With a callousness that defies belief, the British government continues to pursue and persecute Chagossians in pursuit of the genocide they initiated on the community in 1971. This blog has been campaigning for the Chagossians for over ten years, but following the recent resounding condemnation of the British government at the International Court of Justice, and the massive vote at the UN General Assembly for Chagos to be returned to Mauritius, thankfully the issue is becoming better known. The SNP are to be congratulated for initiating and leading a debate at Westminster this week to demand that the UK respects the International Court of Justice decision (which the Tories are refusing to do).
You may be interested to know that, having spent some of your subscriptions for two years on paid promotion of the blog to targeted audiences on Facebook, it was my article analysing at length the disgraceful British political actions over Chagos, particularly by New Labour, which caused Facebook to ban me from all Facebook advertising. I am still banned.
When the British government forcibly deported every single Chagossian from their islands between 1967 and 1971 to make way for a US nuclear weapons base, a few of them eventually found their way to the UK, being at the time British subjects. The small British Chagossian community is very active. Steven Leelah’s grandfather was one of the original deportees and his mother is a UK citizen. Steven had his right to remain in the UK refused by the Home Office, and when he turned up to report as required pending his appeal, he was arrested and imprisoned in “immigration detention” pending deportation. Just where they intend to deport him is an interesting question – his father is Chagossian and his mother is British – certainly not to Chagos, where the islanders are still forbidden from their own homes.
This is yet another example of the vicious and callous brutality which was injected, deliberately, into the Home Office by Theresa May and her “hostile environment” policy, which is no more and no less than the institutionalisation of racism as government policy. It goes hand in hand with the deprofessionalisation of the “Border force” and the contracting out of most of its functions to for profit companies.
You may find it hard to believe, but I worked very closely with officers of the old “Immigration Service” when posted in Lagos, Warsaw and Accra and formed many good friendships with members. They were career civil servants and included individuals who were sensible, humane, erudite and even kind, and often took a real interest in understanding the cultures of the people with whom they were working abroad. All that has now gone and been replaced by minimum wage teens box checking applications, and Serco and Group 4 thugs “enforcing”, all for profit, and in pursuit of the objectives of racism.
That the UK should compound the world renowned disgrace of its Chagos brutality with this treatment of Steven Leelah is jaw dropping. I really am incandescent with rage over this. Please do help by contributing to his fundraiser here.
Time for a bit of moral honesty I think. I have no hesitation in declaring my support for Steven Leelah and for Julian Assange. So I find it rather difficult to understand why I’m supposed to turn a blind eye to what is being done to Tommy Robinson – or worse, cheer it on.
He has just been convicted for a second time for contempt of court for which he has already served jail time, and now faces a second spell in jail. Here is an article from the BBC covering past cases of grotesque miscarriages of justice caused by irresponsible media reporting. Some of them resulted in cases being abandoned, and some even resulted in convictions being quashed:
https://www.bbc.com/news/uk-13905765
No journalists were convicted or even charged in any of these cases, and I think (although I’m not certain) that no other journalist has ever been prosecuted in the UK for contempt of court resulting from irresponsible reporting.
Robinson has also served time in jail for mortgage fraud – the identical offence for which Peter Mandelson was not even prosecuted while a serving Cabinet Minister. Mandelson’s fraud was compounded by the fact that he secretly borrowed money from Geoffrey Robinson, a businessman whose affairs were at the time being investigated by Mandelson’s government department.
I recently watched a 20-minute video compilation. During the EU Parliamentary election, Robinson held a rally in Oldham. He organised it in a location that was nowhere near any “Muslin area”. A group of several dozen Muslims, some masked or balaclavaed, and clearly intent on trouble, were escorted by police for several miles to the location of Robinson’s rally. They proceeded to pelt the rally – which included mothers and children – with missiles including bricks, while the police watched and did nothing. The police took no action until the mob began to pelt them with missiles too.
Not one word of this incident appeared in the MSM.
Feel free to try to imagine this similar, but opposite scenario: The police escort a mob of EDL supporters across Oldham to the location of a Muslim political rally that includes mothers and children, and then stand aside and watch while the mob pelts the rally with bricks. Not one word of this appears in the MSM…
The establishment seems to have become utterly cynical in its creation of “hate figures” to keep the mob slavering, and anybody who presents the slightest threat to the established order – from any part of the political spectrum – can be turned into a target. Julian Assange, Tommy Robinson, Chris Williamson, Alex Salmond, The Naked Rambler, David Kelly, Craig Murray…
The MSM meekly and obediently play their allotted role as the orchestrators of the hate.
RT is not accredited to visit the Global Conference for Media Freedom
https://www.gov.uk/government/topical-events/global-conference-for-media-freedom-london-2019/about
It is all you need to know about Media Freedom.
@ Tatyana July 7, 2019 at 09:17
Are you crazy? How can you have a copper-clad tame MSM propaganda system if you allow alternative news?
A debate in Westminster Hall entitled Future of the Chagos Islands on 3td July 2019 is currently being shown on the Parliament Channel. Freeview 232.
Sir Alan Duncan speaks for HMG as a FCO minister.
Chagos Islands: UN General Assembly Resolution
https://hansard.parliament.uk/Commons/2019-07-03/debates/3A6C6A98-82CA-4D65-BDF9-576F216F892A/ChagosIslandsUNGeneralAssemblyResolution
It was opened by Patrick Grady, SNP Glasgow North
Craig
How about some observations on the Washington FCO leak? An article?
Nobody is better placed than you to write on this subject, nobody!
Who could have performed this dastardly deed?
Whoever it was, at least they have a conscience!
Durak
“Whoever it was, at least they have a conscience!”
Why do you think that?