Government ministers and police chiefs are demanding new powers to allow the police to stop and search people in the streets if they suspect them of terrorism. These powers echo the notorious “sus laws” of the 1970s.
Then the laws created an atmosphere of fear as police targeted young black men. Those laws were abandoned after widespread rioting in the early 1980s.
A glimpse of what these new laws would mean was shown last week when two foreign students were arrested for “terrorism” after taking snapshots of Tower Bridge.
Salam Abdulrahman is a politics student at Swansea university. On 14 May he and a friend travelled to London to arrange funding for a PhD.
After their meeting they decided to visit tourist attractions and walked around the capital taking pictures.
Salam told Socialist Worker, “We went to Tower Bridge and then to Big Ben.
“I took pictures of many beautiful views. The final one I took, minutes before being arrested, was a building belonging to the MI5 security services – which I only discovered was an MI5 building when in jail.
“We did not realise we were being watched. As we approached Scotland Yard we were stopped by police.
“They questioned us, took our student IDs and searched us.
Searched
“They radioed other police who arrived in two cars and they too questioned us, searched our bags and frisked us.
“They told us we were being arrested under the Prevention of Terrorism Act. We were handcuffed and taken to a police station.
“There we were strip-searched, fingerprinted, photographed, swabbed for our DNA and put in separate cells.
“While I was in jail the police raided my room at the university. The broke down the door and seized my laptop, my other camera, CDs, books, passport and clothes.
“The next day I was interviewed by police. I was told that I would be charged for possessing a book called Future Jihad, Terrorist Strategies Against The West by Walid Phares, possessing a press ID, using the term Al Qaida in my emails and essays, visiting a number of places in Britain,
taking photos of Tower Bridge which show the structure of the bridge, and having pictures of military people.
“They concluded that I was acting suspiciously and ‘collecting information for terrorism’. I was told that my Iraqi passport – I am a Kurd from Irbil – added to their suspicion of me. But these charges are unbelievable. I bought the book from my university bookstore for academic reasons – it is widely available.
“I was issued a press card before coming to Britain because I worked for the Kurdish Globe newspaper. The accusation that they found the term Al Qaida in my writings and emails is not a surprise.
“I am studying international relations and for one of my essays I had to collect a lot of articles related to radical Islam and terrorist groups.
“I also have relatives throughout Britain, and wanted to visit the places I had read about. There are thousands of tourists taking photos of Tower Bridge, and every photo shows the ‘structure’ of the bridge.
“I do have pictures with officers and soldiers of the South Korean Army who were based in Irbil in Iraqi Kurdistan. I worked as an interpreter for the Korean troops.
“I have been released on bail. I have to return to the police station on 26 June. What happened was a great shock. I recently wrote an essay on multiculturalism in Britain saying that the police do not discriminate on race.”
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Absolutely DISGRACEFUL!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
30.05.2007 17:20
It as becoming grossly apparent that the state wants to put society into an utter state of chaos where the police have unfettered powers to trump up whatever shit they choose against peaceful people that they specifically target due to racist idiotic assumptions.
Tony wants society to break down to the state where we have an army dude on every corner to "keep the peace" OTHER WISE KNOWN AS MARTIAL LAW!
And this poor guy will be fed through Westminster Magistrates Courts, judged before the trial even begins, and be wrongly sentenced by one of our illustrious bent judges.
Forewarned is forearmed...
Corrupt judges to avoid:
DJ ANTHONY EVANS
DJ NICHOLAS EVANS
DJ SNOW
DJ PURDY
DJ WICKHAM
DJ WRIGHT
DJ WORKMAN
DJ TUBBS
ALL ABOVE DISTRICT JUDGES HAVE BEEN COMPLICIT IN PERVERTING THE COURSE OF JUSTICE AND HOLDING POLITICALLY INFLUENCED TRIALS OF POLITICAL DISSENTERS.
THEY ARE AN ABSOLUTE DISGRACE TO THIS GREAT NATION!
ARTICLE 6 OF ENGLISH HUMAN RIGHTS DECLARES YOUR RIGHT TO A FAIR TRIAL AND THAT HAS BEEN PROVED TO BE IMPOSSIBLE AT CITY OF WESTMINSTER MAGISTRATES' COURTS WITH ANY OF THESE LISTED RENT-BOYS AND WHORES FOR INJUSTICE THAT HAVE BECOME ACCUSTOMED TO TONY'S BIG BROWN ENVELOPES.
BOLLOCKS TO THE BLOODY BENT LOT OF THEM!
WHAT GOES AROUND WILL COME AROUND AND THE TRUTH IS GONNA BITE THEM IN THE ASS ONE DAY WHEN THEY ARE ON THEIR MERRY WAY TO THE HAGUE - GUILTY OF THE CRIMES OF AIDING AND ABETTING A WAR CRIMINAL THAT HISTORY HAS NOT SEEN THE LIKES OF BEFORE.
GENOCIDE IS A WAR CRIME AND TONY BLAIR IS A WAR CRIMINAL.
THE GENTLEMAN WHO HAS BEEN TARGETED BY SUCH MALICIOUS BULLSHIT HAD BETTER FIND HIMSELF A GOOD LAWYER... PLEASE CONTACT ME IF I CAN BE OF ANY ASSISTANCE OR HELP.
SINCERELY,
Charity Sweet XXX
Charity
e-mail:
charitysweet@hotmail.co.uk
is it actually an offence to have certain books?
30.05.2007 20:32
worried
Knowledge is a weapon
30.05.2007 21:36
58. -
(1) A person commits an offence if-
(a) he collects or makes a record of information of a kind likely to be useful to a person committing or preparing an act of terrorism, or
(b) he possesses a document or record containing information of that kind.
(2) In this section "record" includes a photographic or electronic record.
So far, it has only been Muslims that have been charged with "possessing information useful to a terrorist". Having a copy of the 'Anarchist Cookbook', which is freely available in the US and on the Internet, will be mentioned in any prosecution you face. Again, so far this has only been used against a BNP activist. We all hate the BNP, and few of us are Muslim, so we probably ignore the significance of this charge - so far. The Animal Rights people are beginning to suffer from this though. But to answer your question "is it actually an offence to have certain books?" then the answer is 'Yes, if the judge deems it to be so'.
So if you were a terrorist then you should divest yourself of certain books, like the 'Anarchist CookBook'. And now you have read my advice, which is obviously useful advice to terrorists, and it is on your hard disk even if you stopped reading at the start, you are obviously in possession of information useful to a terrorist. Anyone who has read this should now hand themselves in to their local police station. Oh, if that isn't enough, here is an old CIA Assassination Manual that is certainly useful to terrorists. After all, the CIA are the biggest terrorist organisation in history.
Danny
Homepage:
http://www.frankolsonproject.org/Documents/Assassination%20Manual.html