PRESS RELEASE: Anti-Fascist Network statement on Saturday 7th September EDL demonstration

The Metropolitan Police arrested over 280 anti-fascist activists, local community members, and passersby in East London on 7 September, as up to 700 English Defence League supporters were allowed to march over Tower Bridge and rally at Aldgate without encountering any mass opposition.

A large community demonstration was restricted to Altab Ali Park, well out of sight of the EDL’s march route and rally point. A bloc of around 600 within the demonstration, coordinated by the Anti-Fascist Network (AFN), attempted to hold a march to get within sight of the EDL’s route and present a visible opposition, which was then blocked and kettled by police. Despite police attacks the front of the AFN bloc did manage to get within sight of the EDL march, meaning the only political opposition the racists saw on the day was a direct result of the AFN mobilisation.

Sarah Smith from London Anti-Fascists said:

   “The number of people who joined the Anti-Fascist Network bloc on the day shows that there is a real mood for forms of anti-fascism that go beyond static rallies where mainstream politicians and religious leaders spout liberal platitudes. The 600 people who attempted to march with AFN on Saturday shows that a moderate, ‘respectable’ anti-fascism based on deference to the state and the political status quo is no longer the only show in town.”

Anti-fascists, independent legal observers, and people who were just passing by were detained on the street for over six hours before the police announced their intention to make mass arrests. Arrestees were taken to police stations on the outer extremities of London — including Colindale, Sutton, and elsewhere — mostly under the pretext that they had committed an offence under the Public Order Act. Their alleged ‘crime’ was to march down a street the police didn’t want them to march down.

Some arrestees were held for up to 15 hours in total. Were it not for the work of arrestee support groups, many of those detained would have been thrown out of police stations in the middle of the night on the outskirts of London with little way of getting home. Most have now been released with highly restrictive bail conditions preventing them from opposing the EDL and other racist groups.

Tony Dixon from the Anti-Fascist Network said:

    “These mass arrests, following a similar operation at an anti-BNP demonstration in May, show how the state is using political policing to criminalise protest and intimidate people out of taking political action. Only the tamest, most moderate forms of protest are sanctioned; anything else is met with police violence, kettling, and mass arrests.”

Val Swain of the Network for Police Monitoring (NetPol), added:

“Carrying out mass arrests on any demonstration is an excessive and draconian measure. In this case it was clearly not necessary to prevent disorder – many, if not most of the arrests were carried out after the EDL had left the area.

“In this case the police have taken 286 sets of names, addresses, fingerprints and dna. It has been a highly effective data gathering exercise. They have also imposed bail conditions preventing all of those arrested from participating in future protests – even though they have not been charged, let alone convicted of any offence. The police have had a successful operation to disrupt, deter and prevent anti-fascist protest.”

Notes for editors:

– The Anti-Fascist Network is a network of independent anti-fascists and anti-racist groups from across Britain, fighting the far right on the basis of direct action and working-class politics.

– The Anti-Fascist Network can be contacted on afncontact@riseup.net

SchNEWS: Tower Power

The Met Police made up to 300 arrests (07/09/13) in order to allow the EDL to march across Tower Bridge and into the outskirts of Tower Hamlets.

The day started well enough with hundreds answering the Anti -Fascist Network‘s call to stop the EDL. The AFN responding to earlier threats by the Met to march the league into the heart of Tower Hamlets had announced their meeting point as Altab Ali park – effectively as a side rally to the Unite against Fascism shindig.

The UAF affair went down much as expected – a platform with speakers firmly within the designated protest zone. In the end they produced nearly fifty speakers (all the usual suspects and local worthies). It also has to be said that the UAF really only started banging the drum for Tower Hamlets when it was clear that a police ban on an EDL march into Tower Hamlets proper would be enforced.

Meanwhile the AFN quietly assembled towards the back of the park and when the moment came around 500 surged out behind the banners and to the cops’ surprise marched east in order to outflank them and exploit a few undefended side streets. Many locals joined in with the break away.

Swinging round, the block made for Tower Bridge and tried to make its way through the hastily improvised police cordons. Some were kettled or turned back but one group of around a hundred made it to within sight of the EDL’s rally point on Tower Bridge. Determined attempts to break through were met with the threat of horses and dogs. In the end the exchange between anti-fascists and EDL was limited to shouting abuse.

Other anti-fascists operated in small groups along the route of the EDL’s march. After the huge build up and with all the benefits of the Lee Rigby incident the league only numbered around 600 on the day. One SchNEWS reporter who walked alongside them said “They seemed pretty despondent, there was very little shouting or chanting”.

At the EDL’s rally point at Aldgate station one brave couple, who’d evaded police detection, unfurled a banner with the pithy slogan “Racists fuck off”. This provoked a hail of bottles from the enraged EDL. The banner wielders were then nicked for ‘breach of the peace’. There were also (unconfirmed) reports that non-aligned anti-fascists got into a building site to the south of the rally and hurled bricks into the crowd.

The EDL were permitted a half hour rally, during which Tommy Robinson announced a series of charity walks in the Tower Hamlets area, an obvious move in light of the astounding success of the last one. They were then marched directly back along their route and embarked on their buses. A handful remained drinking under the watchful eyes of cops in pubs near the bridge. No EDL supporters managed any kind of visible presence in Tower Hamlets on the day.

As the news of the EDL’s departure came through the UAF staged a ‘victory march’ along Whitechapel High St. The celebration of this ‘victory’ while nearly two hundred comrades were being held in police kettles and being prepared for mass arrest was condemned by at least one AFN activist as a “fucking disgrace”.

Police brought commandeered buses to the two kettles and began loading prisoners into them to be distributed to police stations across London. Arrest support was organised by Green and Black Cross across the capital, with activists waiting outside police stations for released detainees. As far as SchNEWS is aware virtually nobody has been charged with an offence or even interviewed. They have all been bailed away from ‘demonstrations by the BNP, EDL or EVF inside the M25’. These are the very same bail conditions handed out to activists who confronted the BNP’s attempted march on the Cenotaph . Clearly the Met at least are worried about the growing presence of militant anti-fascists on the streets.

Were you arrested? If you haven’t already then it’s probably worth your while to contact Green and Black Cross who are collating information and organising legal support.

For more information on autonomous street based anti-fascism – ANTI FASCIST NETWORK

Link

More reports:

Anti-Fascist Network: East End: Always Anti-Fascist

East Midlands Anti-fascists: Heavy manners in Tower Hamlets

South London Anti-Fascists: Our Thanks

Vice: I Was Arrested for Trying to Report On Saturday’s EDL Rally

Undisinfo: The Hate Agenda’s Transparent This Weekend

Netpol: Mass arrest – an abuse of power

Bristol Anti-Fascists Say: Stop the EDL

Let’s defend ourselves against the English Defence League!

The EDL are marching in Bristol on the 14th of July. The counter- mobilisation is in full swing, so get involved. There have been alot of posts on Bristol Indymedia about the EDL demo.

Now is the time for our call to action. Come to Templemeads area and line the route at 10am on the 14th to give them the welcome they deserve. Stay alert. Stay mobile. Bring your mates

There are many many ways to show your opposition to the EDL: don’t let them march, don’t give ’em a lift in your taxi, put posters up in shops, don’t serve them drinks, raise awareness about their farcical attempts to disguise their homophobia, chat to work colleagues, decorate the city…. do whatever you feel comfortable with but now is the time to get a crew together and take action against racism in our city.

We want to meet them at the station to stop them marching for any distance. We will resist them wherever they turn and we will be watching them. Let’s defend ourselves against the EDL! Zero tolerance of fascism on our streets.

For more information email bristolantifascists@riseup.net Or see http://antifascistnetwork.wordpress.com Twitter: @stopedl #stopedl

Indymedia posts:http://bristol.indymedia.org/article/709150 http://bristol.indymedia.org/article/708817 Someone else has also set up a facebook page: Facebook: http://www.facebook.com/events/195613943884582/

*For translations of the call out in Farsi, Arabic, Somali and Polish see here

*Update July 1st Bristol indymedia “EDL Bristol March Organiser Photographed Giving Nazi Salute at Bradford Demo”

*Update July 4th This is Bristol “Anti-fascists call for mass opposition to EDL march in Bristol”

*Update July 12th “Bust card and other stuff” and “EDL and BNP up the racism in the lead up to their Bristol demo”

*Update July 13th “Anti-EDL Demonstration in Bristol – Information”

*Update July 13th article from The Network for Police Monitoring

Netpol publish critical report into EDL policing

“Netpol has published a critical report into the policing of the EDL and Counter demonstrations of February 4th in Leicester. The report is a collation of the evidence and observations obtained by a team of community-based legal observers who spent the day monitoring the policing of both EDL and counter-demonstrations. The legal observers deployed were local volunteers trained by Netpol with support from The Race Equality Centre (TREC) and Highfields Centre.

The report criticises police handling of the demonstration, particularly the effort and resources the police and local authorities devoted to persuading the local community, particularly young people in the local community, not to attend counter demonstrations against the EDL. It also raises questions about the use of force, particularly the use of dog units against Muslim youth, and the restrictions on movement placed on the Muslim population, effectively making Leicester a ‘no-go’ area.

Val Swain of Netpol stated, “The decision by Leicestershire constabulary to persuade local communities, voluntary and faith groups and particularly young people to stay away from counter demonstrations was utterly wrong. It really cannot be the role of the police to decide who is able to demonstrate and who is not. As well as being an interference with fundamental rights to protest, it led to a policing strategy that prioritised police control of the local community, especially Muslim youth. This raised tensions, heightened anger, and in my view made conflict more, rather than less likely.”

A statement given to Netpol by a local youth who witnessed his friend being bitten by a police dog, is illustrative of this;

 “That is ridiculous, that is not acceptable. He was in a lot of pain, he was treated by the ambulance for an hour. When last year the EDL kicked off big time, did they use the dogs on them? No. Why not? Because they are only after Muslims, that’s why.”

The report was launched at the Highfields Centre in Leicester on Monday 11th June by community youth worker and Netpol campaigner Saqib Deshmukh, who presented the findings to local activists, journalists and a representative of Leicestershire constabulary. Saqib has also helped to train community based legal observers in East London, as part of the initiative to monitor the policing of the Olympics by Netpol partner Newham Monitoring Project.

Key Findings:

• Police, working with Leicester council, put significant resources into a campaign aimed at persuading local people, particularly the youth, to stay away from counter demonstrations.
• The use of the Children Act, which allows police to take under-eighteen year olds to a ‘place of safety’, was unacceptably used as a ‘scare tactic’ to further dissuade young people from attending demonstrations
• Police maintained control over the movements of local people, making Leicester effectively a ‘no go zone’ for young Muslim men.
• Police used substantial force to control groups of Muslim youth, including the use of kettles, baton strikes and police dogs, leading to one young man sustaining dog bite injuries.
• Stop and searches were carried out under s60 Criminal Justice and Public Order Act, a police power that does not require suspicion of an individual. Although the number of such stop and searches was not high, all reported searchers were of people of Asian appearance. Powers to remove face coverings and scarfs also appear to have been disproportionately used against Muslim/Asian young people.
• The facilitation of the EDL appeared to take greater priority than the facilitation of counter demonstrations.

There has been a great deal of interest in the media – from the local paper and BBC Radio Leicester, though not all of it was positive.

Netpol would like to thank the community legal observers in Leicester for their hard work in putting the report together. The quality of evidence that was given both in written form and the photographic and video evidence is testimony to this.”

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