ELECTORAL POLITICS| GOVERNMENT POLICY
As anti-migrant, anti-equalities, anti-abortion, misogynistic and anti-LGBTQI rhetoric in electoral campaigning are increasingly interlinked, we reflect this in the coverage below which also includes information on the influence of the Christian Right as well as the religious Right generally.
14 May: Poland’s polarising presidential election campaign is contributing to a rise in anti-Ukrainian sentiment and abuse on public transport, bullying in schools and xenophobic material online, according to a media investigation. Far-right candidate Grzegorz Braun campaigns against the ‘Ukrainisation of Poland’. (BBC News, 14 May 2025)
15 May: Labour MPs in ‘red wall’ constituencies call for more radical immigration policies following pressure from Reform’s success in the local elections, including an end to the use of hotels to accommodate asylum seekers. (inews, 15 May 2025)
19 May: In Portugal, the far-right Chega party wins a record vote (22.6%) and 58 seats (+8) in a snap general election and looks set to form the main parliamentary opposition. In the run-up to the election, it advocated tougher sentences for criminals, including chemical castration for repeat rapists. (Reuters, 19 May 2025)
21 May: After Reform UK’s 65 councillors officially take control of Durham County Council, several key departments are renamed to remove references to climate change, equality and inclusion, with the title of cabinet officer for equality and inclusion changed to ‘stronger communities and belonging’. (BBC News, 21 May 2025)
21 May: After the release of a French government-commissioned report claiming Muslim Brotherhood influence is spreading, the president says that ‘Political Islamism’ poses a threat to ‘national cohesion’ and his party proposes a new criminal offence of coercion against parents who force daughters to veil. The Rassemblement National party president vows to ban the Muslim Brotherhood if the far Right come to power. (Le Monde, 21 May 2025; Le Monde, 23 May 2025)
26 May: SNP leader John Swinney demands that Facebook act on a Reform UK ‘racist’ Hamilton, Larkhall and Stonehouse byelection video advert, which attacks the Scottish Labour leader, Anas Sarwar, claiming that he wants to prioritise Pakistani communities. The advert ‘appears designed to provoke division, stir racial resentment and marginalise Pakistani residents in Scotland’, says the SNP. (Guardian, 26 May 2025)
ANTI-FASCISM AND THE FAR RIGHT
13 May: A Czech court fines Igor Mižák, operator of the far-right White Media website, for enabling the publication of hacked personal emails, phone numbers, and documents of dozens of anti-racist activists, politicians, and Romani advocates. The court confirms he ran the site but does not address its hateful content due to legal restrictions. Mižák, who lives in Australia, escapes a suspended prison sentence. (Romea, 13 May 2025)
14 May: Three British far-right extremists are convicted of plotting terrorist attacks on mosques or synagogues as part of an ‘inevitable race war’. Brogan Stewart, Marco Pitzettu and Christopher Ringrose held violent white supremacist beliefs, idolised Hitler and expressed hatred toward Muslims, immigrants and non-white people. Despite claiming their actions were fantasy, they made real preparations for mass violence. (Reuters, 14 May 2025)
15 May: Rasmus Paludan, the Danish far-right Stram Kurs party leader who has been convicted for burning the Koran, is stopped at an airport in Milan and expelled from Italy on public order grounds on his way to the Remigration Summit. (L’Union Sarda, 15 May 2025)
19 May: A report maps active far-right groups in Greece, highlighting their growing presence despite most being small and loosely organised. Named groups include the Nationalist Youth of Thessaloniki, Propatria, Sacred Battalion, the Golden Dawn Youth Front and Hellenic Socialist Resistance. (Ekathimerini, 19 May 2025; Ekathimerini, 20 May 2025)
21 May: German police arrest five teenagers, aged 14 to 18, linked to the far-right ‘Last Defence Wave’. The suspects are charged with attempted murder and arson after allegedly setting fire to a cultural centre in Altdöbern, trying to bomb asylum accommodation in Schmölln, and planning another arson attack in Senftenberg. (NBC News, 21 May 2025)
POLICING| PRISONS| CRIMINAL JUSTICE SYSTEM
13 May: The Children’s Legal Centre Wales calls on the Senedd to ban the strip-searching of children in Wales, saying that FOI requests reveal discrepancies and contradictions in the data reported to police and a disproportionate number of ethnic minority children being strip-searched. (Nation Cymru, 13 May 2025)
14 May: The European Legal Support Centre, which has launched a database on anti-Palestinian repression in Germany, launches a legal challenge against the Berlin assembly authority after it restricts the annual Nakba demonstration in Berlin to a stationary rally in Südstern. (ELSC, 14 May 2025)
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14 May: An IOPC report reveals that allegations against Greater Manchester police more than doubled last year, the highest increase across all forces. The Northern Police Monitoring Project attributes the increase to a ‘deeply embedded culture of disrespect, discrimination and abuse’. (Mancunian Matters, 14 May 2025)
15 May: A Hampshire and Isle of Wight Constabulary officer sacked after racist and offensive WhatsApp messages (sent when he was working in an unpaid role for Dorset police) is reinstated by the Police Appeals Tribunal. (BBC News, 15 May 2025)
15 May: The IOPC finds that the use of force by Met police officers during the arrest of an actor, who was an innocent bystander at a crime scene, was ‘reasonable in the circumstances’ and that he was not treated in a discriminatory manner because he was Black. Richard Reece says he was pepper-sprayed, thrown to the ground and kicked during arrest in Fulham, west London, in September 2024. (BBC News, 15 May 2025)
17 May: Around 170 police officers, including dog handlers and drone operators, are deployed after counter-protesters gather in Bristol city centre in opposition to a UKIP rally calling for ‘mass deportations’. (BBC News, 17 May 2025)
19 May: Transport for London rejects an Amnesty International advert for a report on racism in predictive policing, which AI sought to place at Elephant and Castle tube station, apparently on the grounds that it may bring members of the Greater London Authority Group into disrepute. (SE Londoner, 19 May 2025)
20 May: Lucy Connolly, wife of ex-Tory councillor Raymond Connolly, loses her appeal against a 31-month jail sentence for inciting racial hatred after posting a tweet calling for asylum seeker hotels to be set on fire, which received 300,000 views before deletion. Judges dismiss her defence, citing messages she sent mocking the fallout and planning to feign mental illness. (Guardian, 20 May 2025)
22 May: After justice secretary Shabana Mahmood says she is considering bringing in measures targeting prisoners with ‘problematic sexual arousal’, experts say that any attempt to bring in compulsory chemical castration would be legally challenged as ‘ethically unsound’, as doctors are not agents of social control. (Guardian, 22 May 2025)
25 May: A report from the Institute of Race Relations, entitled ‘Paramilitary Policing Against the People’ reveals the hypermilitarisation of policing across Europe – from borders to during civil unrest and now against public protest. It covers 69 deaths of migrants, refugees and other racialised groups through the use of supposed non-lethal weaponry. (Guardian, 25 May 2025)
ASYLUM | MIGRATION| BORDERS| CITIZENSHIP
Asylum and migrant rights
16 May: As the third deadline to register for an eVisa approaches on 1 June, up to 700,000 people will not have registered, as flaws in the scheme lead to many being held in airports and unable to access housing or benefits. (Guardian, 16 May 2025)
25 May: An Observer investigation reveals that the SAS vetoed the issue of visas to thousands of Afghan soldiers who had fought alongside them, to prevent them from giving evidence to the Afghanistan Inquiry about war crimes allegedly carried out by SAS soldiers. (Observer, 25 May 2025)
25 May: The Council of Europe warns against ‘politicising’ the European human rights court after nine European leaders sign a letter by the Italian and Danish prime ministers calling for the court to allow states more freedom to deport migrants. (Guardian, 25 May 2025)
Borders and internal controls
19 May: One person dies and more than 60 are rescued as an overloaded migrant dinghy collapses and sinks in French waters crossing the Channel. (Euronews, 19 May 2025)
19 May: The UK and EU agree on ‘innovative approaches to reduce irregular migration’, including cooperation on border security and enforcement. (European Commission, 19 May 2025)
19 May: Byline Times exposes the high error rate of the Home Office’s vaunted Chat-GPT-style software trialled for use in asylum decision-making, with nearly one in ten of its summaries containing inaccuracies or serious omissions, rendering them dangerous to use. (Byline Times, 19 May 2025)
20 May: Lithuania files a case against Belarus at the International Court of Justice, accusing it of violating the UN Protocol by enabling migrant smuggling and failing to cooperate with enforcement efforts. (Politico, 20 May 2025)
21 May: Two people die attempting to cross the Channel, ten are rescued and returned to Calais and around 70 more continue their journey to the UK. (Guardian, 21 May 2025)
Two people die attempting to cross Channel in small boats
— The Guardian (@theguardian.com) March 20, 2025 at 10:55 AM
Reception and detention
13 May: The French Senate votes to bar NGOs currently providing legal advice from immigration detention centres and to replace them with a government body affiliated with the interior ministry. (InfoMigrants, 16 May 2025)
15 May: A report based on medical data and interviews by Médecins Sans Frontières and Doctors of the World UK, who run a mobile healthcare clinic outside the Wethersfield facility accommodating 800 men, shows that 62% of patients between November 2023 and December 2024 presented with severe mental distress and 30% with suicidal ideation. (Relief Web, 15 May 2025)
18 May: Newly released FOI documents reveal that the Home Office failed to act on warnings from on-site Red Cross staff about Manston and Western Jet Foil processing centres in 2022, when severely overcrowded accommodation and very poor conditions placed migrants, many unlawfully detained, at risk of disease. Widespread use of ‘glance age assessments’ was also reported. (Independent, 18 May 2025)
Deportations
15 May: On a trip to Albania, the prime minister announces he is in talks with a number of countries about hosting ‘return hubs’ to receive refused asylum seekers whose legal routes are exhausted, as Albanian prime minister Edi Rama rules out being a UK ‘return hub’ host. (Guardian, 15 May 2025)
18 May: North Macedonia’s prime minister Hristijan Mickoski announces a strategic partnership with the UK which will invest up to £5 billion in favourable loans, but denies that the country will host a migrant ‘return hub’. (Balkan Insight, 19 May 2025)
18 May: A New Humanitarian analysis of the Readmission Case Management System (RCMS), a digital tool developed by IOM to speed up deportations from the EU, suggests that the lack of safeguards had led to the deportation of migrants with permission to stay and asylum seekers to persecuting countries. (New Humanitarian, 18 May 2025)
27 May: The 2016 deportation of Gersham Williams, now aged 74, to Jamaica is revoked since he arrived in the UK in 1961, aged 10, and was exempt by law. His case follows that of Winston Knight, 64, whose deportation order was revoked on 16 May. Williams’ solicitor says there will be many similar cases, and calls on the Home Office to do more for them. (Guardian, 27 May 2025)
Citizenship
14 May: A report by Parliament’s Joint Committee on Human Rights reveals that the UK government strips citizenship from more people than almost any other country in the world, calls for more transparency and oversight of decisions and urges the government to share more information about British nationals held in north-east Syria and to identify and repatriate British children in the camps. (EIN, 14 May 2025)
EDUCATION
Although we do not cover student protests for Palestine, we do track university administrative measures that deny the right to protest and authorise the use of force, or silence pro-Palestinian voices and display anti-Palestinian bias.
14 May: A report based on interviews with 40 international PhD students and recent graduates in Sweden finds that respondents ‘would not recommend’ others to pursue PhDs in Sweden, citing a ‘lack of employment opportunities after finishing their PhD, lengthy permit processing times and systemic bias in case assessments’. (THE, 14 May 2025)
20 May: A new report sets out the challenges faced by international students in the UK, including financial hardship, isolation and racism. (HEPI, 20 May 2025)
EMPLOYMENT| EXPLOITATION| INDUSTRIAL ACTION
16 May: A former Arsenal kit manager sues the club for unfair dismissal after his sacking in December 2024 for pro-Palestinian posts. (Guardian, 16 May 2025)
22 May: In a case involving the food delivery company Wolt, Finland’s Supreme Administrative Court sets a precedent by ruling that food couriers are employees, not entrepreneurs, overriding an earlier lower court ruling. (YLE, 22 May 2025)
25 May: A Guardian investigation finds that only a third of recommendations from major reports commissioned over the last 40 years to tackle endemic racism have been implemented. It also finds that companies in the UK, in the face of right-wing attacks from Reform UK and others, are rebranding diversity policies to avoid controversy. But, as the Institute of Race Relations and others point out, in any event such ‘DEI’ policies have little connection to the radical demands coming from the anti-racism movement itself. (Guardian, 25 May 2025; Guardian, 26 May 2025)
CULTURE| MEDIA| SPORT
While we cannot cover all incidents of racist abuse on sportspersons or their responses, we provide a summary of the most important incidents. For more information follow Kick it Out.
14 May: Elon Musk’s AI chatbot Grok inserts claims about ‘white genocide’ in South Africa into unrelated chats, saying it is ‘instructed by my creators’ to treat the topic as real and racially motivated. The far Right maintains this conspiracy theory despite a South African court dismissing it as baseless. Grok later calls the responses a mistake and says it will focus on verified information in future. (Guardian, 14 May 2025)
16 May: A blue plaque is unveiled on a Plymouth house for black footballer Jack Leslie 1901-1988 who captained Plymouth Argyle and was the first black player for England. (Guardian, 16 May 2025)
‘Bittersweet’: plaque unveiled for black footballer whose England call-up was rescinded
— The Guardian (@theguardian.com) May 16, 2025 at 6:20 AM
19 May: Gary Lineker resigns from the BBC after sharing a social media post about Zionism that featured an image of a rat, a symbol often linked to antisemitic tropes. He says he hadn’t noticed the image and would never have shared it knowingly, but accepts responsibility and calls stepping down the right move. The BBC confirms he will leave after presenting his final Match of the Day on Sunday. (BBC News, 19 May 2025)
20 May: In a landmark decision, Kids Company, supported by the Good Law Project, wins a judicial review against the Charity Commission, with the court finding the regulator’s report into the collapse of the charity ‘irrational’ and full of ‘extremely unfair’ innuendo. (Good Law Project, 20 May 2025)
20 May: Spain’s parliament deliberates press access reforms after journalists walked out of a chaotic briefing disrupted by far-right activist Bertrand Ndongo. Journalists say harassment and threats from so-called media figures obstruct their work and distort the public’s right to information. The proposed sanctions, backed by PSOE, Sumar and Junts, face opposition from Vox and the PP, who claim the changes amount to censorship. (Euronews, 20 May 2025)
21 May: Five Real Valladolid fans receive suspended sentences for racially abusing Real Madrid’s Vinicius Jr. in December 2022. The landmark ruling classifies the abuse as a hate crime, the first of its kind in Spain, and bans the offenders from football matches for three years. La Liga calls it a historic step in tackling racism in Spanish football. (Euronews, 21 May 2025)
22 May: Kneecap band member Liam Óg Ó hAnnaidh (stage name Mo Chara) who has been charged with a terrorism offence for allegedly displaying a flag in support of Hezbollah at a London gig last year, denies the ‘offence’ and describes the prosecution as political policing, as Gaza is the real story. (Belfast Media, 22 May 2025)
22 May: Police Scotland warn that allowing Kneecap to perform at TRNSMT would require a ‘significant policing operation’ following terror charges against Mo Chara and public backlash over past comments. Scotland’s first minister calls the band’s past remarks ‘completely unacceptable,’ adding pressure on organisers to drop them from the lineup. (BBC News, 22 May 2025)
25 May: A London & South East Regional Women’s Football League Trophy fixture is abandoned after management at the venue, Maidstone United’s Gallagher Stadium, object to a Palestine flag among Clapton CFC supporters and an anti-genocide flag among the Dulwich Hamlet fans. Clapton CFC players issue a statement in support of their fans. (Clapton CFC, 25 May 2025)
RACIAL VIOLENCE AND HARASSMENT
For details of court judgements on racially motivated and other hate crimes, see also POLICING | PRISONS | CRIMINAL JUSTICE SYSTEM.
21 May: A 40% surge in politically motivated crime in 2024 is reported in Germany, with a record 84,172 offences, nearly half linked to far-right ideology and including attacks on politicians, LGBTQ+ events and party offices. Authorities also record 6,236 antisemitic crimes, half of which are attributed to far-right actors, alongside a 15.3% rise in violent offences. (Macau Business, 21 May 2025)
This calendar is researched by IRR staff and compiled by Sophie Chauhan, with the assistance of Graeme Atkinson, Sam Berkson, Margaret McAdam and Louis Ordish. Thanks also to ECRE, the Never Again Association, Research Against Global Authoritarianism and Stopwatch, whose regular updates on asylum, migration, far Right, racial violence, employment and policing issues are an invaluable source of information. Find these stories and all others since 2014 on our searchable database, the Register of Racism and Resistance.