Category Archives: EDL/BNP/BFP

Feb 14 0 comments
Activism, EDL/BNP/BFP, Press releases

Sikhs set to join protest against racist EDL in Cambridge

Supporters of the ‘Sikhs Against the EDL’ campaign are set to be joining a mass counter protest called by Cambridge Unite Against Fascism (CUAF) against a static protest scheduled to be held in on Saturday 23rd February by the far-right English Defence League (EDL).

The EDL is a racist organisation whose main activity is street demonstrations against the Muslim community. Although it claims only to oppose Islamic extremism it targets the entire Muslim community and its actions deliberately seek to whip up tensions and violence between Muslim and non-Muslim communities.

This will be the second visit by the EDL in Cambridge in the past two years. In July 2011, the EDL attempted to march with only 200 members in protest against a mosque before being prevented from marching by 2,000 anti-racism campaigns and local residents.

Since then anti-racism campaigners have successfully prevented the EDL from marching at a number of locations across Britain. The EDL has suffered a series of humiliating defeats, most recently in Norwich and Waltham Forest. Their failure to mobilise sympathisers of their cause has resulted in them cancelling their scheduled march in Slough due to an expected ‘massive local opposition’.

Meanwhile, EDL leader – Tommy Robinson (also known as Stephen Lennon and Paul Harris) has been sentenced to ten months in prison for entering the US illegally on a false passport and his deputy, Kevin Carroll, was arrested last month on suspicion of race hate crime.

The ‘Sikhs Against the EDL’ campaign was initiated two years ago in response to a handful of misguided Sikh youth who were then supporting the EDL. They provoked an angry response from the Sikh community with many community leaders and prominent organisations condemning their actions in a joint statement for misrepresenting the community by carrying the Sikh insignia in their vile anti-Muslim propaganda.

However, most of the misguided individuals have since left the EDL, largely due to the campaign led by the ‘Sikhs Against the EDL’ campaign but also after the EDL decided to form an alliance with British Freedom Party (BFP), a breakaway group from the BNP but with equally openly fascist policies.

Balwinder Singh Rana, a spokesperson for ‘Sikhs Against the EDL’ campaign said, “We will continue to show our solidarity with all individuals against racism and the Muslim community. We must keep up the pressure on the EDL; they have been wounded but have not yet been defeated.”

He further added: “In the current economic climate with mass unemployment and austerity, the racists will always try to blame the minorities for all of their problems. When they go looking for scapegoats, we are an easily identifiable and convenient target. They try to divide our communities to turn us against each other, but now is the time for all communities to unite together and show to these racists that their message of intolerance will not work.”

Oct 28 1 comments
Activism, EDL/BNP/BFP

An account of the Walthamstow rally against the EDL

Below is an account of the 27/10/2012 counter-EDL rally in Walthamstow, written by Varinder Singh, a member of the ‘Sikhs Against the EDL’ campaign. This account was written on 28/10/2012.

A few words from Varinder Singh: “Generally speaking, I don’t write accounts of events and rarely keep notes on demonstrations that I attend. On this particular occasion I decided otherwise. Hopefully, I’ll continue to write accounts for other demonstrations as they come for the purpose of being a reference worthy source. I think its very rare to find a recorded narrative and perspective from members of our community. It is a shame that despite the historic contribution of the Sikh community in anti-racism and anti-fascism campaigning since far back as the 1960′s in the United Kingdom, that we have failed to maintain a record of the personal experiences of all those who participated in the protests, street battles, those who went to jail and those who were the victims of racial hate crime.”

At 11.10 I left the London Borough of Redbridge with a veteran anti-fascist activist and colleague in the ‘Sikhs Against the EDL’ campaign. Balwinder Singh Rana, my colleague, was one of the earlier immigrants to have come to the United Kingdom from India and had been heavily involved in anti-racism campaigning since the early ‘60s. We were travelling in his car and but were missing a few members from West London who had initially indicated that they intended to travel to the rally with us.

We reached Walthamstow around 11.40 and came across police road diversions on Hoe Street. As we drove through the side roads, we struggled to find any parking. My colleague suggested that I leave the car and continue by foot to the rally point whilst he found parking. As per his suggestion I left the car and opened the boot, taking with me a black rucksack containing our distinctive banner and another carry-case containing the wooden poles for our banner.

I couldn’t help but notice the freezing cold weather on my hands. Fortunately, I didn’t have to walk too far as I was only around the corner from the rally point. I could see the lorry which was being used as a stage and a thin line of about eight to ten police officers in high-visibility jackets standing behind the road diversion.

As I walked past the officers and joined the crowd I could see some familiar faces. Weyman Bennet (the joint secretary of Unite Against Fascism) shook hands and walked past, a few faces from student politics were huddled together, a few members from the NUS Black Students campaign were present and a few friendly faces from CWU Wales could be seen amongst the rally. I also saw a small boy, probably aged seven or eight, holding his mother’s hand and carrying a red homemade poster with an anti-racist caption.

Most people were carrying the distinctive pink Unite Against Fascism placard with photos of Anders Behring Breivik and Tommy Robinson with the caption: ‘Different faces, same hatred’. Others were carrying the black Socialist Workers Party (SWP) placard with the captions ‘Smash the EDL & BNP’ and ‘Smash the English Defence League’. There was a significant local community presence with others holding yellow or red flags from different solidarity groups as well as people with trade union banners.

Get the whole story »

Oct 23 0 comments
Activism, EDL/BNP/BFP

‘Sikhs Against the EDL’ counter-protest against the English Defence League (EDL) in Walthamstow

The ‘Sikhs Against the EDL’ campaign have today announced that they will be supporting the counter protest against the EDL in Walthamstow on Saturday 27th October 2012. The counter protest is being organised by a multi-cultural, multi-racial and multi-faith organisation known as ‘We Are Waltham Forest’, a broad-based network of local community groups, political organisations and trade unions. Their aim is to ‘celebrate diversity and oppose racism and fascism’ and to show the EDL that they are not welcome in Walthamstow. The UK’s largest anti-fascism organisation, ‘Unite Against Fascism’, is also calling for a national mobilisation to support the ‘We Are Waltham Forest’ demonstration.

This is the second time the EDL would be coming to Walthamstow within two months. Only weeks earlier the EDL suffered a humiliating defeat as they could only muster 200 supporters and were blocked by more than 4,000 local people.

The scheduled return has been planned to cause deliberate provocation and offence to the Muslim community by returning during the holy Muslim festival of Eid. It has also been reported that 53 supporters of the EDL were arrested over the weekend apparently heading towards London to, allegedly, target a Mosque while the police were occupied at the large TUC demo. It is also alleged that among those arrested were EDL leader Tommy Robinson aka Stephen Yaxley Lennon and deputy leader Kevin Carroll who is also running for the Police commissioner’s position in Bedfordshire on behalf of the EDL’s political wing, the British Freedom Party.

The EDL is a racist organisation that particularly targets Muslims. In the last three years, since it was formed, they have staged more than 90 provocative demonstrations in towns and cities around the country, attempting to stir up anti-Muslim racism and hatred. Their recent march in Walsall, like many others before, ended in violence when they pelted the police with bricks and sticks and subsequently 28 of their members were arrested. In the past, in some cases they have broken free from police cordons and rampaged down the streets attacking cars shops and passers-by.

They claim to oppose ‘extremism’ but EDL supporters have been filmed chanting ‘Burn a mosque down’. A series of arson and other physical attacks on mosques and  community centres have taken place in areas where the EDL is active. In Dudley, after one of their marches, a Hindu temple and a Sikh elderly gentleman were also physically attacked by their supporters.

The leade of the EDL, Tommy Robinson and a number of other leading members are former member of the fascist British National Party (BNP). Many more former members of the BNP, the National Front and other fascist organisations are also active in the EDL and have been photographed giving Hitler’s ‘sieg heil’ salute. Recently the EDL announced a formal alliance with the British Freedom Party (BFP), a breakaway group from the BNP but with equally fascist policies who want to ‘scrap the Equalities Act and ban all manifestations of religious and cultural separtism’.

The ‘Sikhs Against the EDL’ campaign was formed two years ago in response to attempts by the EDL to recruit Sikh youth to their ranks. The campaign immediately received wide support from major Sikh and Hindu organisations, MPs, councilors as well as many other prominent people from the community. As a result of the campaign, most of the Sikh supporters of the EDL now seem to have disappeared.

Balwinder Singh Rana, spokesperson for the ‘Sikhs Against the EDL’ said:

”The EDL want to come back to Walthamstow to try to intimidate the Muslim community and to cause divisions. In the past they have pretended that they are friends of the Sikhs. But their alliance with the BFP has now totally exposed their true nature. They are no different than the BNP and they are against all minorities and opposed to multiculturalism. So, they can not fool us and we should oppose them where ever they show up to spread their racist poison”.

He further added:

“We should all take note of what is happening in Greece where the fascist ‘Golden Dawn’ party has taken advantage of the deep economic crisis and have grown considerably in a matter of months. They go around dressed in ‘fascist like’ uniforms and openly attack immigrants in the streets. In this country we are also in a deep economic crisis with mass unemployment and massive public spending cuts. At such times they have always looked for scapegoats to blame. In the 30s it were the Jews, in the 70s and 90s it were the blacks and the Asians and now they have found a convenient scapegoat in the Muslims. But we should never forget that today it’s the Muslims and tomorrow it would be all of us”.

Oct 19 0 comments
Activism, EDL/BNP/BFP

‘EDL = SIKH HELL’ reads graffiti


Sep 28 0 comments
Activism, EDL/BNP/BFP

Report encourages support for the Turban Campaign

This week a new report titled ‘Faith Hate’ was launched by Faith Matters, a not for profit organisation which works to reduce extremism and interfaith and intra-faith tensions. The report investigates what draws people of faith to right wing organisations & what effects does the EDL have on interfaith relations?

The report highlights the continuing attempts by the far-right English Defence League (EDL) to manipulate local tensions between faith communities in the United Kingdom. The research also explicitly highlights attempts by the EDL to actively recruit members of faith communities into its ranks.

Some of the key findings include:

- There is a need to maintain resilience as the EDL’s message is tailored to play on historical angsts between faith groups and their campaigning with faith groups is thought out.

- Religious institutions need to recognise the fact that a small number of radicals within their communities might be drawn to right‐wing organisations. This issue should not be discounted or ignored as it can only be addressed by accepting that the problem exists, no matter how minor.

- Groups like the Turban Campaign and ‘Sikhs Against the EDL’ should be supported in their work against the EDL, given that they are committed, dedicated campaigners who have campaigned for years against the EDL without any resource. Their impact can be widened.

The research also makes recommendations that Christian organisations should be doing far more to combat the appeal of far-right groups such as the English Defence League given that the group uses mainly Christian symbolism in its promotion and publicity material.

Commenting on the report, Varinder Singh who runs the Turban Campaign said: “We welcome the findings of this report. We have long maintained the view point that faith communities should not allow a handful of individuals to propagate hatred and that their views should be challenged.”

Speaking to the Huffington post about challenging the EDL, Singh said: “You have to point out the double-standards of EDL, how they have attacked or mocked communities which are supposedly their allies. We have very little common ground.”

The full report can be downloaded here.