facebook memorial page set up in honour of the victims had more than 200 members and dozens of posts by Saturday afternoon.
One person described Radons as "the sweetest guy ever" whose "smile lit up every one around him."

Co-workers describe him as a fun and outgoing guy, who was passionate about baseball.
Meanwhile, the thoughts of staff at the dealership have turned to whether the worker identified as Mike will survive his life-threatening wounds.
Bart Yachimec, the dealership's owner, said his wounded employee has undergone two operations since the shooting.

"Our prayers go out to the families. We still have one in the hospital that I'm going down to check on. We hope that he makes it, we pray that he makes it. That is the key now," Yachimec said Saturday.

"They operated on him and he came out. They had to take him back in for a second operation."

Shooter 'snapped'
Yachimec declined to confirm the names of the shooter or the victims because of the ongoing police investigation. But he said the suspect had worked at the dealership for more than 20 years and the fatal shooting victim for 15 years.
"I had known the man for a long time. I just can't figure out what happened. He just snapped. Something went awry somehow. I know he was very attached to this dealership," he said.

"We have talked to a lot of people about it and that is what they are all saying. Not when they worked together for years."
One person who knew Burns from Alberta's four-by-four vehicle community said that when he heard about the shooting he just couldn't believe it.
"This was a guy who snapped for no apparent reason. It was not like he was a monster," said Corey Kruchkowski.
He said Burns helped organize the growing movement in the province to drive off-road vehicles in an environmentally responsible way.

"This guy obviously was an altruistic person in some parts of his personality. If you met him in the years before this happened you would never think that this was someone who could hurt people."

Employees have been offered grief counselling to deal with the violent loss of their colleague. There is already talk of how they will help the families of the victims. A memorial service will also be held at some point, but for now everyone is still trying to come to terms with what happened.

The dealership was to remain closed over the weekend.

Autopsies on the suspect and the victim are scheduled for Monday.

cbc

Hundreds attend tower block 'suicide' rally (Scotland, UK)

Hundreds of people have joined a rally in Glasgow in memory of three Russian asylum seekers who apparently jumped to their deaths from a city tower block.

Serguei Serykh, 43, his wife Tatiana and Mr Serykh's stepson died after falling 15 floors at the Red Road flats in the Springburn area on 7 March.

About 200 people, including charities, faith groups, unions and locals marched from the flats to George Square.
They called for an end to the "enforced removal of refugee families".

The BBC understands the Russian family, who will not be formally identified until next-of-kin have been informed, had previously been granted asylum in Canada but left after a dispute with the authorities there.

They first arrived in the UK in 2007 and had been living at the tower block at 63 Petershill Drive, which is currently let to the YMCA, since 2 February this year.
Their application to remain in the UK had recently been refused but they had not been issued with a removal order.
According to a source familiar with the case, the family had been told that they had to leave their flat in Springburn after their application was refused.

No removal order had been issued, however, and they were advised to seek help from the Scottish Refugee Council to find alternative accommodation.

The family are believed to have jumped to their deaths shortly before 0845 GMT on 7 March.

The bodies were discovered by the concierge at the tower block.

The march, which was organised by the charity Positive Action in Housing, is also calling for the immediate return of Stephanie Ovranah and her twin six-year-old sons, Joshua and Joel.
The charity said the family were detained "without warning" on 4 March at Brand Street reporting centre in Glasgow before being moved to Yarl's Wood Detention Centre in Bedfordshire.

It said the children were "terrified of being returned to Africa, which they do not know or remember".

The rally is calling for them to be returned "to their friends, neighbours and local church in Glasgow's Cranhill where they have lived for past five five years".
BBC News

How sectarian hooligans are killing off Scots far-right Scotish Defence League

Sectarianism lies behind the failure of the far-right Scottish Defence League to garner any public support in Scotland, its critics have claimed.
Opponents of the anti-Islam group said that it was finished north of the border and cited religious bigotry as one of the main factors behind its failure.
With the organisation apparently in meltdown, the Sunday Herald can reveal the group has only 25 members. Less than 100 SDL supporters attended a recent rally in Edinburgh where they were outnumbered by a coalition of more than 2,000 anti-fascists.
The rally was only the second time they had protested north of the border, and the low turn-out was in stark contrast to the English Defence League, which attracted more than 1,500 people to its last event in Stoke

Amid allegations that some members were police informers, the SDL closed its Facebook page after the capital rally and directed supporters to a members-only website with strict instructions that anyone wishing to join must be known by at least two people in the SDL.

The SDL previously claimed it had 800 supporters but the new site lists only 25 members. One member called Mark1690 uses a picture of King William of Orange on a white horse while another uses the moniker God Save Our Queen. The site has a video of Enoch Powell giving his infamous Rivers of Blood speech in 1968.
In England, the core of the English Defence League is football hooligan firms who have called an unprecedented nationwide truce to support the movement, but in Scotland this collective agreement has failed to materialise.
The Sunday Herald has learned that casuals who follow Hibernian and Celtic football clubs planned to attack the SDL in Edinburgh because it is made up mainly of protestant Rangers and Hearts football fans.

Members of the Capital City Service, a hooligan group that attaches itself to Hibernian, said Celtic fans had contacted them in advance of the SDL demo and asked to join together. “We were already making our own plans to ambush the SDL. The CCS would never support the SDL,” a CCS member said.

Luke Henderson, of Unite Against Fascism, said sectarianism had undoubtedly played a major part in denting support for the SDL. “The Scottish disease [sectarianism] meant that many football casuals refused to support a right-wing SDL comprising mainly of Rangers fans. There has also been a mass mobilisation against the SDL from the outset in Scotland and we have built a strong activist base.”

David Miller, Professor of Sociology at the University of Strathclyde and founder of the politics website Spinwatch, said that the failure of the SDL to garner support also reflected the political landscape in Scotland.

He said: “I think it is related to the more consensual approach of the political parties in Scotland. The political class in England has not been as united against the EDL. The sight of Tory Annabel Goldie addressing an anti-racist demonstration on Glasgow Green is one obvious contrast.

“Those associated with the David Cameron leadership in London, especially think-tanks like the Policy Exchange and the Centre for Social Cohesion, have been at the forefront of Muslim baiting and have limited the chances of a common response. There is also more support for the British National Party in England.”

Spinwatch revealed recently that some SDL leaders were members of the British National Party, but this claim was denied by the group.
Casuals United, a nationwide umbrella group of football casuals that supports the English, Scottish and Welsh Defence Leagues, admitted that it had not been possible to unite hooligan “firms” north of the border.

“The Scottish football lads seem unable to forget their differences and cannot get past the sectarian divide. We are speaking to various Scottish firms, trying to unite them, and we will not give up,” said Mickey Smith, a hooligan with Cardiff City’s Soul Crew, and spokesman for Casuals United. His colleague Jeff Marsh, founder of both Casuals United and the Welsh Defence League, was sentenced last week for causing an affray and possessing an offensive weapon.

Marsh pleaded guilty and was given a four-month suspended jail term, 150 hours’ community service and ordered to pay £600 costs. He was also banned from football matches for five years.

Marsh was arrested in Cardiff last summer after attacking Celtic fans who had travelled for a friendly match with Cardiff City.

What remains of the SDL remains defiant, however, and the group claimed to have held a small vigil in Lockerbie last week. The meeting had been scheduled for March 27 in response to Justice Minister Kenny MacAskill’s decision to release Lockerbie bomber Abdelbaset al Megrahi but was brought forward.

An SDL spokesman said: “The reason we changed the date was simple, we had no interest in bringing disorder and the red fascist circus to this lovely Scottish town.

“We wanted to remember those who were murdered [in the 1988 bombing of Pan Am Flight 103] with dignity and without left-wing fascists charging around the town looking for confrontation.”

It was also claimed that EDL supporters were in discussions about visiting Northern Ireland for the annual July 12 Orange parades. The claim was made by the anti-fascist magazine Searchlight, but denied by Alan Lake, an EDL leader in London, who said he had no knowledge of a Northern Ireland connection.

A spokesman for the Orange Order said anyone intent on violence should not travel to parades in Northern Ireland.

“Our parades celebrate our culture and tradition and are enjoyed by hundreds of thousands of people across Northern Ireland. Anyone who wishes to attend these parades for other reasons than to celebrate Orangeism is not welcome,” he said.

The Rangers Worldwide Alliance, an official global network of supporters clubs, was contacted but declined to comment.
herald scotland

Don't share meetings with BNP, says AM (UK, Wales)

COUNSEL GENERAL John Griffiths has urged all parties in Wales to refuse to take part in election hustings at which BNP representatives will be on the platform.
The Newport East Labour AM is a fierce critic of the BBC decision last year to have BNP leader Nick Griffin on the Question Time panel.

He believes the party must not be presented as part of the political mainstream.

He challenged rival parties and organisations hosting hustings to deny the BNP publicity.

Both the Conservatives and Liberal Democrats said they would debate with the BNP with the aim of exposing it as a party of “thugs and fascists”.

Mr Griffiths said: “I certainly call on them not to share a platform with the BNP because I think it does give the wrong message of the acceptability of the organisation.”

The BNP said in a written statement: “[This] just shows how frightened Labour is of voters hearing what the British National Party has to say.”

But Mr Griffiths insisted that the BNP should not be seen as a “bona fide political party”.

He said: “They have had some success presenting themselves as a mainstream party, which they are not. They are getting more publicity through appearances like Question Time.

“I think it’s all very worrying, especially perhaps when we live in an age which is anti-politics and the mainstream parties are viewed with considerable suspicion because of issues like MPs’ expenses and sleaze and so on.”

The Conservatives are prepared to take part in hustings if all the other parties are represented.

Tory Assembly leader Nick Bourne said: “We think their agenda is vicious and needs to be exposed. It isn’t what people in Britain have stood for – I’m absolutely clear on that.

“I think they are nasty, vicious thugs.”

Mr Bourne said views between mainstream politicians differed on how to tackle the BNP but the parties agreed “they need tackling”.

He said: “I think there is a great danger in pretending they are not there. That’s probably what happened in Hitler’s Germany – people pretended they would go way and they didn’t.”

Mr Griffiths was not impressed by recent changes to the BNP constitution to admit people from ethnic minorities.

He said: “I think it’s part of their attempts to mislead people, to change their image and make them think they are something they are not.”

Plaid Cymru does not want their candidates to take part in hustings with the BNP but will not stop them from doing so.

A spokeswoman said: “Plaid Cymru believes that, wherever possible, the party's elected members and candidates should do all in their power to reach agreement with other mainstream parties not to share a platform with the BNP.

“Where this is not possible, and the choice is between sharing a platform and leaving an empty chair, elected members and candidates are free to challenge and defeat the racist lies peddled by the BNP by choosing to appear on a platform with their representatives.

“However, no candidate or elected member would be compelled to share a platform with the BNP.”

The Liberal Democrats were ready to engage the BNP in open debate.

As spokesman said: “If the BNP is invited to an event, the Welsh Liberal Democrats should be there to take them on. The BNP has no interest in the important matters that people really care about – jobs, the NHS, good quality schools and reducing the tax burden for hard-working people.

“We should be there to show people that the BNP are a party of thugs and fascists with no answers to the important issues facing Wales today.”

Mr Griffiths said there were ways to attack the BNP other than taking part in the same hustings.
Wales Online

UK 'ignoring' systemic evidence of torture among asylum seekers

Torture survivors seeking sanctuary in Britain are being wrongly held in government detention centres, despite independent medical evidence supporting claims of brutal violence against them in their home countries.

According to Home Office guidelines, in cases where there is evidence that a person seeking asylum has been tortured they should be detained only in "exceptional circumstances". But medical charities that carry out hundreds of independent assessments of torture survivors every year have accused the government of routinely ignoring their reports, with victims held in detention centres until their asylum claims are heard – and, in almost every case, rejected.
Sonya Sceats, a spokeswoman for one charity that carries out medical assessments for the government, told the Observer: "It's very clear there is a systemic and increasing problem here. The corollary of their dismissal of independent medical evidence is that the protection [asylum] claim is invariably rejected and this means a survivor of torture is at risk of being returned to further torture or at risk of detention."

The allegations come in the wake of strong criticism last week of the UK Border Agency, which was condemned for failing to investigate claims of mistreatment by failed asylum seekers in abuse allegations up to July 2008. Ministers now plan to review the use of force against asylum seekers by British security guards after a Border Agency report on abuse conceded that serious injuries were suffered by detainees who had been handcuffed or physically restrained.

The new allegations further highlight systematic mistreatment in Britain's asylum system. One 43-year-old torture victim from Zimbabwe, who is on hunger strike in Yarl's Wood detention centre, Bedfordshire, alleged she was detained despite independent verification of the abuse in her home country.

Her arms are scarred from repeated stabbings during an incident in Zimbabwe in which she was also beaten and raped. The woman, who wishes to remain anonymous, has been in Yarl's Wood for five months and alleges medical mistreatment and racist abuse by staff, claims that have been denied. She told the Observer: "The officers are racist and are not sympathetic. We have suffered and don't want to be tortured here, but inside here it is a form of torture but nobody can see us locked up."

Bibiche Lutete, 36, was beaten and repeatedly raped in the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC), where the UN has confirmed rape is used as a weapon of war. After seeking asylum in the UK, she said she had been further traumatised while being illegally held in a British detention centre. She also claimed to have suffered "medical abuse" and had anxiety attacks after witnessing a naked woman dragged from her room in Yarl's Wood by private security guards, claims robustly denied by the Home Office.

"Everybody was shocked," she said. "She had no clothes on and she was photographed. I still get flashbacks."

The Medical Foundation For the Care of Victims of Torture, the UK charity dedicated to the treatment of torture survivors, said it had lodged complaints with the Home Office over concerns that its assessments documenting evidence of abuse among asylum seekers were being increasingly dismissed by officials. The foundation cited figures from the last 18 months showing only seven people had been released from detention out of 250 cases where clinical evidence of abuse had been presented.

The Border Agency denied it dismissed the evidence of independent medical experts. Hugh Ind, the agency's director for protection, said: "We consider all evidence submitted in support of asylum claims very carefully, including claims of torture. Where an individual sets out a credible case that they are in need of protection, we normally grant asylum."

An Observer investigation has also found that the number of "assaults" against refugees in detention centres remains high. The charity Medical Justice Network has documented at least 15 recent cases where a detainee claims they were assaulted, while allegations by asylum seekers of inadequate healthcare are running at eight a month.

A number involve torture survivors, including one from the DRC who ended up in hospital last March after sustaining severe handcuff injuries during an attempted deportation from the UK by private security guards. His complaint to the Border Agency tells how six guards restrained him on a plane and that "one turned round trying to strangle me by my throat while the other was banging my head on the seat in front".

The government is trying to clear a backlog of 200,000 asylum cases, though the border agency admits it can process fewer than half its target applications a month. Three Russians refugees leapt to their death from the 15th floor of a block of flats in Glasgow last Sunday, prompting further concern over the treatment of asylum seekers. Yesterday hundreds of people joined a rally in the city and called for an end to the "enforced removal of refugee families".

The Guardian

£90,000 council housing boss is secret Nazi (UK)

A £90,000-a-year housing boss leads a sordid secret life – dressing up as a Nazi for sick racist sex games.

By day Gareth Mead works in one of Britain’s most ethnically-diverse communities.

Mead, 44, is in charge of social housing and ­homelessness in ­Hammersmith and Fulham, where his duties include helping decide who is ­eligible for a ­council house or ­emergency ­homeless shelter.

But at night he poses in front of a swastika in full SS regalia and tells other lovers of the vile fetish: “Gas the Jews and Wogs.”
In a series of shocking ­photos seen by the Sunday ­Mirror, the high-ranking council official shows off his array of fascist outfits.

In one shot, Mead reclines on a sofa, wearing jackboots, ­leather trousers, a khaki shirt with ­swastika armband and a Nazi ­officers’ hat.

In another photo, shaven-headed Mead stares ­menacingly into the camera, dressed in “bovver boy” boots, bomber jacket and swastika T-shirt
Mead also sent racist texts to men he met on fetish websites. In one he wrote: “Turn on the furnaces for those ­Jewish boys and let them burn in hell with us 2 Nazis j****** off on their terrified screams.”

In another he said: “Gas the f****** WOGS too! Look forward to seeing your pictures mate. HEIL HITLER! Your nazi buddy.”

As one of the council’s top ­housing officials, Mead heads a team of around 20 staff who manage ­housing policies at Hammersmith and ­Fulham.

The authority, where almost a quarter of residents are from an ethnic minority, is one of David Cameron’s flagship Tory councils.

But in recent years the housing policy has been likened to “ethnic cleansing” for discriminating against poor and ethnic minority tenants.

Plans drawn up by Cameron’s ­Council ­Innovation Unit could ­involve rent hikes and the ­demolition of 3,500 houses which would not be replaced – forcing thousands to move.
In January the council was ­ordered to pay £750 to a pregnant black woman fleeing domestic ­violence who they had refused to provide support and accommodation to.

Mead met some of his contacts through a website aimed at gay men who are into leather and ­uniforms.

His profile – which was active as recently as last week – ­describes him as a “friendly, fit, ­intelligent, clean-living guy who happens to enjoy leather and who has a bit of a twisted side to him”.

He adds: “Have a great b/f who’s not into leather so we have the usual ‘arrangement’ so I’m looking for ­buddies and ­occasional ­leather sex.”

One man who met Mead – who has been with Hammersmith and ­Fulham Council for several years – said: “What he was texting was ­really too much.

“I could not believe that he had such ­extreme views while he is earning a lot of council taxpayers’ money paying lip ­service to multi-cultural political ­correctness.

“The pictures showed just how far he had gone with the whole thing. He had all the bits to go with the uniform. He even had a gun in one picture laid out on a Nazi flag.”

When we confronted Mead about his Nazi secret, he ­admitted ­exchanging extreme ­messages.

But he claimed: “It’s a private fetish – I’m not interested in ­anything political and I’m not a racist. There are Jewish men who do this as well.”

Asked if he believed his bosses would accept his racist fetish, he said: “I would have thought not, but I think there will be sympathy for me. I am well-regarded by white and black colleagues.”

After the Sunday Mirror ­contacted Hammersmith and Fulham Council with our story, Mead was ­suspended pending a full disciplinary ­investigation.

Daily Mirror

BNP fights extremism strategy

British National Party leaders were under fire yesterday after it emerged that they were plotting to "derail" a government programme aimed at quashing violent extremism throughout the UK.

 A leaked email to BNP councillors revealed that the party is running a secret campaign to destabilise the Prevent strategy, set up three years ago to tackle "the specific problem of a small minority of young Muslims being attracted to violent groups".
The Home Office strategy, originally called "Preventing Violent Extremism", pledged £45m for local initiatives designed to coax youngsters away from "individuals preaching hatred and violence in the name of Islam" and integrate them into their communities.

However, it was "rebranded" last year to take in wider issues, including the threat from political extremism, following complaints that the programme stigmatised the Muslim community. Councils have now been ordered to establish their own Prevent strategies to combat extremism in their areas.

The Secretary of State for Communities, John Denham, said: "At the current time, the greatest terrorist threat remains that from al-Qa'ida-linked violent extremism. At the same time, we also need to tackle other potential support for violent extremism, including that from racist and fascist groups."

The BNP has complained that the modified strategy is now allowing councils to target the party and it members – and it has enlisted its councillors in an attempt to undermine the strategy.

In a councillors' bulletin last month, the BNP councillor liaison officer, James North, told colleagues: "Due to complaints that [Prevent] was picking on Muslims they widened it out to include all extremism and implied that they were also targeting right-wing extremism. In some areas they focus their energy on areas where we are active – eg target wards.

"If you have any knowledge of a Prevent strategy in your area could you please send information back, so we can build a more widespread picture of areas that are affected and then we can get local groups active to derail it before it takes hold."

Mr North said yesterday that the BNP wanted to "derail attempts by the Labour regime to link the BNP to right-wing violent extremists". He added: "The email asks BNP councillors for details of all Prevent attempts to link the BNP to extremists so that the BNP can take measures to circumvent these false allegations and smears." But the anti-fascist organisation Searchlight called on the BNP to explain why it was trying to destabilise a government policy.

"This project protects the public from terrorists and violent extremists," a Searchlight spokesman said. "The fact that the BNP is trying to undermine it speaks volumes about its organisation and its membership. If it is a truly peaceful and democratic organisation, what is it afraid of?"

the independent

BNP faces poll battle with National Front

National Front extremists will fight the rival British National Party at the general election.

The clash follows a court ban on the BNP accepting new members because its rules are loaded against non-whites.
Nf activists claim their membership has surged by 70 per cent, swelled by BNP defectors angry at attempts to force them to comply with anti-racism laws.

The National Front hopes to field 25 election candidates, including one against BNP leader Nick Griffin.

Anti-fascist group Searchlight's spokesman said: "Griffin's humiliation has enraged his members."

The Mirror