LONDON: The founder of a Muslim hiking group in Britain has said they have received an “overwhelming response in terms of solidarity” after racist comments were made about the group on Facebook.
One of the hikers, who shared photos from the Christmas Day walk in England’s Peak District, said they had seen a comment “comparing the walkers to the Serengeti wildebeest migration.”
Haroon Mota, the founder of Muslim Hikers, led more than 100 people on a Christmas Day hike. He said he chose Dec. 25 as the route would be quieter than usual.
But after sharing photos from the trip on Facebook, the walkers were accused of damaging the area and not being “proper walkers,” as well as having racist comments made about them.
We had over 130 people sign up for our Mam Tor hike on Xmas day. It was such a success! It's horrible seeing comments like this, but it only gives us further justification and motivation to continue our work. It's the reason why we set up #MuslimHikers #DiversityOutdoors pic.twitter.com/mFfZAHr1H9
— Muslim Hikers (@Muslim_Hikers) December 27, 2021
Mota, from Coventry, told the Press Association: “There were some very racist comments being made.”
“These types of comments, racist comments, only make it more problematic for those from our community who feel less empowered to get outside.
“For people who might be joining for the first time, they might think ‘oh wow, is this what people actually think?’
“One of the reasons why we set up Muslim Hikers was so that we could stand together and for greater diversity and inclusion.
“We’ve been working extremely hard to create a culture of confidence in the outdoors.”
Another hiker, Selma Mehboob, 43, shared pictures from the day on a local Facebook group, but was met with abuse by a minority of people.
She told PA: “I have never seen comments made like this about any other groups of people walking in this Facebook group, so why was it picked up when I posted our trek?
“Someone made a comment that it’s not racism, just that some people enjoy hating on others.
“Whilst I appreciate there is truth in that, unfortunately there were some racist comments such as comparing the walkers to the Serengeti wildebeest migration.
“The majority of comments had been wonderfully supportive and I need to stress how heart warming and reassuring the support has been for the trek, but I noticed early on that there were some quite disparaging and mocking comments.”
Mota said that despite the abuse by some, the group’s hike has been well received by many others.
Muslim Hikers wrote on Twitter that they had gained an extra 4,000 followers since the Christmas Day hike.
Mote said: “Some of these comments were very unpleasant. However, after sharing these comments we’ve had such an overwhelming response in terms of solidarity from the wider community.
“The majority of people will just find extra motivation and think ‘actually, do you know what? Stuff them’.”
LONDON: More than 90 convicted terrorists could soon be released from British prisons, figures have revealed, with some due to appear before the Parole Board within months.
Emergency laws were implemented by the UK government in 2020 after two attacks were carried out in quick succession by terrorists recently freed from jail.
Those laws blocked the early release of terrorists from jail, forcing them to serve at least two thirds of their sentence. Their cases must also be appraised individually by the Parole Board.
There are 92 such cases, with some due to come before parole judges in 2022, The Times has reported.
Among those due to appear before the Parole Board is Rangzieb Ahmed — the first person to be convicted in the UK of directing terrorism after heading a three-man Al-Qaeda cell preparing to commit mass murder, whose case is expected to be ruled upon in March.
That same month, the Parole Board will consider the early release of Jawad Akbar, who plotted to bomb a shopping center in Kent and a club in London in 2004.
Neo-Nazi Jack Coulson, who manufactured a bomb in his bedroom, will be considered for release in February.
The revelation that dozens of terrorists could be freed from jail imminently prompted calls from MPs for a review of the parole system for terrorists.
David Jones, Conservative MP for Clwyd West, said: “These are by any standards seriously dangerous criminals, and there will be huge concern at the prospect of their release next year.
“The government should urgently review the parole rules to ensure that those who continue to pose any threat are not granted early release.”
Dominic Raab, the justice secretary, is expected to publish reforms in the new year. The anticipated changes include renaming the Parole Board to emphasize its focus on protecting the public.
Richard Holden, Conservative MP for North West Durham, said: “The government is rightly reviewing the Parole Board and it is vital this includes a proper review of the rules regarding terrorists, ensuring the rules relating to them are the most stringent of all.”
Since the new legislation came into force in 2020, 117 cases have been referred to the Parole Board. So far 11 people have been freed and 14 refused release.
The Parole Board said: “Public protection is always our top priority. Any terrorist convicted offender released into the community will be subject to some of the strictest licence conditions available, including restrictions of where they can go, who they can associate with, restrictions on internet use, electronic devices, travel and work.”
The Ministry of Justice said: “This government has left no stone unturned in the fight against terrorism and has already ended the automatic early release of terrorists, made polygraph tests mandatory on probation and introduced tougher prison sentences for the most dangerous of these offenders.
“Our ongoing review of the parole system will see public protection increase even further by looking at how we can take a more precautionary approach to all potential releases.”
PARIS: Britons who live in the European Union can no longer drive through France to their homes elsewhere in the bloc under new regulations that have created confusion for many holiday travelers. Many Britons take the Channel Tunnel from England to France, using Eurotunnel’s Shuttle service, to drive from the UK to their homes in other EU countries. But under new Covid travel rules being applied since December 28 by French authorities, only Britons whose official primary residence is in France are being allowed in. “Unless they hold French residency, British citizens are now considered third country citizens and can no longer transit France by road to reach their country of residence in the EU,” Eurotunnel said in a tweet late Wednesday. P&O Ferries issued a similar tweet warning that “only those with French residency will be permitted to enter France.” A French interior ministry official said it had not changed its list of “compelling” reasons enabling Britons to travel to France, but had clarified their application this month by border police. “It seems logical to consider them like all other third-country citizens, and to not allow their transit toward another EU country,” the official told AFP, asking not to be identified by name. All tourism and professional travel from Britain has been suspended since December 18 as France tries to slow the spread of the omicron Covid variant. On its travel advice website, the British government said France had indicated that Britons would not be allowed to transit France “unless they are traveling by air.” “We are urgently seeking further clarification from the French government, and in the meantime advise UK nationals returning to other European countries via France to check with their carrier before traveling,” it said. The change caught hundreds of Britons off guard as they prepared to return from family visits over the holidays. “I’m completely lost. It doesn’t make any sense,” Fiona Navin-Jones, a school teacher who was hoping to return to Belgium, where she has lived with her family for 14 years, told AFP. They decided to risk their Eurotunnel trip anyway on Thursday, where they were told at the terminal that getting through would depend on the border official. “I got through so I guess I was lucky!” she said. Eurostar, the passenger train service which many Britons use to return to homes in Belgium and elsewhere, also warned users earlier this month about the French rule change. But it was not clear if they were being systematically applied at the three Eurostar stations in England. One Twitter user who was turned away at the last minute this week by French police as he tried to board the Eurotunnel shuttle posted that he was able to return to Brussels by train. “The FR customs said they had been handed the paper in the last few hours that clarified the compelling reasons rule. They even seemed a little frustrated,” wrote Roland Moore, a public relations executive in Belgium. Paris and London have been at loggerheads over a range of thorny subjects, including fishing and illegal immigration, since Britain’s official exit from the EU nearly two years ago. That prompted several travelers to wonder if the new French policy was the latest skirmish between the two countries. “Reason has prevailed — but I feel so sorry for families based in Belgium with residence but no passport,” Navin-Jones said. “French rules still stink. You can quote me.”
ISLAMABAD: Afghanistan’s former president said he had no choice but to abruptly leave Kabul as the Taliban closed in and denied an agreement was in the works for a peaceful takeover, disputing the accounts of former Afghan and US officials. Former President Ashraf Ghani said in a BBC interview that aired Thursday that an adviser gave him just minutes to decide to abandon the capital city. He also denied widespread accusations that he left Afghanistan with millions in stolen money. Ghani’s sudden and secret departure Aug. 15 left the city rudderless as US and NATO forces were in the final stages of their chaotic withdrawal from the country after 20 years. “On the morning of that day, I had no inkling that by late afternoon I would be leaving,” Ghani told BBC radio. His remarks conflicted with other accounts. Former President Hamid Karzai old the Associated Press in an interview earlier this month that Ghani’s departure scuttled the opportunity for government negotiators, including himself and peace council chairman Abdullah Abdullah, to reach an 11th-hour agreement with the Taliban, who had committed to staying outside the capital. After calling the government defense minister Bismillah Khan, the interior minister and police chief and discovering all had fled the capital, Karzai said he invited the Taliban into Kabul ” to protect the population so that the country, the city doesn’t fall into chaos and the unwanted elements who would probably loot the country, loot shops.” But Ghani in his radio interview with British Gen. Sir Nick Carter, former chief of defense staff, said he fled “to prevent the destruction of Kabul,” claiming two rival Taliban factions were bearing down on the city and were ready to enter and wage a bitter battle for control. There was no evidence upon the Taliban entry of the rival factions Ghani referred to. The insurgent force quickly took control of the palace and according to humanitarian aid workers, who spoke on condition of anonymity because they wanted to speak privately, and who were there at the time, the Taliban moved to protect their compounds. Still, the Taliban’s entry into the capital was met with widespread fear and a deep longing by many to flee their desperately poor homeland despite billions of international money over the 20 years the US-backed governments had been in power. Ghani in his interview denied widespread accusations that he left Afghanistan with a cache of stolen money. The US Special Inspector General for Afghanistan Reconstruction John Sopko has been tasked with investigating those allegations. Successive Afghan governments, as well as independent foreign and Afghan contractors, have been accused of widespread corruption over the last 20 years with dozens of reports by Sopko documenting the most egregious incidents of corruption. Washington has spent $146 billion on reconstruction in Afghanistan since the overthrow of the Taliban in 2001, yet even before the insurgents returned in August, the poverty level in Afghanistan was at 54 percent. Earlier this week Organized Crime and Corruption Reporting Project, an investigative reporting organization with 150 journalists in more than 30 countries, listed Ghani among the world’s most corrupt leaders. Belarus President Aleksandr Lukashenko was named the most corrupt with Ghani, Syrian President Bashar Assad, Turkey’s President Recep Tayyip Erdogan and former Austrian Chancellor Sebastian Kurz among the finalists for the title of most corrupt. After being told by his national security adviser Hamdullah Mohib that his personal protection force was not capable of defending him, Ghani said, he decided to leave. Saying Mohib, who “was literally terrified,” gave him just two minutes to decide whether to leave, Ghani insisted he was not sure where he would be taken even after he was on the helicopter getting ready to evacuate Kabul. Ghani did not address the rapid and swift collapse of the Afghan military in the weeks leading up to the Taliban’s final arrival in Kabul but he did blame an agreement the US signed with the Taliban in 2020 for the eventual collapse of his government. That agreement laid out conditions for the final withdrawal of the remaining US and NATO forces ending America’s longest war. ‘It also provided for the release of 5,000 Taliban prisoners, which Ghani said strengthened the insurgent force.
BOSTON: Haseena Niazi had pinned her hopes of getting her fiancé out of Afghanistan on a rarely used immigration provision. The 24-year-old Massachusetts resident was almost certain his application for humanitarian parole would get approved by the US government, considering the evidence he provided on the threats from the Taliban he received while working on women’s health issues at a hospital near Kabul. But this month, the request was summarily denied, leaving the couple reeling after months of anxiety. “He had everything they wanted,” said Niazi, a green card holder originally from Afghanistan. “It doesn’t make any sense why they’d reject it. It’s like a bad dream. I still can’t believe it.” Federal immigration officials have issued denial letters to hundreds of Afghans seeking temporary entry into the country for humanitarian reasons in recent weeks, to the dismay of Afghans and their supporters. By doing so, immigrant advocates say, the Biden administration has failed to honor its promise to help Afghans who were left behind after the US military withdrew from the country in August and the Taliban took control. “It was a huge disappointment,” said Caitlin Rowe, a Texas attorney who said she recently received five denials, including one for an Afghan police officer who helped train US troops and was beaten by the Taliban. “These are vulnerable people who genuinely thought there was hope, and I don’t think there was.” Since the US withdrawal, US Citizenship and Immigration Services has received more than 35,000 applications for humanitarian parole, of which it has denied about 470 and conditionally approved more than 140, Victoria Palmer, an agency spokesperson, said this week. The little-known program, which doesn’t provide a path to lawful permanent residence in the country, typically receives fewer than 2,000 requests annually from all nationalities, of which USCIS approves an average of about 500, she said. Palmer also stressed humanitarian parole is generally reserved for extreme emergencies and not intended to replace the refugee admissions process, “which is the typical pathway for individuals outside of the United States who have fled their country of origin and are seeking protection.” The US government, meanwhile, continues to help vulnerable Afghans, evacuating more than 900 American citizens and residents and another 2,200 Afghans since the military withdrawal. The state department said it expects to help resettle as many as 95,000 people from Afghanistan this fiscal year, a process that includes rigorous background checks and vaccinations. Many of them, however, had been whisked out of Afghanistan before the US left. Now, USCIS is tasked with this new wave of humanitarian parole applications and has ramped up staffing to consider them. The agency said in a statement that requests are reviewed on an individual basis, with consideration given to immediate relatives of Americans and Afghans airlifted out. And while USCIS stressed that parole shouldn’t replace refugee processing, immigrant advocates argue that isn’t a viable option for Afghans stuck in their country due to a disability or hiding from the Taliban. Even those able to get out of Afghanistan, they say, may be forced to wait years in refugee camps, which isn’t something many can afford to do. Mohammad, who asked that his last name not be used out of fear for his family’s safety, said his elder brother, who used to work for international organizations, is among them. He has been in hiding since the Taliban came looking for him following the US withdrawal, Mohammad said. On a recent visit to the family home, Taliban members took his younger brother instead and held him more than a week for ransom, he said. Now, Mohammad, a former translator for US troops in Afghanistan who lives in California with a special immigration status, is seeking parole for this brother, too. He hopes a conditional approval letter can get them a spot on one of the US evacuation flights still running out of the country. “I can provide him housing. I can provide him everything,” he said. “Let them come here.” Immigrant advocates began filing humanitarian parole applications for Afghans in August in a last-ditch effort to get them on US evacuation flights out of the country before the withdrawal. In some cases, it worked, and word spread among immigration attorneys that parole, while typically used in extreme emergencies, might be a way out, said Kyra Lilien, director of immigration legal services at Jewish Family & Community Services in California’s East Bay. Soon, attorneys began filing thousands of parole applications for Afghans. When the US immigration agency created a website specifically to address these applications, Lilien said she thought it was a sign of hope. By November, however, the agency had posted a list of narrow criteria for Afghan applicants and held a webinar telling attorneys that parole is typically granted only if there’s evidence someone faces “imminent severe harm.” A few weeks later, the denial letters began arriving. Lilien has received more than a dozen but no approvals. “Once the US packed up and left, anyone who was left behind has only one choice, and that is to pursue this archaic refugee channel,” she said. “It is just so angering that it took USCIS so long to be clear about that.” Wogai Mohmand, an attorney who helps lead the Afghan-focused Project ANAR, said that the group has filed thousands of applications and that since the US troop withdrawal, has seen only denials. The despair has led some immigration attorneys to give up on filing parole applications altogether. In Massachusetts, the International Institute of New England is holding off filing new applications until it hears on those that are pending after receiving a flurry of denials. Chiara St. Pierre, an attorney for the refugee resettlement agency, said she feels clients like Niazi are facing an “unwinnable” battle. For Niazi’s fiancé, they had provided copies of written threats sent to the hospital where he works as a medical technician and threatening text messages he said came from Taliban members, she said. It wasn’t enough. A redacted copy of the denial letter provided by St. Pierre lists the USCIS criteria released in November but doesn’t specify why the agency rejected the application, which had been filed in August. For now, Niazi says her fiancé is living and working far from Kabul as they weigh their options. They could potentially wait until Niazi becomes an American citizen so she can try to bring him here on a fiancé visa, but that would take years. “He can’t wait that long. It’s a miracle every day that he’s alive,” Niazi said. “I’m feeling like every door is closing in on him.” ___ Taxin reported from Orange County, California.