The Home Secretary has banned the English Defence League from marching through Bradford.
The Home Office has said:
“Having carefully balanced rights to protest against the need to ensure local communities and property are protected, the Home Secretary today gave her consent to a Bradford Council order banning any marches in the city over the bank holiday weekend.
“West Yorkshire Police are committed to using their powers to ensure communities and property are protected and we encourage all local people to work with the police to ensure community cohesion is not undermined by public disorder.”
The letter from the Home Office confirming the ban is interesting, saying:
The application from the Chief Constable of West Yorkshire Police is clear that the activities of some who attend English Defence League protests — and indeed counter protests — has little to do with freedom of expression. So while the Government has set out its commitment to restore rights to non-violent protest, we are equally clear that such rights do not extend to intimidation, harassment, and criminality, and that rights to protest need to be balanced against the wider rights of local communities.
It’s nice that the notion of free expression is even acknowledged here.
But we must wonder: can we be free in a society that places public order above all other concerns?
Again, (see previous post)I’ll ask why offensive, potentially confrontational marches are allowed take place throughout Northern Ireland, but not in England?
Index on Censorship’s Mike Harris took part in a discussion on the use of social media and protest at the Frontline Club on Tuesday night with Sina Motalebi of BBC Persian TV, Sunny Hundal of Liberal Conspiracy, Benjamin Chesterton of Duckrabbit, and Mexico Reporter founder Deborah Bonello. Watch it below
Russian authorities have been criticised for giving permission to a sports car federation to hold an event in Triumfalnaya Square, St Petersburg, on July 31, the same day that opposition protesters had applied to use the square. Two weeks after the protesters applied to use the square it was announced that car racing would take place instead. Angered by this, hundreds of protesters arrived at the square on July 31 to be greeted by police. In total around 95 were arrested in similar protests across Russia, including well known Kremlin critic Boris Nemtsov. Reports state that many of those arrested had facial injuries.
On 27 July, a Selangor court imprisoned a man for a week and fined 11 others after they protested against the construction of a Hindu temple with a severed cow’s head. All 12 pleaded guilty to the charge of “illegal assembly” and were fined 1000 ringgit (£202) whilst two men were also convicted of sedition and fined a further 3,000 ringgit (£606) for stamping and spitting on the cow’s skull. The rally took place in August 2009, in response to a proposal to build a Hindu temple in a Muslim neighbourhood. An alternative site was eventually chosen for the place of worship.
