A campaign to save a mother and her two children from deportation has broadened its appeal by seeking support on an international scale and enlisting the help of Coronation Street actress Julie Hesmondhalgh. Samina Altaf and her two children, Aqsa, 12 and Sumama, 6, fled their native Pakistan following incidences of domestic violence and sought
Theme: Health
Detainees punished for protesting after suicide
Asylum detainees at Harmondsworth immigration removal centre have been punished for protesting against conditions there after the suicide of an Eritrean asylum seeker. On 19 January 2006, Bereket Yohannes, a 26-year-old Eritrean asylum seeker was found hanged in a shower block at Harmondsworth – the first death of a detained asylum seeker this year. According
No justice without equality
Lord Herman Ouseley, the former chair of the Commission for Racial Equality, explains his misgivings about the new Commission for Equalities and Human Rights. The Equalities Bill has just been through parliament and will be enacted shortly. Its main provision is to create a new Commission for Equalities and Human Rights (CEHR) and abolish the
Racial violence round-up
We record below incidents of racial violence and harassment that have taken place in the last months of 2005 and also note the results of court proceedings against perpetrators of attacks that took place after 7 July 2005. 9 January 2006: Cambridge Evening News reports that Michelle Whittaker, 20, who racially abused a young schoolboy
Orwell revisited: a film on asylum detention
The organisations No Borders, the National Coalition of Anti-Deportation Campaigns and the Manchester Committee to Defend Asylum Seekers have joined forces to produce a very evocative short film exploring the experience of ‘failed’ asylum seekers in detainment. The promotional video was filmed on location at Dallas Court Enforcement Unit, Salford and involves a group of
New terror law will harm race relations
We reproduce here the letter sent by the Director of Oldham Race Equality Partnership to Tony Blair on proposed anti-terror laws and the damage they are likely to cause. The Executive Committee of the Oldham Race Equality Partnership has asked me to write to government, local MPs and others who are in a position to
Couple challenge removal on compassionate grounds
The Scottish wife of a failed Mauritian asylum seeker has launched a campaign to keep her husband in the UK. Lynda Donald met Mahmad Salim Yadun four-and-a-half years ago when he moved from London to her native Aberdeen for work purposes and the pair married a year later. Salim had fled from Mauritius in 1992
A Dickensian classic set in Bedfordshire
In true Dickensian fashion, a new report reveals the appalling treatment of society’s forgotten victims, namely female rape survivors and torture victims held at Yarl’s Wood Removal Centre. 15 December saw the launch of the findings of an investigation into the conditions provided for women detained at Bedfordshire’s Yarl’s Wood Removal Centre and the neglect
Eliminating electoral racism
The failure of states to protect minority communities from racial violence is compounded by the opportunistic way in which race, religion and immigration are discussed in local, regional and federal elections. Over the past year, the following trends have been observed: Xenophobic slogans and propaganda deployed in campaigning shows electoral parties are using language which
Schools still failing Black children
After thirty-five years, campaigners have seen fit to re-issue one of the first exposés of racism in the British education system. For racism and exclusion, if in new guises, still blight the lives of young Black people in Britain. ‘How the West Indian Child is made Educationally Subnormal in the British School System’ was first