The British state is engaged in a systematic policy of terrorising its ethnic minority population. At a time when British terrorists are looting, torturing and murdering their way through Iraq, this domestic terror is essential, now more than ever, to maintain social control at home. Four innocent men who had been arrested with maximum hype and media panic, stood accused of a ‘ricin terror plot’. On 8 April they were acquitted of all charges at the Old Bailey.
A second trial against another four men was then quickly dropped. These eight innocent immigrants who had spent over two years in Belmarsh high security prison, were alleged to be part of an Al Qaida ‘terror network’ who conspired to ‘kill thousands of women and children’. A ninth man, Kamel Bourgass, who turned out to be armed to the teeth with nail-polish remover, cherry stones and castor beans, was then convicted of ‘conspiracy to cause a public nuisance’. This was the only conviction to come out of this £20 million trial. Bourgass had already been sentenced to life imprisonment for the killing, during one of the ‘anti-terror’ raids on a flat in Manchester, of DC Stephen Oake.
The ‘ricin arrests’ were big news and used to instil huge fear in the population. When it finally transpired that apart from a few beans, no terror plot existed, there was no ricin and no ‘ricin ring’, the media was either silent or reported only that Bourgass was a ‘failed asylum seeker’. This led the Tories to insist Labour should apologise to the family of Stephen Oake, which Minister Alan Milburn duly did, exploiting the opportunity to advertise the government’s ID card plans.
All the other ‘freed’ men were re-arrested for immigration offences or given control orders. The government is now trying to deport three of those acquitted to Algeria despite the public protestations of members of the trial jury.
Terrorising children
In Bradford, November 2003, a Mr Q Hussain was driving home with his ten year old son, when he was stopped by police who searched his car, checking his tax disc, tyres, etc. They let him go after apologising for mixing him up with a Z Hussain. The next day on the same stretch of road they stopped him again, ‘sorry Mr Hussain, but your name is still on our list of terrorist suspects. We’ll take it off, on you go’. Five minutes later, further down the road, the Hussains were stopped again by an armed police unit, who pulled them out of the car, dragged them onto the pavement, shouting, ‘Are you Mr Z Hussain?’ He said he wasn’t and tried unsuccessfully to explain he was a different Mr Hussain. Then one of the officers placed the nozzle of his gun in the mouth of Hussain’s 10-year-old son and said: ‘tell us it’s you, or we’ll shoot the fucker!’ (Talk given by Kenny Glenaan, director of UK film Yasmin, 30 October 2004)
The British Gestapo
A British Muslim, Babar Ahmad, was repeatedly kicked, punched, stamped on, grabbed by the genitals and ‘pulled all over like a dog on a lead’ by police terrorists, in full view of his wife. Ahmad sustained over 50 separate injuries to his body after also being punched while handcuffed in a police van by police who wore gloves. Ahmad was released six days later without charge. The CPS refused to prosecute the police officers who assaulted him. He was then re-arrested on an extradition warrant from the US, on charges of running a support network for ‘terrorists’ from Chechnya and Afghanistan. The racist Labour government duly obliged and interned Ahmad under the Extradition Act 2003. On 17 May Bow Street Magistrates Court ruled he would be extradited. Further appeals are pending. See http://www.freebabarahmad.com for more details.
Terrorising disabled elderly women
Another ‘anti-terror’ police raid turned conveniently into a sweep for illegal immigrants when last November five black people were arrested on ‘immigration offences’ after terrifying raids on houses in Manchester. These included the homes of Asha Awad, a 65-year-old Somali woman in a wheel chair, her neighbour, a 64-year-old Somali pensioner and foster carer, Sylvia Ramsay. Armed Greater Manchester Police (GMP) smashed down the doors, screaming and shouting for the whereabouts of non-existent ‘terrorists’ before dragging Asha Awad away to ‘help her find accommodation while her home was searched’.
The Somali community protested vigorously against the despicable raids and confronted, jeered and jostled the racist GMP thugs as they interrogated the ‘terrorist’ in the wheel-chair. The repulsive GMP is known for its racist attitude towards black women – one of their number was caught (and exonerated) sending a colleague racist e-mails (a monkey’s head on a black South African woman’s body).
Terrorising the black community
Terrorising Muslims may be an extra perk for the police that Muslims should accept as a ‘reality’ (according to minister Hazel Blears), but it does not seem to stand in the way of that old favourite pastime – attacking black people.
In September 2004, Beverly Bryant, 56, died of a massive brain haemorrhage, two months after nearly 100 police raided her pub in west London, looking for ‘drugs and prostitutes’ (The Voice, 11 October 2004). They made the locals, mostly black men, some handcuffed, lie on the floor while they searched and videotaped them all. Some were strip-searched in the toilet. Even though the pub staff offered them the keys, the police smashed down the doors, smashed tables, chairs, computers and forced Ms Bryant, who suffered from high blood pressure, up against a wall. The Bryants lost thousands of pounds and Beverly sank into depression. The racist scum said they ‘wouldn’t rest until the pub was shut down’.
Charles Chinweizu
FRFI 185 June / July 2005
