Two of Wales’ religious leaders have issued a joint statement condemning a planned demonstration by Welsh Defence League as “crude and dangerous”. The Archbishop of Wales Dr Barry Morgan and the Secretary General of the Muslim Council of Wales Saleem Kidwai say Saturday’s protest in Cardiff will “undermine efforts to promote tolerance and diversity”.
Category Archives: Wales
Racist march due on day of music and rugby in Cardiff
Saturday 5th June is gearing up to be a busy day in Cardiff, with Wales hosting South Africa at the Millennium Stadium and the Stereophonics preparing to rock the Cardiff City Stadium.
Resources are bound to be stretched and many fans will be arriving by train to the city centre, and could be greeted by a march by the Welsh & English Defence League (WDL/EDL).
The group is due to be marching at lunchtime in the city centre and massing outside Cardiff Central Station. A rival march has been setup by campaign group Unite Against Fascism and will be marching through the city centre at the same time in opposition to the protest.
Unite Against Fascism are arranging a rival march and are calling on Cardiff City fans to support them. A leaflet from the group states: “Cardiff City fans have been linked with the WDL/EDL. Bluesbirds vs the Nazis has been set up to show that the majority of CCFC fans are opposed to racism and facism.”
Mark Serwotka, General Secretary of PCS union, said: “The WDL/EDL hold their demos to intimidate and divide us. As a Cardiff City fan, I call on everyone to unite and protest against the WDL/EDL’s attempts to whip up racism.”
The Unite Against Facism protesters are due to meet at 11 AM at Roald Dahl Plas on Saturday 5th June 2010 and march through Butetown and the city centre, finishing at City Hall with a rally at 1 PM.
Police probe Facebook page attacking Wrexham ‘super mosque’
Police are investigating a sick anti-Muslim website set up on Facebook to stir up tensions over fake claims a ‘super-mosque’ was being built in Wrexham.
The site “No to the super mosque in Wrexham” on the social network site wrongly claims permission has been given for a mosque at the Miners Institute in North Wales’s largest town. And the website, which bears the Welsh Defence League logo, is also filled with hateful messages against Muslims, which North Wales Police are now investigating.
The web group has more than 2,800 members and this follows a march by the Welsh Defence League designed to stir up tensions in the town.
Hundreds join Facebook protest against Valleys anti-Muslim march
More than 700 people have joined a Facebook group to oppose a proposed anti-Muslim march through the Rhondda, which five men have been arrested and bailed in connection with.
“We Say No To The Planned Rhondda Valleys Racist March” is described on Facebook as “a group for intelligent, informed, peace-loving residents of the Rhondda Valleys, who are opposed to the planned anti-Muslim march from Treherbert to Pontypridd on February 28”.
Police arrested five men for religiously aggravated public order offences two weeks ago, after Wales MEP Jill Evans alerted them to some of the comments being made on the social networking site in relation to the Rhondda March, a group set up to organise a protest in favour of moving Muslim people out of Wales.
Teacher Kelly Robson, who formerly taught French at Porth County Comprehensive School, explained that she decided to set up the opposition group after reading about the Rhondda March on the Rhondda Leader page of WalesOnline website.
The former Treorchy Comprehensive School student said: “I was disgusted by the kind of comments that had been posted on the original Facebook group. I know a lot of people who live in the Valleys and I know the majority of them don’t share these views. So I decided to set up this group so that these people could make their views heard as well.”
Within three days of setting up the group, the 33-year-old received positive messages from anti-racism groups from as far away as Canada, as well as backing from hundreds of supporters, such as Rhondda AM Leighton Andrews and South Wales Central AM Leanne Wood.
“The first group had 150 members but hundreds more people joined this group within a week, which just goes to show how strongly people feel about this,” she said.
Some members of the opposition group have suggested marching on February 28, which was the intended day of the original march. But Mrs Robson has stressed that if anyone decides to organise a protest it should be peaceful.
“I set up this group as a peaceful outlet for residents of the Rhondda Valleys who wish to declare their opposition to an anti-Muslim march,” she said. “I do not wish to antagonise the situation.”
Police have confirmed that they do not believe the Rhondda March will take place but will be monitoring the situation.
The five arrested men have been bailed pending further inquiries until February 28.
No one from the Rhondda March would comment when contacted by the Leader.
Anti-Muslim racists arrested in Wales
Five men have been arrested after a Facebook site was set up declaring “all Muslims should be thrown out of Wales”.
Around 150 people joined the group on the social networking site claiming they would march through the Rhondda Valleys to make their feelings known. But South Wales Police have now stepped in and arrested five men for religiously aggravated public order offences.
It is one of the first occasions people have been arrested over comments posted on Facebook. The group has also been removed from the site. Police now believe the march will not go ahead, but they will be on standby in case anyone turns up.
Members of the group, which was entitled Rhondda March, said they would walk from Treherbert down to Pontypridd on February 28. And the organisers declared: “We Dont Want Musslims in our country move them out they are takeing over.”
The group’s message board was inundated with comments including “ai im in, gona put sum nails in a stick 4 the f******” and “Got my steel toe caps ready, wot a craking idea”. Another reads: “send the f****** bk. Join us u now u want 2 stand up tall”. A further message said: “Move these musslims back home”. And another read: “yeah support our local buissnes not forgin ones. Im in”.
Update: See “Hundreds join Facebook protest against Valleys anti-Muslim march”, Wales Online, 18 February 2010
Tory MP says rapist was influenced by migrants’ ‘barbaric and medieval’ attitudes towards women
David Cameron was last night challenged to deselect a Welsh Conservative MP who linked the case of a teenage Muslim rapist to “barbaric and medieval” views towards women “imported into this country”.
Monmouth MP David Davies made his controversial comments during a radio interview while discussing the case of Bilal Khan, 13, who was jailed for three years for raping a 20-year-old woman in a park at Stoke-on-Trent.
He said: “I think there is a wider question here. What is it about this young man’s upbringing, what about his community or his parental upbringing, that led him to think that women are second-class people whose rights can be trampled over like this?
“That is a very interesting question, and there are some sensitive issues here but there do seem to be some people in some communities who don’t respect women’s rights at all and who, I may say, without necessarily saying this is the case on this occasion, who have imported into this country barbaric and medieval views about women, and that is something that also needs to be addressed.”
Welsh Secretary Peter Hain said: “David Davies should be ashamed of himself. His was a knee-jerk reaction based on ignorance. Rather than concentrating on the facts of a shocking case, he chose to malign entire communities in a wholly unfair and divisive way.”
Naz Malik, chief executive of Awema, the All Wales Ethnic Minority Association, said: “By linking in this instance the rape case to undefined migrant communities, David Davies displays the thought processes of a racial bigot. I think it is time David Cameron reassured Britain’s ethnic minority communities by sending a very strong message to him that his remarks are wholly unacceptable. That could be achieved by deselecting him as a Conservative candidate in the coming general election.”
Mohammed Shafiq, chief executive of the Ramadhan Foundation, a group representing young Muslims, said: “We in our communities find what Bilal Khan has done evil and totally unacceptable in Islam and for Mr Davies to suggest that somehow these rapist attitudes are engrained in some parts of [black and minority ethnic] communities is deeply offensive and of no substance.”
Plaid Cymru AM Leanne Wood said: “These comments not only display a crass ignorance of different cultures, but are highly inflammatory. To suggest that ‘backward, medieval and barbaric’ views towards women are being ‘imported’ into the UK is dangerous and irresponsible. Discriminatory attitudes towards women have to be tackled in all communities, regardless of race or religion. For David Davies to claim otherwise, suggests he is either very ill-informed or trying to court the anti-immigration brigade.”
Four arrested in protest against mosques in Wrexham
Four people were arrested at an anti-Muslim demonstration amid a strong police presence in Wrexham. Around 40 members of a group calling themselves the Welsh Defence League (WDL) shouted racial abuse and gestured towards locals, saying they were protesting against plans for a new mosque.
Four people were arrested for public order offences, and North Wales’s Temporary Deputy Chief Constable, Ian Shannon said the day passed without “significant incident”. Meanwhile Unite Against Fascism held a counter-protest, near where the WDL gathered on Saturday.
And a Wrexham Communities Against Racism festival attracted around 200 people. Residents were joined by faith groups, the Wales TUC, Searchlight, Unison and members of Wrexham Council. Searchlight Cymru secretary Ian Titherington said none of the WDL protestors were Welsh, and they appeared to be members of the English Defence League (EDL).
He said: “This was the final humiliation for the EDL’s disastrous visits to Wales. The only way they could hold an event was to bus in 30 from Bolton, who on arrival went to the nearest pub, got drunk and bawled out racist chants. The EDL gathering did not exactly sell any local links, by displaying a Bolton Wanderers FC English flag and singing God Save the Queen.”
The WDL was formed in June 2009 as an off-shoot of the EDL, which claims to campaign against Islamic extremism. The group insists it is not fascist. But at a march in Swansea in October, onlookers were confronted by jeering men giving Nazi salutes, and one was arrested for a racially aggravated public order offence.
EDL fails to spread its poison in Wales
Newport anti-fascists scored a major victory this weekend when an impressive show of local unity stopped the English Defence League’s (EDL) attempt to spread its racist poison in Wales.
The EDL had planned a rally in the city’s John Frost Square on Saturday to launch the Welsh Defence League, but a 500-strong counterprotest and a complete lack of local support forced it to cancel.
This followed the fascists’ disastrous visit to Swansea last weekend, where they were driven off by a larger counterdemonstration.
“Newport is a multicultural city with an industrial background,” explained Ian Titherington of Searchlight Cymru, “and today’s fantastic turnout shows that racists are not welcome here.”
Campaigners, joined by local politicians and faith groups, occupied the square to celebrate multicultural Newport with live music, including a drum band and an impressive performance from the Cor Cochion Caerdydd (Cardiff Red Choir).
Unite Against Fascism marched through the city centre before joining the rally, which also heard speeches from Welsh Assembly Minister John Griffiths and local Labour MP Paul Flynn.
See also “Racists day off” on Paul Flynn’s blog, 24 October 2009
Far-right protesters in Swansea burn anti-Nazi flag
Far-right activists gathered in the centre of Swansea over the weekend to protest against Islamist extremism. Members of the Welsh Defence League performed Nazi salutes and jeered at the hundreds of people who gathered in opposition to the rally. One man scaled a building to take down an anti-Nazi flag, which was then set on fire. South Wales police said a 25-year-old man was arrested for a racially aggravated public order offence and was detained.
Welsh Defence League cancels protest in Newport
A protest planned by the Welsh Defence League in Newport this weekend has been cancelled, police said today.
The demonstration, which was supposed to voice objections to the conversion of a church in Victoria Road into a mosque and multi-faith community centre, had been due to take place on Saturday. But Gwent police confirmed today they had been informed it will no longer go ahead. A counter-protest is still thought to be taking place.