CALEDONIAN COMMENT

In the UK police are gathering information (above) about people attending protests for a national intelligence database, it was disclosed yesterday. Details of activists – including photographs – are collected by forces and passed to a central  “domestic extremism” unit for storage and analysis. The database features people seen at public demonstrations including anti-war rallies and environmental protests. Campaigners can be included on the systems even if they have not committed a crime, an investigation has revealed. The information is used to compile police ”spotter cards” which are used at demonstrations and protest events. Truly, “Big Brother is watching you”.

Reportedly 3 national police units responsible for combating “domestic extremism” are run by the “terrorism and allied matters” committee of the Association of Chief Police Officers (ACPO). It receives £9 million in public funding, from police forces and the Home Office, and employs a staff of 100. Maybe somebody should tell these arrogant petty dictators that there’s no such offence in British law as “domestic extremism” – and maybe the police time and money expended on this possibly illegal and certainly undemocratic intrusion might be better spend investigating members of their own police forces who’ve been filmed this year assaulting and in some cases killing people taking part in lawful demonstrations.

And if that wasn’t bad enough, Big Brother (above) will soon be trying to pry inside people’s bedrooms. Government ministers are being accused of planning to snoop into citizens’ private lives in the most intrusive national census ever carried out. The planned 2011 survey will demand to know how many bedrooms there are in homes and detailed information about any “overnight visitors”. Other new questions include how well respondents can speak English, what kind of central heating they have installed, whether they have a second home, how they define their national identity and whether they are in civil partnerships. The demand for the number of bedrooms in each home, coupled with a requirement to give the name, sex, date of birth and address of any overnight visitors, amounts to “bedroom snooping”, critics say.

Opposition Conservative party Cabinet Office spokesman Nick Hurd said: “An increasingly invasive and intrusive census will erode public support, cost more and result in a less accurate survey. Just because the Government has the legal powers to ask these questions does not give the state the licence to ask anything they want. ‘These bedroom snoopers are yet another sign of how the New Labour Government has no respect for the privacy of law-abiding citizens.” Couldn’t have put it better myself. So when the census forms arrive – now where’s that bin ?

The trial at the United Nations Yugoslav war crimes tribunal of Radovan Karadzic (pictured above), the former Bosnian Serb leader seen as the mastermind of the worst ethnic violence in Europe in the postwar era, was adjourned yesterday after he boycotted the opening. Prosecutors argued the trial should go ahead despite the defendant’s absence but the presiding judge, O-Gon Kwon of South Korea, adjourned the case until tomorrow. Question for the presiding judge please – why not just drag the murdering bastard into court, showing him the same respect for his human rights as he showed his victims ? After all, how many victims of this bloke’s regime survived by saying they wanted to boycott his death squads ?

Looking more like an ageing rock star than ever, Colonel Gaddafi (pictured above) has apologised for the first time for the killing of WPC Yvonne Fletcher who was shot outside the Libyan Embassy in London in 1984. However, in an interview the Libyan leader also stressed that the young police woman’s killer had never been identified. WPC Fletcher was shot in the back with a burst of automatic gunfire that came from inside the embassy as she policed a peaceful demonstration outside in St James’s Square in April 1984. Asked if he had a message for WPC Fletcher’s family, Colonel Gaddafi said: “You see, I know that such a thing happened. I know a policewoman was shot and killed when she was doing her duty. She is not an enemy to us, and we are sorry all the time and our sympathy, because she was on duty, she was there to protect the Libyan embassy, but this is the problem that should be solved — but who did it ? That is the question. It is always like a persistent matter.” He talks gibberish like an ageing rock star as well. He knows damn fine who did it. His “diplomats”, who should have had their diplomatic immunity revoked and been arrested.

France (above) is to launch a hard-hitting campaign aimed at “reaffirming pride” in the country and combating Islamic fundamentalism. As well as providing civic lessons for adults – including classes about the country’s history and liberal political institutions – the government will encourage school children to sing the national anthem regularly. In words which are certain to infuriate ethnic minority groups, Immigration Minister Eric Besson even suggested that foreigners should learn to speak better French. Isn’t that just typical of the wayward French ? Seeking to encourage nationhood, oneness and equal citizenship, as opposed to the enlightened UK alternative of a multi-lingual, multi-cultural shambles, underpinned by the growing threat of Islamic fundamentalist terrorism. How can they live with themselves ?

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This entry was posted on Tuesday, October 27th, 2009 at 1:09 am and is filed under Daily Posts. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.