EUROPEAN RACE BULLETIN - Institute of Race Relations

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Workmates of Mohammed Rehman tied him to apost and lit a fire round him.Setting fire to Pakistani was `workplace accident’A social security adjudicator has declared that the `practicaljoke’ which left Mohammad Rehman in hospital for over sevenmonths with severe burns was a `workplace accident’. The decisionmeans that Mohammad will be entitled to compensation,which he could not get if the incident was declared unrelated towork. Mohammad worked in a shipyard in Escucha and inNovember 1997, when it began to rain, he and his workmatestook shelter in a boat, where his workmates tied him to a postand lit a fire round him. Mohammed recently came out of hospitalbut still requires almost daily out-patient treatment for hisburns. SOS Racism took up his case and the EscuchaHousewives’ Association showed its support by raising moneyfor him among the townspeople. (Heraldo de Aragon 30.6.98)Gambian attacked as far-Right organise in SantFeliu, Barcelona,Four youths, described as neo-nazi skinheads, have been arrestedin the Sant Feliu area of Barcelona after assaulting a 35-yearoldGambian man. Kaba Barrou, who works as a street cleanerfor the town council, was beaten repeatedly by a gang of tenyouths before a colleague managed to pull them off. A dozenpeople witnessed the attack from a nearby bar but none botheredto intervene. A couple out for the evening with their childcame to his assistance and called the police.According to a town councillor in Sant Feliu, the authoritieshad been aware of the youths racist behaviour against the NorthAfrican community for about a year. One of those arrested hada previous conviction for assaulting African immigrants. Whilethe four youths were in detention, racist graffiti, including sloganslike ‘Long live Spain’ and ‘Blacks, get out’ were sprayedacross the town. Right-wing extremists are suspected of beingbehind the build up of racial tension in the area. (El Pais14.8.98)Chinese toddler dies in flat fireThere are no indications yet as to what caused a fire in theEmbajadores area of central Madrid, in which a two-year-oldChinese girl was burnt to death and her three-year old brotherwas seriously injured. The fire broke out on the balcony of a firstfloor flat occupied by three Chinese families. (Heraldo de Arja27.8.98)Racism, Roma and press stereotypesThe National Convention of the Roma has asked for the introductionof special measures to counter racism, particularly theanti-Roma prejudice generated by the media which constantlyportrays Roma as beggars, drug dealers and criminals. Demandsinclude more social programmes directed toward Roma communitiesand the creation of a special Roma TV channel.Madrid camp criticisedA slum on the outskirts of Madrid, where Roma families wereresettled from a rubbish dump, has become a honeypot for drugaddicts and, as a result, the Roma have become unfairly associatedin local myth with drugs dealing. The newspaper, ElMundo, describes the settlement at Rosilla, just 15 minutesfrom the centre of Madrid, as an ‘offence to human dignity’. At38IRR EUROPEAN RACE BULLETIN • NO 29 • MARCH 1999the beginning of 1997, the estate became associated with drugdealing and attracted drug addicts from all over the country.Police appear to have given up on the area. (Romnews/RomaNational Congress 2.9, 12.10.98)Discrimination in new Catalan language lawallegedFollowing the introduction in Catalonia of a new language law,a pressure group, Babel Forum, comprising 300 Catalan intellectualshas accused the regional government of creating a divisive,two-tier system designed to favour Catalan speakers anddiscriminate against those – about 40 per cent of Catalonia’spopulation – who do not consider Catalan their first language.The new language law has also been criticised for underminingthe Catalan regional government’s alliance with the nationalconservative minority government.The law will set minimum quotas for the use of Catalan incinemas and on radio. Regional president, Jordi Pujo, has campaignedto achieve maximum devolution for Catalonia since hecame to office in 1980 and until recently had the full backing ofprominent intellectuals. Many now have denounced him for alinguistic aggression which they say has gone too far, setting upthe new pressure group Babel Forum. (Guardian 9.7.98)PoliceRoses police officer accused of assaultingimmigrantSeven officers from the autonomous police force of Cataloniahave been suspended and another police officer charged withinflicting multiple injuries after a Moroccan national wasallegedly beaten while in detention.On 2 August, Drizz Z. was arrested after driving the wrongway down a one-way street. According to police, the Moroccanbecame angry after being asked to identify himself and in theensuing argument broke the police officer’s arm. He was thentaken to the police station at Roses where, the following day, hewas assaulted by the injured police officer. An official policeinquiry has been launched. If found guilty, the Catalan parliamentwill consider whether the police officer should be suspendedfrom the force. (El Pais 14.9.98)Undocumented worker hospitalised after policepursuitAn undocumented Moroccan worker was taken to hospital inCadiz after suffering multiple injuries when he attempted tojump off a bridge in order to escape the Civil Guard. TheMoroccan had been detained, together with seven other immigrantssuspected of having made an illegal entry into Spain viathe Algeciras coastline. (El Pais 14.9.98)SWEDENRacism and fascismThe racist Right and the Swedish electionsFollowing elections, the Social Democrats have formed aminority coalition government. While right-wing populist
parties failed to make the predicted breakthrough in theSeptember elections which encompassed parliamentary, regionaland local elections, anti-fascists and civil libertarians havewarned against complacency. Never before have so many racistand extreme-Right parties contested the elections: for instance,the Interest Party of Swedish Retired Persons (52,869 votes), theNew Party (25,260) and New Democracy (8,297). All refusedto collaborate with the far-Right Sverge Demokraterna (SwedenDemocrats) which emerged with 19,624 votes and is now thethird largest party outside parliament. The anti-immigrationnetwork, People Against Mass Immigration, led by prominentintellectuals, had met to establish a new project, ‘Save Sweden’.It did not, however, contest the recent elections.The anti-fascist magazine Searchlight concludes that‘Populist and protest politics won serious acceptance in the localelections. If one includes the pensioners party and a number ofparties outside the SV alliance, populist parties took up to 100council seats in Skåne alone. And if the votes of all the extreme-Right parties are combined, it amounts to around 2 per cent ofthe national vote. Particular concern has been noted at the riseof the Interest Party of Swedish Retired Persons which has, inrecent years, promoted an anti-immigrant agenda and is nowconsidered close to the extreme-Right. It now has as many as 50council seats. The Sweden Democrats, which were backedfinancially by Le Pen’s Euro-Nat Alliance, scored poor nationalresults but increased their local representation from five to eightseats, of which two were in Haninge where the party received3.4 per cent of the vote. Negligible support was registered forthe far-Right anti-immigration New Party and New Democracy(NyD) now holds only one council seat. But there was a breakthroughfor the racist Right in the southernmost region ofSweden, where the Welfare of Scania, an alliance made up ofnumerous populist right-wing parties, won six seats on theregional council and is now part of the ruling alliance governingthe region.39IRR EUROPEAN RACE BULLETIN • NO 29 • MARCH 1999The Sweden Democrats received an estimated£80,000 from the Euro-Nat Alliance, whichincludes the FN.Campaign of the Sweden Democrats boosted by FNsupportThe SD received 0.3 per cent of the vote, a slight increase fromthe ‘94 elections when 14,000 people voted for the extreme-Right. It held more than 100 public meetings and events, andstatistics indicate that it scored well in some school elections, asin the Kungsör class 7-9 school, where it received 13 per cent ofthe vote. According to a survey, about 2 per cent of the MetalIndustrial Union voted for the SD. Its eight local seats were asfollows: one in Dals Ed, close to the Norwegian Border; twoseats retained in Höör, in Sweden’s southernmost region ofSkane; two new seats won in Haninge, in the south ofStockholm; two seats won in Trollhättan, central Sweden; oneseat in Sölvesborg, south Swedish coastal town. Much of theEuropean far-Right funding was used to finance the intensivecampaign in Haninge, a mainly working-class borough south ofStockholm. It is alleged that leaflets distributed during the campaignwere printed by the municipal council of Vitrolles.The FN MEP Ivan Blot was sent as an advisor to the SD’scampaign. A rally organised a week prior to the election inJärfälla, north-west of Stockholm, provoked a media outcrywhen Blot and the former SS officer Franz Schönhuberappeared on the platform.Prior to the elections, media reports exposed that the SDhad received an estimated £80,000 backing from the Euro-Natalliance, which includes the FN, the Vlaams Blok and theGerman REP. In an interview with the southern Swedish dailynewspaper, NST, Le Pen spoke of his sympathy for this ‘new,young and poor party. We in the FN recall the enormous materialdifficulties we had at the beginning’.FN support is not new. In Spring ‘88, shortly after the formationof the SD, a senior member of the SD was invited to theEuropean Parliament by the Young National Front. But as splitsemerged on the Swedish far-Right, foreign support was lessforthcoming. The FN support shows that the SD are attemptingto move away from its skinhead and Nazi image. Accordingto SD spokesperson, Paul Svensson, ‘I’ve met Jean-Marie Le Penin person, and we are the only Swedish party with which hewants to work. That must surely mean we’re not the horriblecharacters people imagine.’Conservatives collaborate with anti-immigrantlobby in Scania regional governmentThe prime minister, Gövan Persson, has protested at the inclusionof the Welfare of Scania in a non-Socialist alliance whichhas scrabbled together a regional coalition government.After the elections, all political parties declared that therewould be no collaboration with Welfare. But soon theConservatives were backtracking, and on 2 November a non-Socialist alliance was voted into power on a platform includingthe populists. The prime minister called on the national leadersof the Conservatives, Christian Democrats and Liberals to putpressure on regional representatives to desist from such collaboration.But the Conservatives rejoined that in the past theregional Social Democrats collaborated with one of the partieswhich make up the Welfare alliance. (Searchlight, October,November 1998, Arbetaren no. 46, 1998, Aftonbladet 29.10.98,Dagens Nyheter 26.10, 2.11.98, Arbetet Nyheterna 24.9.98,Svenska Dagbladet 1.10.98, Internationalen no. 47 1998,Sverigedemokraternas Hemsida 14.9.98)Issues raised by the tragic death of 63youngsters in Gothenburg disco fireRacist arson has all but been ruled out as the cause of the deathof sixty-three youngsters, mostly the children of immigrants,following a discotheque fire in a working-class district ofGothenburg on the night of 30-31 October. But racists havemade mock of the fire, fuelling tensions in the city raised by thewider questions thrown up by these tragic and needless deaths.Sixty-one youngsters died in the fire at Bakapan in theHammarkullen district of Gothenburg. Two youngsters diedlater in hospital and a further hundred were badly injured. Mostof the teenagers, aged from 13 to 20, came from some of thepoorest districts of town: 53 were of immigrant origin.Racist arson all but ruled out as neo-nazis makemock of deathsInitially, there was speculation that neo-nazis could have beenbehind the fire, particularly as racists have a strong presence inGothenburg and the fact that neo-nazi premises were not farfrom the youth club. Immediately after the fire, investigatorssuggested that arson could not be ruled out as the fire had startedin a backroom with access to an unlocked fire escape door. Inthe days following the fire, graffiti was found in the areas surroundingthe disco, stating ‘We burnt sixty, soon we’ll burn therest.’ Later more graffiti appeared announcing ‘sixty Swedestoo’. On several occasions, mourners were disturbed by skin-
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Page 3: on insufficient evidence. It also s
Page 6 and 7: important than the Roma. The Counci
Page 8 and 9: Hansen, has complained to the Minis
Page 10 and 11: larised, was aborted when 60 anti-r
Page 12 and 13: Our supporters must ‘prepare ment
Page 14 and 15: uation in other FN towns, the minor
Page 16 and 17: FORMER-YUGOSLAVIAHuman rights and t
Page 18 and 19: tion held in recent years was held
Page 20 and 21: the right-wing scene can take over
Page 22 and 23: Incensed at what it regards as an a
Page 24 and 25: Renewed criticism of withdrawal of
Page 26 and 27: parliamentary group. When the House
Page 28 and 29: asylum-seekers for congregating in
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Page 32 and 33: Employer organisation calls for dec
Page 34 and 35: assailants and charged them with as
Page 36 and 37: On 16 August, Corneliu Vadim Tudor,
Page 40 and 41: head mobs who prevented them from r
Page 42 and 43: Dispersal and payment in kindPropos

EUROPEAN RACE BULLETIN - Institute of Race Relations

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