USEC IM UK Edition

Viewpoint: Why I’m right to work with sex offenders

ollado — Sun, 26 May 2013 08:29:28 +0000

My knees were wobbling as I walked down the stairs, wondering how I was going to cope, sitting in a very small room with the man who had done these awful things.

It was my first encounter with a sex offender.

I was horrified by the crimes he had committed against boys, but I pulled myself together and called his name.

An average-looking man stood up. He didn’t have horns, he didn’t have a tail, he looked like anybody else.

I introduced myself and asked him to tell me what he thought I needed to know about him.

He looked me in the eye and said: “I’ve done some really dreadful things and the first thing I think about in the morning and the last thing I think about at night is the harm that I have caused and now I’m trying to rebuild my life.”

On one level I was struggling with the feelings that any human being would have when meeting somebody who has harmed children and their families.

But on the other hand I met someone who was asking for help.

Should I respond emotionally and treat him with disgust, or as a professional and do what I could to help him rebuild his life?

I chose the latter and worked with him for two years, coming to believe him when he said he never wanted to harm anybody again.

For the past 15 years I have continued to work with men who have committed dreadful crimes. I trained as a social worker and, before becoming a consultant, ran the sex offender treatment programme in the community. I was also a national trainer for the probation service’s sex offender treatment programme.

Sometimes people ask, “How can you sit in a room with abusers and not punch them?” Does it mean I actually like them?

Rehabilitation works for some sex offenders and good treatment programmes make a significant difference”

Lydia Guthrie

I can do it because I recognise the harm done to victims. If there is anything I can do to reduce the risk of it happening again then it’s a job worth doing.

The latest figures show that 18.5% of adult sex offenders reoffended in the 12 months to June 2011 – a figure that has been broadly consistent for the past decade.

Rehabilitation works for some sex offenders and good treatment programmes make a significant difference.

As a society we are prepared to accept that people with lots of different problems, like drink and drugs, are capable of reforming. But we are sceptical that people who commit sexual offences can do the same.

Rehabilitation needs to go hand in hand with public protection. The police should use every tool at their disposal – like satellite tracking – to manage the people who pose a high risk.

The length of treatment varies. The highest-risk individuals have up to 200 hours of treatment, usually in two-hour blocks.

During treatment, they must consider how they want their lives to be, what a good life looks like and that there might be a way back into society.

It can be hard to hear. I’m a mum, I’ve got two children. If somebody committed a sexual offence against them I’d have feelings of rage, anger and hatred. I would want revenge.

But as a society we need to listen to what the evidence shows us about the best way of re-integrating sex offenders.

We live in a society where we don’t have the death penalty. Prison sentences mostly have an end – there are only 30 or 40 people in the whole country who have a whole life sentence and will die in prison. The vast majority of sex offenders will be released one day.

We hear about the extreme cases of people who commit offences against many, many children. That forms the basis of the public debate, but these people are the exception.

Sexual abuse has existed in human societies since records began. That’s not to downplay it and it has always caused harm, damage and trauma for those involved.

More from the Magazine

It was the UK’s biggest ever computer crime investigation. Thousands of people were accused of downloading images of child abuse – some were found to be innocent. Ten years after the raids began, has Operation Ore really changed the UK?

But as a society we need to have more intelligent ways of dealing with it. What we do at the moment is dehumanise the perpetrators, we say they’re non-human.

There are something like 40,000 offenders on the sex offenders register at the moment. Are we going to have a great big ship that we put them on that circles the British Isles until the end of time?

Human beings are complex. We’re all capable of rage, anger, lust, a desire for revenge. We’re all capable of coping badly with problems. I don’t think society divides neatly into the kind of people who do awful things and everyone else.

I’m not an apologist for sexual offenders. If you work in this area, you have to make a decision about what you’re going to say you do as a job when you go to a party. Some people choose to make something up. I made the choice that I would be open.

I say to them, the human part of me feels pain for the victims, feels anger, sadness and disgust, but the professional part of me recognises that we don’t have any magic cure.

There needs to be a group of professionals, in prisons and in the community, who are prepared to work alongside people convicted of sexual offences, to treat them as human beings who have strengths and weaknesses and character flaws like all human beings.

The only difference is that they’ve done something really awful.

Source: bbc.co.uk

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Man killed in Morden betting shop attack

ollado — Sun, 26 May 2013 08:27:15 +0000

The victim, who has not been formally identified, was pronounced dead at a branch of Ladbrokes in Aberconway Road in Morden at 10:30 BST on Saturday.

Officers from the Homicide and Serious Crime Command said one man was responsible for the fatal attack.

Police said it is not known if any money was taken from the betting shop which is next door to Morden police station.

A post-mortem examination is due to be held on Sunday.

Source: bbc.co.uk

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IoS exclusive: MI5 ‘tried to recruit’ Woolwich attack suspect Michael Adebolajo

ollado — Sun, 26 May 2013 08:25:36 +0000

Mike Glover , Brian Brady , Jonathan Owen , Paul Cahalan , Paul Bignell

Evidence emerged last night that one of the suspects involved in the killing of the British soldier Lee Rigby was well known to anti-terror police and the security services for at least three years before the brutal Woolwich attack. Michael Adebolajo was arrested in Kenya under suspicion of being at the centre of an al-Qa’ida-inspired plot in 2010, The Independent on Sunday can reveal.

He was one of seven men arrested by Kenyan police after landing on an island off the Kenyan coast in November 2010. Local press reports of the arrests referred to Mr Adebolajo as a “Nigerian with a British passport” who was “suspected of masterminding the racket”. Police claimed the men were travelling to Somalia to join the ranks of the al-Shabaab terrorist group. His family claimed he was held in detention and tortured before being deported back to Britain without charge.

After the incident, members of his family said he was “pestered” by MI5 agents pressuring him to become an informant for them and infiltrate radical Islamic extremist groups. Relatives said other family members were also harassed and questioned by the UK authorities. In an exclusive interview with The IoS, Mr Adebolajo’s brother-in law claimed constant demands to get him to spy on Muslim clerics might have pushed him over the edge.

The allegation that MI5 knew of Mr Adebolajo’s radical views for so long has increased the pressure on the intelligence services over their failure to recognise the scale of the threat he posed, amid the fall-out from the shocking killing of Drummer Rigby last Wednesday.

A friend of Mr Adebolajo has told the BBC that MI5 had attempted to recruit the suspected killer six months ago. It was also reported last night that Michael Adebowale, who was arrested alongside Mr Adebolajo following the soldier’s killing, had been detained by police two months ago.

Sir Malcolm Rifkind, who leads the body that oversees the work of the intelligence services, said the organisations had “serious questions to answer”. The MI5 chief, Andrew Parker, will provide a written report on the incident this week, before he is called before the Intelligence and Security Committee (ISC).

But Sir Malcolm, who is chairman of the ISC, pledged that the committee would also use new powers to force intelligence agencies to hand over all confidential documents relating to the case.

Abu Zuybyr, who is married to Mr Adebolajo’s sister, Christiana, said last night that his brother-in-law had recently been “elated” following the birth of his child. But added: “Then things became a little strange.”

Speaking from a café in the shadow of a mosque in an east Lancashire town, just before midday prayers, Mr Zuybyr said: “Why did he suddenly flip?” As family members struggled for explanations for Mr Adebolajo’s actions, they speculated that pressure from the security services to turn informer may have pushed him to act.

“That is what the [Mr Adebolajo's] family is saying; that the secret service pushed him over the edge,” his brother-in-law claimed.

They insisted that Mr Adebolajo’s character changed markedly in 2010, after a visit to Kenya – where, they say, he had gone to study Arabic and Islam with imams in mosques in Nairobi.

But an investigation by The IoS has revealed that Mr Adebolajo – officially described as “Mr Michael Olemindis Ndemolajo” – was one of seven youths arrested by Kenyan police on suspicion of trying to join the ranks of the al-Shabaab terrorist group in Somalia.

The young men had gone on a speedboat from Lamu island to Kizingitini, Pate island, where they were arrested by police who were waiting for them after a tip off. The group he was travelling with, which included two secondary-school boys, had been radicalised during weekly visits to a mosque in Mombasa, according to police sources.

They were thrown in jail and “the suspect from Nigeria” accused police of torturing him, according to local reports.

“We are being tortured by the police and we haven’t eaten for two days now,” he was quoted as saying. “We have been denied the right to talk to our family members and lawyer. We are being treated as criminals and we are innocent.”

Kenyan media stated: “The Nigerian, Mr Michael Olemindis Ndemolajo, is said to have travelled from the UK to join the group.”

He was kept in jail for several days before being deported back to Britain, “after it was established that his travelling documents were genuine and that he lacked a criminal record”, according to The Nation newspaper. Mr Adebolajo’s family said he had been told he would be hanged or beheaded, but after he had appeared in court he was freed to return to Britain. Relatives said they believed the release came after they had alerted local MPs and the Foreign Office. The decision has raised questions over official involvement in Mr Adebolajo’s release – and the true extent of his connections with the intelligence services since he returned home to the UK.

Mr Zuybyr claimed his brother-in-law had been tortured violently, threatened with rape and his private parts had been grabbed.

Mr Zuybyr also alleged that, when Mr Adebolajo returned to Britain, he had been pestered by MI5 about informing for them. He added that other members of the family had been quizzed about Mr Adebolajo in an effort to put pressure on him.

Mr Adebolajo’s elder brother, Jeremiah, had gone to Saudi Arabia to teach English, but had been arrested and harassed by the authorities about his brother. And Mr Zuybyr himself said that when he went to Yemen four years ago to learn Arabic with his new wife, he was rounded up and questioned at gunpoint.

He added: “When I came back to Britain, MI5 contacted me and showed significant interest in Michael. I was harassed for a while, with constant calls from people claiming to be from the FBI.” Mr Zuybyr and his wife left their family in London and moved to east Lancashire, but he said MI5 had still tracked him down and questioned him about his brother-in-law.

Sir Malcolm made it clear last night that MI5 would be closely questioned about any suggestion that it had been in contact with the two men arrested in connection with Drummer Rigby’s death.

He said: “I have been following all the news items and you can certainly assume that any of these serious allegations will be put to the intelligence agencies.”

Colonel Richard Kemp, former commander of British forces in Afghanistan and a past chairman of the Government’s Cobra intelligence committee, conceded that MI5 and the police could possibly have done more to prevent the shocking murder.

But, he added: “It would have required probably significant additional resources, so that they can increase the number of suspects they monitor. Even though these two were on their radar, they have to prioritise who they look at, because surveillance, monitoring and communications is all very expensive. And maybe they need more resources to do that if it is necessary to widen the net, which I think probably it is.”

EDL marches in Newcastle

An estimated 2,000 English Defence League supporters paraded through Newcastle upon Tyne city centre yesterday as right-wing groups appeared to be gaining followers in the wake of Drummer Lee Rigby’s death. Two weeks ago it was thought about 500 would attend.

Yesterday’s demonstration, which was met by around 400 anti-fascist protestors, passed without major incident after 1,000 officers lined the streets, Northumbria Police said, adding that there were “a number” of arrests for drunkenness, or to prevent public order offences. The BNP (British National Party) has said it will march on Saturday in Woolwich, where the soldier lost his life last week.

The young father’s killing provoked a backlash across the country, with many reported incidents of mosques being attacked and racial abuse.

Paul Cahalan

Source: independent.co.uk

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Corruption and the FCO: Blue skies, white sands, dark clouds

ollado — Sun, 26 May 2013 08:23:02 +0000

Paul Peachey

Britain’s former top diplomat on the Cayman Islands should face a criminal inquiry for allegedly lying to police investigating corruption in the notorious tax haven, a Scotland Yard review has concluded.

Former governor Stuart Jack has been cited for possible attempts to pervert the course of justice over a Watergate-style break-in at a newspaper office on the islands, according to documents seen by The Independent on Sunday.

In the latest twist of a tortuous dispute played out under the island’s tropical blue skies and courtrooms thousands of miles apart, the Metropolitan Police says there are sufficient grounds for an investigation into Mr Jack and two other senior officials. The head of a police team sent in 2007 to investigate the allegations accuses them of misleading him and effectively scuppering his inquiry, according to the letters.

The claims against the three, which Mr Jack strongly denies, amount to possible “misconduct in public office, attempting to pervert the course of justice and possibly wasting police time”, according to a letter from the Yard’s Commander Allan Gibson to the island’s current governor, Duncan Taylor. “It is my view the allegations are serious and contain sufficient detail to warrant a criminal investigation,” he said.

The letter – copied to Simon Fraser, the head of the Diplomatic Service – poses awkward questions for the Foreign and Commonwealth Office (FCO): any inquiry is likely to inflame a long-running controversy and embarrass senior diplomats, the Cayman authorities – and the Met. If it does nothing, it faces accusations of hypocrisy after David Cameron last week called on the Cayman Islands and other British Overseas Territories to show greater transparency in their tax affairs.

The FCO is already fighting in the courts to block release of a document that could blow the lid off its attempts to avoid blame for the original bungled police inquiry. It began as a leaks investigation and ended as a multimillion-pound inquiry into alleged police wrong-doing. FCO officials have declined to release an inquiry report because its “disclosure could lead to a loss of confidence within the international community which could impact negatively on the Cayman Islands’ reputation and, more directly, on its financial services industry”.

Nicholas Shaxson, author of Treasure Islands, a critical study of tax havens, said: “The Cayman Islands’ authorities are completely and utterly captured by the financial sector… I wouldn’t trust them to do an independent investigation if the reputation of the Caymans is at stake.”

The case is one of a string of embarrassing episodes involving British Overseas Territories, the 14 nations that represent a hangover from Britain’s imperial past and which remain some of the world’s most controversial tax havens, in receipt of billions in global cash.

They include the Turks and Caicos Islands, which were ruled directly from the UK for three years from 2009 because of a corruption scandal, and the tax havens of the Caymans, Bermuda and British Virgin Islands, which all retain the Queen as head of state. The territories stopped short of claiming full independence from the Empire but secured a status that includes British oversight and, in the Caymans’ case, a career diplomat, appointed from London, to become the most powerful man on the island.

Mr Jack retired from the post in 2009 and moved back to Britain after a final two years dogged by controversy over the Scotland Yard inquiry which has cost an estimated £20m, in high salaries, costs and damages payouts.

Martin Bridger, a former senior Met detective, led the original investigation into alleged police leaks to the media. But the inquiry became much longer and larger after the team learned that the island’s police leadership had authorised a potentially illegal search of the newspaper office that was receiving the alleged tips.

The investigation was a disaster and led to a £1m payout to a judge who was wrongly arrested, the ousting of the islands’ British police chief, and major criticisms of the inquiry in a judge-led review. The 12-strong police team – dubbed the Sunshine Squad amid claims of drinking and hard partying – was sent home in 2009, damaging the reputations of those involved. A member of the team, who declined to be named, said: “This was a flawed investigation from the start. There was arguably never a substantive offence. It seemed some officers drew the investigation out for their own ends.”

Mr Bridger claimed he learned, after his team was banished from the island, that the former governor had used his position to authorise the search but failed to tell him. If Mr Jack had done so, he said he would never have embarked on the two-year inquiry. “I am pleased that the Met has agreed that a criminal investigation is warranted and should be commenced against those named,” he said. “My hope is that the FCO and the Governor, Duncan Taylor, will remain true to their public statements that good governance, transparency and integrity must at all times underpin the activities of those who hold high public office.”

In a statement to the IoS, Mr Jack said. “I categorically deny the allegations made by Martin Bridger. Such baseless accusations are deeply upsetting to my family and harmful to my reputation. I look forward to giving evidence when those proceedings come for trial in the Cayman Islands Grand Court. I have no doubt the court will find Mr Bridger’s remarks to be wholly unsubstantiated.”

John Evans, the man who searched the newspaper office, has contacted Scotland Yard and said he would back the former governor in an inquiry, threatening more bad publicity for the Met. “It’s generated a huge feeling of distrust. The people in the Cayman Islands aren’t sure who to blame for it all,” he said.

“It has left behind a feeling that, if anyone comes out from the UK to do a future investigation, they are untrustworthy. They are only in it for what they can get out of it.”

Today, the Caymans is one of the world’s biggest offshore trading centres, worth billions of pounds, based on zero taxation and banking secrecy. It comes second only behind Switzerland in the Tax Justice Network’s financial secrecy index. Enron, the failed US energy giant, used hundreds of Cayman-registered subsidiaries to keep billions off its balance sheets.

David Marchant, the owner and editor of OffshoreAlert, was scathing about the authorities’ efforts to close down the saga. “David Cameron talks tough about clamping down on offshore tax. But he already has the framework for the Turks and Caicos Islands; he could literally take over these jurisdictions overnight. Only in Britain could this nonsense happen. People are infected with this peculiar Fawlty Towers way of conducting business. It’s breathtaking. They need to bury this 50ft under the ground and move on.”

Although Scotland Yard has called for an inquiry, it said it could not carry it out because it was “conflicted” owing to its former officers’ initial involvement. It indicated a non-British force should be brought in.

An FCO spokeswoman confirmed it was considering the Met’s letter.

Source: independent.co.uk

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Woolwich attack: Calls for Anjem Choudary to be placed under a new terror control order

ollado — Sun, 26 May 2013 08:20:29 +0000

By Robert Mendick, and Robert Watts

It is estimated that one in five terrorists convicted in Britain over the past decade were either members of or linked to al-Muhajiroun, the extremist group founded by Choudary and the exiled preacher Omar Bakri Mohammed.

Choudary, 46, and a lawyer by training, has never been convicted of any offence, much to the frustration of British authorities.

But the revelation last week that al-Muhajiroun had played a large part in radicalising Michael Adebolajo, 28, who is accused of murdering a soldier outside Woolwich Barracks, has renewed pressure on the Home Office to find a way of dealing with Choudary.

Omar Bakri, a Syrian-born cleric, left Britain in the wake of comments made after the July 7 attack on London in 2005 and has been refused permission to come back. He now lives in exile in Lebanon.

But Choudary was born in Britain and went, ironically, to Mulgrave Primary School. It is beside the road where Lee Rigby, the soldier, was murdered.

His British citizenship makes it impossible for authorities to deport him. The recently introduced Terrorism Prevention and Investigation Measure (TPim) regime, which was brought in to replace the old control orders, may now be used to try to curb his radical preachings.

Mark Reckless, a Conservative member of the home affairs select committee, said: “If there is clear evidence of him [Choudary] encouraging terrorism or inciting violence then the Home Secretary may want to consider if he’s a fit person to be subject to the TPim regime.”

The TPim regime is less restrictive than the control orders it replaced and which fell foul of human rights legislation.

Last week, Choudary refused to condemn the killings while Omar Bakri, speaking from Lebanon, praised the killers’ “courage” in standing and waiting for police to arrive at the scene rather than fleeing.

Choudary was radicalised in the 1990s. He was a medical student at Southampton University – known to friends as Andy – but failed his first year due to excessive partying.

It has been claimed that in those days, he drank, womanised and took drugs. He switched to law but became embittered when a City law firm turned him down for a well-paid job.

He began attending mosque and his path crossed with Omar Bakri and another radical preacher Abu Hamza, who ran Finsbury Park mosque.

Since those days he has been inseparable from Omar Bakri. He drafted Omar Bakri’s resignation letter from Hizb ut-Tahrir, another radical Islamist organisation, and they established al-Muhajiroun.

The group was based at first in the basement of Finsbury Park mosque before moving to offices on a retail park in Tottenham, London. Omar Bakri became known as the “Tottenham Ayatollah” but not taken seriously until the 9/11 attacks.

The group espouses a hardline version of Islam, whose ambition is to see sharia law imposed in the UK.

Al-Muhajiroun was finally banned in 2010. Choudary had in the meantime set up other groups such as the Saved Sect and run a website Islam4UK, which has also been shut down. But efforts to strangulate al-Muhajiroun and its offshoots are difficult in an internet age.

On Friday, Omar Bakri was preaching to his followers in an internet chatroom. He even briefly discussed the case of the murdered soldier. The chatroom can be followed by anybody signing up to it.

Affiliates of al-Muhajiroun have gone on to be implicated in terrorism. One of Choudary’s proteges Richard Dart, 30, a white British convert, was jailed for six years last month for plotting to attack soldiers in Royal Wootton Bassett.

Another former al-Muhajiroun associate Omar Khyam was jailed for life in 2007 for leading the “fertiliser bomb” plot targeting London nightclubs. In March 2007, Abdul Muhid, a al-Muhajiroun stalwart, was convicted of soliciting murder during Danish embassy anti-cartoon protests. In April 2008, he was convicted of fundraising for terrorism.

Last week, Lord Carlile, the Government’s former reviewer of anti-terrorism legislation, called for an investigation into Choudary over his connections to Michael Adebolajo. Yesterday, Choudary said he had not been approached by police investigating the Woolwich murder.

Source: telegraph.co.uk

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£4 million bill and rising to police badger cull

ollado — Sun, 26 May 2013 08:18:37 +0000

By Patrick Sawer

Police forces in south-west England fear the cost of ensuring the cull can proceed in the face of determined efforts to sabotage it will be higher than originally anticipated.

New estimates in Whitehall suggest that the cull, due to start on June 1, will cost £4 million to police, which comes on top of the £1 million already spent on last summer’s aborted culling trials.

But, with animal-rights activists planning to trespass on land where the night-time cull is taking place and set up illegal protest camps, senior officials fear the bill is likely to rise.

Badgers have been blamed for the spread of bovine tuberculosis in dairy herds and the Government has approved a pilot cull in Gloucestershire and Somerset, to tackle the problem.

Around 5,000 badgers will be shot during a six-week period, with more culled over the next four years.

Police face the prospect of having to keep the peace between militants determined to disrupt the cull and the marksmen hired to carry out the killings.

Plans are in place to call on police officers from neighbouring counties and, possibly, private security companies to help maintain order.

Privately, senior officers have described the prospect of widespread protests against the cull as “a nightmare”.

Richard Berry, the assistant chief constable of Gloucestershire, said: “We will deliver our statutory responsibilities, which include dealing with any incidents of crime and disorder and ensuring that anyone who wishes to protest peacefully and lawfully is able to do so.”

The forces will be reimbursed by the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs for the cost of policing the cull after it has been completed.

Source: telegraph.co.uk

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Stansted Jet: Britons Charged Over Diversion

ollado — Sun, 26 May 2013 08:16:46 +0000

Sky News

Two men have been charged with endangering an aircraft after a passenger jet from Pakistan to Manchester was diverted mid-flight.

The British nationals aged 30 and 41, who have not been named, will appear at Chelmsford Magistrates Court on Monday.

They were detained on Friday after a Pakistan International Airlines flight was diverted to Stansted Airport in Essex, where it landed at 2.15pm.

Flight PK709, which was due to land in Manchester at 1.30pm, was heading west towards the airport when it was suddenly re-routed near York.

The Boeing 777 aircraft headed back out to the North Sea before travelling south to Stansted, escorted by a Typhoon jet from RAF Coningsby in Lincolnshire.

Passengers were ordered to leave their possessions on board before leaving the plane, which was directed to an isolated stand.

The two men were arrested after armed police boarded the plane.

Source: uk.news.yahoo.com

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Cameron To Crack Down On Preachers Of Hate

ollado — Sun, 26 May 2013 08:15:22 +0000

By Jon Craig, Chief Political Correspondent | Sky News

David Cameron is to attempt to launch a crackdown on the preachers of hate blamed by the Government for the extremism that led to the murder of Drummer Lee Rigby in Woolwich.

The Prime Minister’s fightback will come with the launch of a taskforce to tackle all forms of radicalisation that can lead to violent extremism and terrorism.

The group will include the most senior members of the Cabinet, including Nick Clegg, George Osborne, Theresa May, Eric Pickles and Chris Grayling, as well the Muslim Foreign Office minister Baroness Warsi.

In tackling extremism, the task force will aim to produce initiatives on:

:: Disrupting extremist activity

:: Challenging poisonous narratives

:: Trends in radicalisation

:: Tackling radicalisation in institutions (mosques, madrassas, schools, colleges, universities and prisons)

:: Supporting faith and community leadership to build strong, integrated and united communities

Writing in The Sunday Telegraph, Mr Pickles, the Communities Secretary said: “Our answer to the extremists and preachers of hate is to speak out, to show them for what they are.

“That is why the Government’s ‘integration’ strategy focuses on working with people of goodwill to marginalise and outflank the extremists – not only Islamist preachers of hate, but also their malevolent counter-point, the racist English Defence League.

“As we reflect on the events of this week, there is no doubt that more can and will be done by the Government to challenge radicalisation and extremism.”

Mr Pickles also hit out at some broadcasters for giving publicity to extremists: “Politicians of all colours, and clerics of all mainstream faiths should challenge hatred and the politics of division.

“That means the public not standing idly by – refusing to listen to their sermons and refusing to accept their literature.

“That means broadcasters making a sensible editorial judgement not to give oxygen to their publicity.

“And that means councils not giving taxpayers’ money to organisations which promote segregation or shelter extremists.”

But the coalition’s strategy to counter Islamist extremism is failing, according to an outspoken intervention by the former Cabinet minister who ran the programme under the last government.

Hazel Blears, who as communities secretary led Labour’s Prevent strategy, told the Observer that people vulnerable to extremist preachers were being spotted too late.

She said it had been a serious mistake to dismantle the policy of funding local authorities that have a population more than 5% Muslim, to help them curb radicalism by engaging and funding community groups, Islamic societies and mosques.

Source: uk.news.yahoo.com

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Woolwich Murder: ‘Tasered’ Suspects Quizzed

ollado — Sun, 26 May 2013 08:13:54 +0000

Sky News

Police are continuing to question three more people arrested on suspicion of conspiracy to murder soldier Lee Rigby in southeast London.

Two men aged 24 and 28 were arrested at a residential address in London while a 21-year-old man was held in the street, Scotland Yard said.

Counter Terrorism Police used tasers to detain two of the men but neither needed hospital treatment.

The arrests came as Downing Street confirmed the launch of a new terror task force to crack down on extremism.

The group, comprising Cabinet ministers and top police and security service officials, will focus on radical preachers who seek out potential recruits in prisons, schools, colleges and mosques.

David Cameron has also announced that the parliamentary Intelligence and Security Committee (ISC) will carry out an investigation after it emerged that the two men suspected of murdering Drummer Rigby – Michael Adebolajo, 28, and Michael Oluwatobi Adebowale, 22 – were known to MI5.

Authorities in France are also investigating whether the murder of Drummer Rigby was linked to an attack on a French soldier, who was stabbed in the neck in a busy shopping area in Paris on Saturday.

Meanwhile, the father of murdered schoolboy Damilola Taylor has revealed that he had acted as a mentor to Adebowale, who was known to his friends as Toby.

Richard Taylor told ITV News: “I was terribly shocked at what I saw that day. It’s a different Toby or Michael that I was seeing that day. I don’t believe it was anything Islamic.”

Mr Taylor, whose son was just 10 when he was killed in London in 2000, said he had tried to help Adebowale after he was bullied at school and then became involved in drugs and gangs.

But he said that when he spoke to Adebowale two months ago, he told him that he had changed his ways as he had become a Muslim.

He said: “Having seen how my own son was stabbed to death, made me feel that … whatever happens, they will still be alive, they will still be on the street or maybe they will take them away from the public or change their faces.

“They don’t deserve to live.”

Adebowale and Adebolajo remain in a stable condition in hospital after being shot by police when they charged towards armed officers in Woolwich on Wednesday.

A 29-year-old man arrested on suspicion of conspiracy to murder has now been released on bail, police said.

Two women aged 29 and 31 have been released without charge after they were held on Thursday on suspicion of conspiracy to murder.

A number of other people not directly involved with the attack have been charged over malicious comments made on social networking sites.

Drummer Rigby was hit by a car and then attacked with weapons including a knife and a meat cleaver.

The young father’s murder has provoked a backlash of anger across the country, with mosques being attacked, widespread racial abuse and comments on social media and a large increase in anti-Muslim incidents.

Up to 2,000 people took part in a EDL march in Newcastle on Saturday, which had been planned before Wednesday’s attack.

Police said there were no major incidents, with a small number of arrests related to alcohol and public order offences. Three people were held before the march for allegedly making racist tweets.

A service dedicated to the soldier will be held at St Peter the Apostle Roman Catholic Church in Woolwich today, while prayers will also be said at Woolwich’s St Mary Magdalene Parish Church.

Meanwhile, a poll for the Mail on Sunday has shown that almost two-thirds of the British public say they think British troops should continue to wear their uniforms in public.

But 54% say the events in Woolwich highlight the need for British troops to withdraw from Afghanistan more quickly than currently planned for at the end of 2014.

Source: uk.news.yahoo.com

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Two questioned after UK plane alert

ollado — Sat, 25 May 2013 09:18:35 +0000

Police boarded Pakistan International Airlines (PIA) flight, originally en route to Manchester from Lahore, after it was diverted to Stansted on Friday.

The British nationals being held are aged 30 and 41, Essex Police said.

Police later released the plane and passengers were flown to Manchester.

Passengers said they had heard threats had been made on board, but there has not been any official confirmation.

The plane was scheduled to leave Lahore – the capital of the Pakistani province of Punjab – at 09:35 local time (05:35 BST) on Friday and had been due to arrive in Manchester at 13:30 BST.

‘Strong argument ‘

One passenger told the BBC the pilot had informed them there had been threats.

The man said: “We were about half-an-hour away from landing in Manchester and we saw that the plane was taking different actions.

“We did not know anything about it other than the pilots announced that they have landed at Stansted. And we landed, safely. Then he announced that he had a threat from someone, which was why he had landed the plane.”

Supt Darrin Tomkins: “At this point no suspicious items have been recovered”

Another passenger, Umari Nauman, told Sky News cabin crew had said two men had repeatedly tried to get into the cockpit.

The plane remained at a spot on the north side of Stansted Airport with flights carrying on as normal, before being released by police allowing passengers to be flown to Manchester.

On arrival, one passenger told the BBC there had been a “strong argument between the crew and one passenger”.

Another said it was a “fuss about nothing”, adding that the pilot had “over exaggerated”.

Pakistan International Airlines flight PK709: Diverted route

1. Pakistan International Airlines flight PK709 was due to arrive at Manchester Airport at 13:30 BST after leaving Lahore, Pakistan, at about 09:35 local time (05:35 BST)
2. After an alert was raised, the flight was diverted to London Stansted Airport, in Essex, and Typhoon jets from RAF Coningsby, Lincolnshire, were scrambled to escort the plane
3. After the plane landed at London Stansted, two men were arrested by police on suspicion of endangerment of an aircraft

PIA said there had been 308 passengers on board, as well as 14 crew including pilots, with a mixture of Pakistani and British passport holders.

‘Investigate’

An MoD spokesman said Typhoon jets could be scrambled after the pilot or crew of a passenger aircraft sends out an emergency signal.

“The purpose of going up is to investigate what the situation is,” he said.

RAF Typhoon jets were scrambled to escort the airliner to Stansted.

“Often when a quick reaction alert aircraft is launched the details are not known, but it is known that a signal has been sent.”

In 2011, two PIA passenger planes were the subject of bombs threat coming from Pakistan.

A Boeing 777, with the same flight number as in the latest incident, carrying 347 passengers plus crew and bound for Manchester from Lahore was forced to land at Ataturk International airport in Istanbul.

The second plane, carrying 176 passengers, landed safely at its destination in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia.

Source: bbc.co.uk

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