An overseas student reviews an unflinching film by augenauf, a Swiss human rights organisation, re-enacting a deportation. To my mind, many of those who support anti-racism, multiculturalism, asylum seekers and refugees speak from an easy, privileged, white, middle-class position. Hence, it is often pity that they feel towards BME communities and asylum seekers rather than
Caged gems
Haunting poetry written from prison by Talha Ahsan deserves to be widely read. ‘I wish I could trap your laughter in a jar – to unscrew and make me crumble’. This is a line from a love poem, a poem from an unrequited lover, entitled ‘Lines for f – the doted on’, in Talha Ahsan’s
Bradford 12: lessons for organising
An event in London marking the Bradford 12 thirtieth anniversary was a celebration and an education for resistance. Thirty years ago, on 10 July 1981, twelve young Asians were arrested and charged with conspiracy to cause explosions and to endanger life, after a crate of home-made milk-bottle petrol bombs was found. (In fact thirteen were
Breivik and Eurabia
Hours before he set out on his murderous spree, Anders Behring Breivik – the man who shot dead 68 young Socialists at a youth camp on Utoeya island after mounting a bomb attack on the centre of Oslo – placed a PDF of his 1,500 page political manifesto online. Entitled 2083: A European Declaration of
Attacks on Islamic institutions increase
As part of ongoing research on racial violence in the UK, the IRR has documented 21 attacks on Islamic institutions reported by the media in 2011: at least one incident, on average, every ten days. These attacks exclude confrontations where people have been physically assaulted, except where they took place alongside acts of vandalism. Incidents
Swiss campaign against double punishment
An interview with Heiner Busch, a migrants’ rights activist, who works in the secretariat of Solidarité sans Frontières (SoSF) in Berne and is engaged in the ‘Double no’ (2xNo) campaign. Frances Webber: In the UK, the debate about the rights of foreign national prisoners is getting more heated. Why did Swiss campaigners launch the ‘Double
Belgian prison teacher vindicated
A Belgian prison teacher has won a two year battle against a work ban on security grounds. Luk Vervaet, who had taught in prisons for five years when he was summarily dismissed from his post in August 2009, was a regular commentator on prison issues for national newspapers and had collaborated with academic research projects
Northern Ireland detention centre opens
Larne House, the first detention centre in Northern Ireland, has opened. The opening of the first purpose-built immigration detention centre in Northern Ireland this month, is a sad day as it will expand the detention estate once again. But we can resist the simultaneous expansion of our own mental barriers against human equality and freedom,
Mary Dines 1927-2011
We have lost one of our greatest fighters for racial justice and human rights and, because she was so self-effacing, you may not even have heard of her. Apocryphal stories about Mary abound. There was the time when would-be immigrants from the Indian subcontinent in the late 1960s and early 1970s arrived at Heathrow with
Still spooked
Greater emphasis on the Channel project in the revised Prevent strategy gives much cause for concern. In October 2009, the IRR’s report Spooked: how not to prevent violent extremism first drew attention to concerns over Prevent’s gathering of information on individuals thought to be on a pathway to radicalisation. Now an ongoing research project on