taking photos can now get you arrested for terrorism ...

[luke]

‘I took a picture of Tower Bridge and was arrested for terrorism’

by Simon Assaf

A chilling glimpse of ‘stop and search’ Britain

Government ministers and police chiefs are demanding new powers to allow the police to stop and search people in the streets if they suspect them of terrorism. These powers echo the notorious “sus laws” of the 1970s.

Then the laws created an atmosphere of fear as police targeted young black men. Those laws were abandoned after widespread rioting in the early 1980s.

A glimpse of what these new laws would mean was shown last week when two foreign students were arrested for “terrorism” after taking snapshots of Tower Bridge.

Salam Abdulrahman is a politics student at Swansea university. On 14 May he and a friend travelled to London to arrange funding for a PhD.

After their meeting they decided to visit tourist attractions and walked around the capital taking pictures.

Salam told Socialist Worker, “We went to Tower Bridge and then to Big Ben.

“I took pictures of many beautiful views. The final one I took, minutes before being arrested, was a building belonging to the MI5 security services – which I only discovered was an MI5 building when in jail.

“We did not realise we were being watched. As we approached Scotland Yard we were stopped by police.

“They questioned us, took our student IDs and searched us.

Searched

“They radioed other police who arrived in two cars and they too questioned us, searched our bags and frisked us.

“They told us we were being arrested under the Prevention of Terrorism Act. We were handcuffed and taken to a police station.

“There we were strip-searched, fingerprinted, photographed, swabbed for our DNA and put in separate cells.

“While I was in jail the police raided my room at the university. The broke down the door and seized my laptop, my other camera, CDs, books, passport and clothes.

“The next day I was interviewed by police. I was told that I would be charged for possessing a book called Future Jihad, Terrorist Strategies Against The West by Walid Phares, possessing a press ID, using the term Al Qaida in my emails and essays, visiting a number of places in Britain,

taking photos of Tower Bridge which show the structure of the bridge, and having pictures of military people.

“They concluded that I was acting suspiciously and ‘collecting information for terrorism’. I was told that my Iraqi passport – I am a Kurd from Irbil – added to their suspicion of me. But these charges are unbelievable. I bought the book from my university bookstore for academic reasons – it is widely available.

“I was issued a press card before coming to Britain because I worked for the Kurdish Globe newspaper. The accusation that they found the term Al Qaida in my writings and emails is not a surprise.

“I am studying international relations and for one of my essays I had to collect a lot of articles related to radical Islam and terrorist groups.

“I also have relatives throughout Britain, and wanted to visit the places I had read about. There are thousands of tourists taking photos of Tower Bridge, and every photo shows the ‘structure’ of the bridge.

“I do have pictures with officers and soldiers of the South Korean Army who were based in Irbil in Iraqi Kurdistan. I worked as an interpreter for the Korean troops.

“I have been released on bail. I have to return to the police station on 26 June. What happened was a great shock. I recently wrote an essay on multiculturalism in Britain saying that the police do not discriminate on race.”

[faceless]

The cops don't need any reason to arrest you up here - they just say you were causing 'breach of the peace' if they don't like the look of you. I was once arrested for waiting for a bus... no joke. The cop came up to me and said 'what are you doing here?" (at a bus stop) and I said "I'm waiting for a bus". Nicked for the night.

[Bat]

The cops don't need any reason to arrest you up here - they just say you were causing 'breach of the peace' if they don't like the look of you. I was once arrested for waiting for a bus... no joke. The cop came up to me and said 'what are you doing here?" (at a bus stop) and I said "I'm waiting for a bus". Nicked for the night.

Yeah, but you probably LOOKED as if you were up to something. Waiting for a bus? At a bus top? Tell it to the judge.

[luke]

thats shocking faceless, well out of order - i've always been quite anti the police, ever since battle of the beanfield when i was younger, i've seen them do so many dark things that are completely disproportionate to what they were facing, power goes to there heads. people make it into the police if there of a certain mindset - follow orders, do as your told, don't question authority ... when/if things really kick off in this country, the police will protect power, like programmed robots

they tried to stitch a couple of mates up for smashing windows, claimed they'd actually seen them do it - when they'd been on the other side of the road waiting for a taxi and hadn't done anything. took about 6 months and forensic testing of all there stuff before they admitted they was wrong.

i was arrested last year on my way to see rob newman! damn sniffer dogs ... luckily i didn't have anything on me, but it wasn't a nice experience being handcuffed arms behind back and strip searched ... no apology either ... i missed the first half of the show because of that

i can't tell you what my first time being arrested was like, i don't remember a thing about it - i just woke up in the cell the next day thinking whoooah how did i get here i had to phone an ex girlfriend to pick me up, i was miles from home, no shoes on either

i don't really do drink and drugs nowdays except the odd toke

[SpursFan1902]

Shocking! That kind of stuff doesn't happen in my happy little daisy world. Guess I need to pull my head out...

[Marcella-FL]

am I a dork for not being arrested? My brother took care of that for my family ...

[luke]

am I a dork for not being arrested?

i think its probably the other way around ...