Losing the Right to Walk the Streets of London

Pax Europa

Below is the intervention read by Elisabeth Sabaditsch-Wolff, representing Bürgerbewegung Pax Europa at the OSCE Human Dimension Implementation Meeting, Session 8 “Freedom of Assembly and Association”, Warsaw, September 27, 2013. Elisabeth’s speech on behalf of the EDL, “Losing the Right to Walk the Streets of London”, is followed by the official British response.

Many thanks to Henrik Ræder Clausen for recording these videos, and to Vlad Tepes for uploading them.

Intervention:

Right to respond, United Kingdom:

The text of the British response was not registered with OSCE. Below is the prepared text of Elisabeth’s intervention (official OSCE pdf version):

Losing The Right to Walk The Streets of London

BPE welcomes the statement from the EU as delivered by the United Kingdom.

Freedom of Assembly is a fundamental right enjoyed and exercised by individuals and groups, among others. This freedom is guaranteed in order to protest, again, among other reasons.

In June of this year, Tommy Robison and Kevin Carroll, both of the English Defence League, were arrested for attempting to walk to Woolwich, where Drummer Lee Rigby was hacked to death by a Muslim shouting “Allahu Akbar”.

Both Robinson and Carroll wanted to march to Woolwich to lay a wreath in commemoration of Rigby’s death and raise money for a cancer-stricken girl. The police put severe restrictions on the march, banning the two men from walking past a large mosque in East London and the borough of Tower Hamlets. In addition, a man was allowed to step forward and assault both Robinson and Carroll despite police presence. Later, they were arrested by a senior police officer on the pretext of obstructing the police.

Let me remind you that all the two men did was march while wearing t-shirts bearing the words “Support our troops”.

Ladies and gentlemen, this was a charity walk. By denying access to Tower Hamlets, the British government has effectively ceased sovereignty to that area by banning Robinson and Carroll from walking from point A to point B.

What is certain is that citizens are banned from exercising their right to walk the streets of their capital city; thus this constitutes a restriction on their freedom of movement.

Recommendations:

  • BPE reminds the United Kingdom of its commitments to facilitate public assemblies.
  • BPE calls upon the United Kingdom to effectively prosecute those who attack public rallies.
  • Finally, BPE calls upon ODIHR to send observers to assess the situation on the ground in the United Kingdom.

For links to previous articles about the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe, see the OSCE Archives.

13 thoughts on “Losing the Right to Walk the Streets of London

  1. This reminds me of the PFJ meeting in Reg’s house and agreeing to put the motion to a vote.

    Just march.

    • And march (peacefully, of course) in tens if not hundreds of thousands. That just might work if there are still enough of us Brits out there with something resembling a backbone.

      Furthermore, this has nothing to do with whether or not I do or don’t sympathise with or support Robinson, Carroll and the EDL -that is immaterial. What the British Gestapo can first get away with by depriving one person or group of their rights will encourage them to do it to others. Any and all of us. Do remember what Niemoller said.

      • What is your take on the Miner’s Strike of 1984?

        Talk about preparing the way for Islam.

  2. Patronising response from the UK delegation the retort of absolute right is disproportionate and off field, the context of the contention was non-absolute rights.

    The United Kingdoms slide into a police state began in the nineteen eighties with the draconian public order responses to the miners’ strike and the politicising of the police as a response to that industrial dispute.

  3. UK right to respond…

    “…the rights to speak and protest freely are not absolute and cannot extend to activity that stirs up hatred against other citizens based on their race or other protected characteristics.”

    Hatred is a state of mind. By itself it does not specify an object nor a guiding measure. Many things deserve to be hated – murderers, slave traders, aspiring world conquerors.

    When did freeborn men concede that free speech, and hatred itself, was an issue best left to governments to decide?

  4. What a super scillious response. (did I spell that right?) So, anyone walking down a street can disturb the public order?
    OK, I get it, they were not just two individuals. But the fact that the police decided to arrest them rather than give them safe passage speaks volumns of the current trend in the UK.
    Funny that now that Kev and TR have forsaken the EDL the charges have been dropped.

    So,

    • Obviously the pair would have been beaten to death.

      The cops would then have been exposed as enabling the immivasion. They even staged it so a white would punch Tommy.

      [unsourced assertion redacted]

  5. The only way to inspire a positive response from the UK government towards a group of people seems to be by committing acts of violence such as muslims do on a daily basis. That seems to be the way to get what you want. Then perhaps a muslim “inciting” violence by walking past a church would be arrested?

  6. i think Elizabeth is very sophisticated in all her presentations..
    she’s been at it quite a while..thank god for her..

  7. While I agree with other commentators that the modern day removal of freedom to protest and demonstrate in the UK started with events like the miner’s strike and Wapping, you should not forget that the UK government has been operating the routine curtailment of those rights for years, generally under the radar and with little publicity (until it goes wrong) in the mainstream UK media, let alone anywhere else. I’m talking about the Northern Ireland Parades Commission, a non-elected, quasi-governmental organisation, backed by the full power of the police, whose sole function is the determination of whether a group of people have the right to assemble and walk in a particular area on a particular day. And before anyone starts spouting on about “contentious parades”, “Orange Order triumphalism” or any of the other phrases and neologisms designed to demonise those wishing to express that right (is this starting to sound familiar?), please realise that these are exactly the same issues surrounding the right to march past a mosque, or through Tower Hamlets. One group is prevented from exercising their freedom of assembly by another group claiming “offense” at the first group’s presence on “their” streets. Except in the case of Northern Ireland, the police don’t have to apply to the Home Secretary for a banning order, it’s the other way round. The marchers have to apply for permission to march. And don’t think this is solely about the Orange Order; a group of people who were at a public meeting about public sector cuts outside their union offices were prevented from walking to local government offices (whether this was a spontaneous decision or not) because they had not applied for permission to do so.
    All those in the rest of the UK need to see what is happening in Northern Ireland and pray that the government doesn’t decide that what it really needs are local “Parades Commissions” across the rest of the country. Because then our freedom of assembly and of movement will really be at an end.

    • Interesting point you make about the sectarian conflict in Northern Ireland. While Europe is being Islamised at an ever increasing speed both sides of the fence in Northern Ireland need to look to the future. Islam is coming for all of us. Its time for you to forget the past and control your future unless you want to live under muslim masters applying shari’a?

  8. “…the rights to speak and protest freely are not absolute and cannot extend to activity that stirs up hatred against other citizens based on their race or other protected characteristics.”

    Clearly the British rep(s) are not paying attention. Islam stirs up hatred and inequality in it’s doctrine. Simply because it veils itself as a ‘religion’ it has acquired protection to maintain it’s activities to ”sir up hatred against” all non believers.

    The Orwellian effect of this British rep’s statement/intended policy is beyond alarming.

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