News

Calendar of racism and resistance (6 – 20 December)

A fortnightly resource for anti-racist and social justice campaigns, highlighting key events in the UK and Europe. ASYLUM, MIGRATION AND CITIZENSHIP Crimes of solidarity 10 December: Fifteen activists who blocked the takeoff of an immigration removal charter flight in 2017 are found guilty of endangering the safety of Stansted airport, a terrorism offence for which

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Press Release

IRR statement on Stansted 15 verdict

IRR vice-chair Frances Webber comments on the stansted 15 verdict, a trial where laws designed to deal with terrorist threats at airports have been brought against human rights defenders. The crime of endangering airport security, under the Aviation and Security Act, was designed to deal with terrorist threats at airports – not peaceful anti-deportation activists

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News

Calendar of racism and resistance (22 November – 5 December 2018)

A fortnightly resource for anti-racist and social justice campaigns, highlighting key events in the UK and Europe. ASYLUM AND MIGRATION Asylum, migrant rights and citizenship 21 November: The European Court of Justice rules that a 2015 Austrian regulation giving minimal social assistance to refugees is not compatible with EU directive on the recognition of ‘third-party’

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Review

Review of ‘The UK border regime’ – a goldmine for activists

Frances Webber explains why Corporate Watch’s ‘The UK border regime: a critical guide’ is an essential resource for activists. In the overcrowded market of books on immigration control, Corporate Watch’s 331-page book, The UK border regime: a critical guide, is one which will not only be read, but will be an indispensible resource for activists. My initial

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News

Investigations and prosecutions for crimes of solidarity escalate in 2018

At least 89 humanitarian volunteers and anti-deportation activists have been placed under criminal investigation or prosecuted so far in 2018 In 2017, the European Commission (EC) published its long-awaited evaluation of the 2002 Facilitators Package which regulates member states’ national penal laws against human smuggling. Pleas from NGOs throughout Europe for an end to the

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News

Calendar of racism and resistance (8 – 21 November)

A fortnightly resource for anti-racist and social justice campaigns, highlighting key events in the UK and Europe. ASYLUM AND MIGRATION Asylum and migrant rights 8 November: A total of six EU states, Bulgaria, Poland, Hungary, Austria, the Czech Republic and Croatia, have so far refused to sign the UN’s non-binding Global Compact for Safe, Orderly

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Press Release

The Windrush scandal exposes the dangers of scaremongering about ‘illegal immigrants’

The Institute of Race Relations (IRR) publishes today a background paper showing how the injustices meted out to the Windrush generation are not anomalies but the logical result of an immigration system that, over many years, has weaponised the idea of ‘the illegal immigrant’. How can people who considered themselves British over a lifetime suddenly

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News

‘Reclaiming our collective past’; meeting Amrit Wilson

IRR’s Sophia Siddiqui has a discussion with Amrit Wilson, an activist and writer, whose seminal book Finding a Voice: struggles of South Asian women has just been republished, forty years later.  Why did you write the book in 1978 and why is it relevant today? Back in the 70s like many other community activists and South Asian

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News

Humanitarian volunteers detained in Lesvos must be released

Meena Masood, Seán Binder’s partner and member of #FreeHumanitarians, calls for solidarity and support for the three humanitarians arrested and detained in Greece since August. On 20 October, protests took place in Dublin, Berlin, London, Boston and Stockholm in support of three humanitarian volunteers currently detained in Greece. Seán Binder (24), Sarah Mardini (23) and

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