The Muslim Council of Britain rejected MPs’ claims yesterday that Asians were not being targeted by draconian police stop and search powers.

After an inquiry lasting five months, the home affairs select committee declared that “we do not believe that the Asian community is being unreasonably targeted by the police in their application of the Terrorism Act or of the other legislation enabling stops and searches”. However, it accepted that “there is a clear perception among all our Muslim witnesses that Muslims are being stigmatised” and called for “special efforts” by police and government to ensure that they are not singled out.

MCB secretary-general Iqbal Sacranie said that there was clear evidence that there was a disproportionate tendency to stop and search Muslims. “We believe that the problem is more than that of mere perception”, he said, accusing the committee’s report of being flawed because it only identified Muslims by race. Mr Sacranie said that a true picture could only be obtained if the statistics took account of non-Asian Muslims.

Morning Star, 7 April 2005

See also BLINK news report, 6 April 2005