Racial tensions reach boiling point in Birmingham after the deaths of three young Muslim men, talk of revenge and race war, its gone too far

Dear All

It isn’t surprising that after the deaths of three young Muslim men who died defending the entire community in Birmingham that racial tensions have rose to boiling point last night.

From the shooting of Mark Duggan now to this tragic incident, Britain is falling apart.

Now, people’s minds are turning to thoughts of being vigilantes and have starting arming themselves with sticks and baseball bats.

Earlier in the day before the deaths of the young men, gangs of black men in 4x4 cars were spotted cruising the streets of Winson Green, near the seen of the collision, stopping by mosques and chanting 'burn, burn' from the open windows.

This has all the hallmarks of Britain being split down the middle and the prospect of race war.

This cannot be allowed to happen; the entire community will lose so much more that they could ever imagine if this escalates.

The Police arrested a 32 year old black man in connection with the murder of the young men; they must be allowed to do their job.

We have to trust in the rule of law and ensure that this is done correctly or there will be no justice for Haroon Jahan, 21, Shazad Ali, 30, and his brother Abdul Musavir, 31.

Local police chiefs are trying to calm the situation by talking to community leaders in the area but there is a lot of anger, innocent people are dead and the police accused of failing to protect Asian communities.

The truth is, there isn’t enough Police and there aren’t enough resources available despite the soundbytes of the politicians and police.

They won’t admit what we all know because then some of the blame has to stick with politicians and the government.

And to make things worse it also emerged that members of the English Defence League (EDL) were threatening to storm mosques.

Mr Iqbal, a shopkeeper said:

“They sent messages on the internet to attack our mosques. We are under attack and need to protect ourselves and we will do whatever it takes. We cannot trust the police to help us anymore.”

After the deaths, a group of more than 100 Muslim men brandishing baseball bats and sticks ran down the streets after rumours spread of a group of black men robbing a house nearby.

A resident, who called himself Mr Arshad, 64, said:

“This is not acceptable, we were under attack. The police need to protect us. There are black people running round doing what they like. This is not about rioting any more; this is a race war which goes back decades.”

In Scotland I have been calling for massive expansion of the Special Constables so that communities can see more Bobbies on the beat as part of the strategy of the hopefully new national police force of Scotland.

Britain has entered a new phase, what was always below the surface, the searing cauldron of hate and anger has bubbled over.

It was always there, we were kept being told by politicians that there were no problems; how out of touch they are to the lives of ordinary people.

Will revenge bring back Haroon Jahan, Shazad Ali, and his brother Abdul Musavir, 31, no, it will not.

And neither will the killing of innocent black people to prove a point, it will only divide communities further apart.

There is so much wrong with Britain, the multicultural social engineering experiment that New Labour enacted has failed.

Respect, trust and hope in politicians and law and order have collapsed in the minds of the public.

We don’t live in a fair and equal society.

That inequality comes from the top down, not the bottom up.

It starts in Westminster and Holyrood and travels down through quangos and councils.

These people like the rioters have so much to answer for but unfortunately they have divided society so much we cannot get rid of the bad politicians among the political class.

Killing innocent people won’t solve our problems, we have to pressure politicians and if they will not serve their communities we must get rid of them.

We have to change so much because inequality and unfairness is so ingrained at the top of our society.

Yours sincerely

George Laird
The Campaign for Human Rights at Glasgow University