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Racist British National Party Wins Seat on London Assembly
Posted By Casey Sanchez On May 6, 2008 @ 10:59 am In Anti-Immigrant, Holocaust Denial | 8 Comments
On May 1, the racist British National Party (BNP) won a seat [1] on the 25-member London Assembly, which has the power to amend the London mayor’s budget and investigate and publish findings on matters of interest to Londoners. Richard Barnbrook, who will take the BNP seat after coming in fifth in the mayoral race and winning 5% of the overall vote, became the extreme right’s most visible elected politician in Britain as a result. All major parties had denounced the BNP in the run-up to the city elections, saying that it represented “hatred, violence and stupidity.”
In 2001, BNP head Nick Griffin, a Holocaust denier, told reporters that his party did not admit anyone not descended from European whites or “kindred” peoples. (The BNP has since accepted a tiny handful of people of color in order to bolster its battle against Muslims.) The party is particularly well known for its hardline anti-immigrant views. Its officials have proposed deporting all illegal immigrants and even paying legal immigrants to leave England, promising “voluntary resettlement whereby those immigrants who are legally here will be afforded the opportunity to return to their lands of ethnic origin.”
Despite his party’s affiliation with white nationalism, Barnbrook tried to reassure foreign-born Londoners after his election. “Do not be nervous. As long as you abide by our identity and laws of this land, come to me and I will see where we can help,” Barnbrook told the BBC.
Barnbrook was the best known of several BNP councillors — the rough equivalent of local City Council members in the United States — before his May election to the higher-ranking post. He was well known to most Londoners, in part because in 2006 he was accused of making a film 17 years earlier that was widely described as gay pornography. (The BNP opposes the “promotion” of homosexuality.) He angrily disputed the charge, saying it was simply an art film about “sexuality.”
Just days after Barnbrook’s election, Scotland’s new counter-terrorism chief Allan Burnett said that neo-Nazis pose a serious terrorist threat [2] to the United Kingdom. “We’ve had a number of right-wing issues recently in the U.K. that again have raised their head in Scotland,” Burnett said. Referring to the arrest of an alleged neo-Nazi in Scotland last fall for making nail-bombs, he added: “There’s no point promoting positive race relations if, in claiming to be everyone’s coordinator of counter terrorism, you take your eye off the right-wing.”
Article printed from Hatewatch | Southern Poverty Law Center: http://www.splcenter.org/blog
URL to article: http://www.splcenter.org/blog/2008/05/06/racist-british-national-party-wins-seat-on-london-assembly/
URLs in this post:
[1] won a seat: http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/uk_news/politics/7381633.stm
[2] pose a serious terrorist threat: http://www.sundayherald.com/news/heraldnews/display.var.2246186.0.0.php
[3] : http://www.bnp.org.uk
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8 Comments To "Racist British National Party Wins Seat on London Assembly"
#1 Comment By redandwhitestripes On May 6, 2008 @ 7:42 pm
“All major parties had denounced the BNP in the run-up to the city elections, saying that it represented “hatred, violence and stupidity.”
The BNP are not popular with the mainstream parties but the quote you are using there is actually from the very minor pressure group known as the ANL.
Also note that your linked article is referring to neo Nazi groups and makes no mention of the BNP whatsoever, it is not a credit to your journalism skills that you try to link the two.
#2 Comment By cant On May 7, 2008 @ 1:11 am
far-left bullshit. [3]
#3 Comment By redandwhitestripes On May 13, 2008 @ 5:33 am
I think you’ll find most people think of the BNP as right wing. I do agree though, most of the “far left” is bullshit.
#4 Comment By playboy On May 13, 2008 @ 1:34 pm
The BNP has gained much strength in the UK, especially after this last election.
I can see considerable trouble for the British in the near future, because of extremist jihadists who are preaching hate in the mosques.
The entire country is under severe scrutiny, I’m told, more so now—or at least as much—as when they were on a wartime footing in WWII when they were in danger of being conquered.
Home-grown terrorists will cause many problems for the next serveral years.
More bombings will equal more strength for the BNP. The country could well implode from their dissident elements if the government’s attempts to neutralize the militants fail, leaving the BNP as the only legitimate power that could deal with the situation.
France is in big trouble as well. The US has been spared so far, but it was reported a few weeks back that the FBI presently has a jihadist training camp under surveillance.
#5 Comment By NeoconsAreCommies On May 13, 2008 @ 9:13 pm
In 2001, BNP head Nick Griffin, a Holocaust denier, told reporters that his party did not admit anyone not descended from European whites or “kindred” peoples. (The BNP has since accepted a tiny handful of people of color in order to bolster its battle against Muslims.)
Griffin has expressed his solidarity with Israel, hardly the mark of a “holocaust denier”; and if he is playing us for fools (because poor wittle Israel is so poisecuted by the English goyim, oy vey, how hateful, why would a bigot express his solidarity with the nation of tollerance) it is only because duplicitous lying IS earnest support for zionism. Any lying politician around the world = zionism.
The BNP is another “we love Israel” organization and therefore does not represent the British people. They couldn’t be any more wretch inducingly PC. Whatever Griffin might have said in the past, he has made up for it by brown nosing for Israel. But brown nosing organizations, British equivilents of the SPLC and ADL, is apparently not enough.
(The BNP has since accepted a tiny handful of people of color in order to bolster its battle against Muslims.)
Jaundiced or gray-skinned vampiric jews aren’t people of color.
#6 Comment By Liesl On May 14, 2008 @ 8:58 am
Pimply faced and living in mom’s basement succubi aren’t people anyone listens to, either.
#7 Comment By Jack Ashton On July 19, 2008 @ 2:45 pm
None of the old parties represent the British people – the English, Welsh, Scots and Irish peoples of the British Isles.
Who do they represent?
Their own career interests.
Business interests they serve by importing cheap labour with no care for the social consequences for our people: low wages, higher crime, overcrowding and a loss of social harmony.
Political correctness that puts minority interests to the fore and native Britons to the bottom of the pile.
We have been betrayed by the old parties especially Labour which claimed to be the party of the working man. Suppoirt for the BNP will keep growing.
#8 Comment By Blackbeauty On November 15, 2008 @ 6:47 pm
is this group like the KKK in USA?