Landlord to lose licence over rally

A pub landlord who “worked against” police as they tried to control a potentially volatile demonstration is to lose his licence.

Licensing chiefs said they would revoke the licence of Simon Kirkpatrick, landlord of the Stags Head in Deane, after he was found guilty yesterday of serving outside his licensing hours and knowingly breaching the conditions of his licensing agreement.

During the two-day trial, Bolton magistrates heard that Kirkpatrick, aged 39, of Buckley Lane, Farnworth, allowed up to 150 supporters of the English Defence League into the pub and served them alcohol before 11am on March 20. Later, more than 50 police officers had to cordon off the pub and arrange for coaches to transport the EDL protesters into the town so they did not walk through Deane. The court heard the protesters were chanting “racist” songs.

Kirkpatrick said the back door of the pub was open at 9am because the cleaner was sweeping up outside. He said a group came in and demanded to be served alcohol or they would smash up the pub.

Susan Tonks, chairman of the bench, said: “Although it is accepted this was uncomfortable, we do not believe that evasive action could not have been taken. The offence was not committed under duress so we find you guilty of two of the counts.”

Magistrates cleared him of knowingly allowing disorderly conduct to take place. Kirkpatrick was fined £1,000 and ordered to pay £350 costs. After the hearing, he said: “I am disappointed but I accept what has happened, I will just have to live with it.”

Bolton licensing officer Natalie Dolan said: “With a criminal conviction for licensing offences he will be unable to continue as a licensee.”

Insp Phil Spurgeon added: “99 per cent of the licensees in Bolton were hugely co-operative. But Kirkpatrick completely worked against us.

Bolton News

West Yorkshire BNP prove they are still clueless

It comes as no surprise to BNP watchers like myself that the BNP nationally are about as much use as a chocolate fireguard. Here in West Yorkshire they manage to sink just that little bit lower when it comes to stupidity.

Today Chris Beverley uploaded a story to the BNP website regarding his hometown of Morley. As a ex councillor for the town, and being married to a Morley town councillor you would expect him to have some familiarity for the place.

Not so, apparently. Beverley's story was a rather dull affair, attempting to "big up" his wife Joanna. According to hubby Chris, she has a 100 percent attendance record since being elected in 2007. Let's hope Joanna has been visiting the correct town hall then. As the photograph accompanying the story is one of Dewsbury Town Hall in the neighboring district of Kirklees 5 miles away!

English Nationalist Alliance in Brighton

The English Nationalist Alliance or ENA is a tiny right-wing organisation formed by BNP Essex member Bill Baker, to unite members of groups like the BNP, NF and EDL.

The EDL predicted 5,000 people would support their Bradford protest on 28 Aug 2010 - in fact only 700 showed-up. So, where an earlier ENA demo in April had drawn an already low turnout of just 150 supporters to Brighton, 2 days after the Bradford defeat, ENA support shrunk even lower, down to just 40 people, with ENA morons giving Hitler salutes and waving EDL flags in Brighton.

The ENA Brighton demo wasn't the 1st time Bill Baker made a fool of himself. In Aug 2009 Bill Baker cancelled an EDL demo he was trying to organise in Harrow after it turned out he'd been lying about Harrow Mosque. The Harrow protest was rescheduled by Stephen Gash's group SIOE (Stephen Gash is a former EDL spokesman who supports Serbian mass-murderer and war criminal Radovan Karadzic). SIOE staged 2 protests in Harrow - the 1st attended by less than 40 people, the 2nd attended by less than 20, and the 2nd Harrow protest was such a shambles Stephen Gash turned up 90 minutes late for his own demo. Despite this, EDL plan to humiliate themselves again in Harrow in Jan 2011.

The EDL, BNP, ENA, NF and SIOE are all the same people, separated only by the different egos that compete for leadership of their stupid movement. All of them pretend to be patriotic, but the ideology they follow is based on GERMAN nationalism.

The ENA/EDL Brighton picture is available here.

Thanks to FightbackUK for the heads-up

The cheap and nasty party...

A couple of our readers have pointed out that the BNP is currently advertising on its website for someone to fill the role of Group Support/Training Officer. Nothing wrong with that, of course, though we would have expected the party to have invested in a new member of staff who actually knew their way around a set of accounts, or possibly someone who could get reasonably close to winning a by-election. Still, it's not for us to wonder why - just to take the piss. And we can do this by taking a closer look at the advert, which looks like it has been cobbled together by someone with too much spare time, an overwhelming sense of their own importance and the mistaken belief that plagiarising whole sections of the ad from another website would never come to light because they are a management guru. Yes, it looks like Jim Dowson has been in action again, doing whatever it is that he does for the BNP in the cheapest way possible in order to maximise his own profits.

There's actually nothing wrong with the ad itself, though it's a tad verbose. Most job descriptions tend to be padded out with all kinds of nonsense which in theory relate to the job but in practice are just buzzwords and phrases to make it sound good within a corporate environment. Like I said, there's nothing wrong with that, and most personnel officers use this kind of language as a matter of course - but it doesn't come naturally from the BNP or anyone I've ever heard from the party. So where has it been pinched from?

Well, as it happens, we know. There is a group called Businessballs which provides 'free online learning for careers, work, management, business training and education', among other things. If you ever wondered where Dowson got his expertise at business or even where Lee Barnes picks up his sometimes surprisingly lucid notes on employment law, you've found the source. And it will come as absolutely no surprise at all to be told that while the BNP is happy to plagiarise a good deal of Businessballs' text for its advert, it's a little coy about acknowledging Businessballs' copyright.

So where is the evidence that the BNP's ad-writer has plagiarised? Mostly not until the profile of the new employee is discussed in the ad. See below:

The BNP's plagiarised advert (click on image to enlarge)

It's worth comparing the two sections because the BNP has lifted most of its ad verbatim from Businessballs - particularly the Specific Job Skills, Computer Skills and the Literacy and Numeracy sections.

Businessballs' original version (click on image to enlarge)

The contents of the Businessballs page is provided free, and a bloody good resource it is, but the site owner, one Alan Chapman, clearly states that,

'The use of this webpage is free provided copyright (see below) is acknowledged and reference or link is made to the www.businessballs.com website. The webpage text may not be sold, or published in any form. Disclaimer: Reliance on information, material, advice, or other linked or recommended resources, received from Alan Chapman, shall be at your sole risk, and Alan Chapman assumes no responsibility for any errors, omissions, or damages arising. Users of this website are encouraged to confirm information received with other sources, and to seek local qualified advice if embarking on any actions that could carry personal or organisational liabilities. Managing people and relationships are sensitive activities; the material and advice available via this website do not provide all necessary safeguards and checks. Please retain this notice on all copies.

© alan chapman 2006-2009'

Elsewhere, in a more explicit statement of the copyright for the site, Alan Chapman says,

'Reproduction of Businessballs materials online (internet or intranet) for any purpose requires permission.'

Naturally, the BNP, not even granting an author his own acknowledgement, has chosen to ignore this notice and we feel that this should be brought to the author's attention. You can do this by emailing Mr Chapman on ac@alanchapman.com or calling him on 0116 235 5585. Let us know what response(s) you get via the comments. For reference, the BNP advert is here (the link goes via an anonymiser).

Idiot Green Arrow reveals his identity

Paul Morris aka Green Arrow

Speaking at the pitifully attended "Indigenous Weekend" Paul Morris aka Green Arrow finally came out of the fascist closet and revealed himself (That isn't a nice thought is it)

Speeches taken from the fiasco have been uploaded to Youtube, including one by Morris.

We won't be providing the link on here, but if you go to Youtube and search for "Welsh fascist" I'm sure you will find what you are looking for.

Don't have nightmares.

Ex-Darwen councillor branded ‘foolish’ over EDL rally

Michael Johnson - now supporting the EDL

A former councillor has been criticised for making an inflammatory speech at a controversial rally.

Michael Johnson, of Dean Street, Darwen, was a guest speaker at the English Defence League (EDL) demonstration in Bradford city centre on Saturday. The former Blackburn with Darwen councillor and parliamentary candidate for Rossendale and Darwen made a speech saying he was ‘defending our identity from attack’. But critics said the EDL’s actions were inciting hatred between communities.

More than 1,600 police from 13 forces were involved in the operation in Bradford at the weekend amid fears the demonstration would descend into violence. Bricks, bottles and smoke bombs were thrown at anti-racism counter-protesters and police as around 700 EDL members gathered. Fourteen people were arrested.

Former Blackburn with Darwen council leader Colin Rigby, who is a Darwen area councillor, said: “It doesn’t surprise me. He was all over the place when he was a councillor. The majority of the people living in Blackburn and Darwen have a good relationship, regardless of where they come from. We do not have any problems at all and these rantings of his show he is a rather foolish individual.”

Speaking to the Lancashire Telegraph, Mr Johnson, who is of mixed race, said he was not against Muslims, but Islamists, who have ‘a rigid ideology, not a religion, which involves taking over the country and our people’.

He said he was not a member of the EDL but ‘the EDL are fighting for something I totally believe in’.

Mr Johnson was elected to the borough council in 2006 for the England First Party which called for a ban on mixed-race marriages, black footballers playing for England, aid to Africa and virtually all immigration to England.

Blackburn Citizen

BNP's Family Weekend goes wrong...

Click on image to enlarge

Kids ask the most awkward questions sometimes, don't they. I've no idea if Jefferson has kids or grandchildren but the idea of them quizzing him about his all-encompassing uselessness or his extremely dodgy past is entertaining. Feel free to post your own captions via the comments...

Football hooligans to launch 'European Defence League' in Amsterdam

The English Defence League (EDL), the anti-Muslim 'street army' composed largely of football hooligans that burst onto the front pages of British newspapers in the last year as a result of its often violent protests, is to hold a rally in Amsterdam in October, EUobserver has learned.

The EDL is to demonstrate in support of Geert Wilders, the Dutch anti-immigrant firebrand, with a recently launched French Defence League and Dutch Defence League, modelled on the English group, to join them along with other anti-Islamic militants from across Europe.

Formed in 2009, the EDL has held over a dozen often rowdy marches and demonstrations in cities across Britain over the last year. Protests that attracted only a couple hundred militants at the end of last year are now bringing thousands out. On Saturday (28 August) a rally in Bradford, West Yorkshire, home to the second-largest community of south Asians in the UK, turned ugly when members clashed with police and pelted anti-racist activists with bricks, bottles and smoke bombs. Thirteen were arrested, according to media reports.

Anti-racist watchdogs call the EDL one of the most worrying developments on the far-right scene in the UK since the 1970s and the days of the National Front, an openly white supremacist and neo-Nazi political party. The group now appears to be meeting with some success in exporting its novel brand of nativism to the continent, a combination of anti-Muslim vitriol, agressive street marches and attempts to rope in football hooligan gangs by holding rallies around the same time as matches.

Graeme Atkinson, European editor of Searchlight magazine, a UK anti-fascist journal, says that the group is "tapping into a widespread and growing Islamophobia in society," in a way that other far-right groups, weighed down with explicitly fascist iconography and discourse, have not been able to. He warns against panic regarding the new group, but says authorities should not be blind to the growth of such movements, describing the new formation as "an utterly socially divisive, politically toxic ideology."

New kind of far-right outfit

Distinct from the traditional far right, the EDL, which originally grew out of the "football casual" subculture, claims to be multi-ethnic, to target "jihadism" rather than Muslims, and employs a rhetoric more in keeping with the fringes of neo-conservative anti-Islamism than the nostalgia for Nazism of other far-right formations.

The group's mission statement declares that anyone is welcome, so long as they are "integrated:" "We are non-racist/fascist and anyone is welcome if they want to live under English values and fully integrate into our way of life."

"English Defence League members recognise that this threat is one that must be stopped at all costs. Our Christian, Jewish, Sikh, and Hindu friends all have tales to tell with regard to Islamic Imperialism," the group's "Exposing the myths" page reads.

One of its leaders is Guramit Singh, a Sikh born in Britain, and it says it is, like Mr Wilders, strongly pro-Israel and maintains both Jewish and LGBT "divisions" while backing a ban on the building of mosques and seeking the burqa to be outlawed. Its LGBT wing was set up after the Dutchman visited the UK in March when he had been invited to show his short anti-Islam film, Fitna, in the House of Lords. At a demonstration in Bolton in March, a man held up a pink triangle alongside anti-Islam placards and banners. Its LGBT division has 107 members at the time of writing.

In what would normally be anathema to traditional, antisemitic far-right outfits, the group has taken to brandishing the Israeli flag at rallies and, according to the Jewish Chronicle, its Jewish division had signed up hundreds of members on its Facebook page until the page was recently deleted, though Jewish leaders in the UK actively discourage young people from joining, with the Board of Deputies of British Jews describing the organisation as "built on a foundation of Islamophobia and hatred which we reject entirely."

Links to BNP, Swedish Democrats

As with other formations in Europe that far-right monitoring organisations describe as "far-right-lite," notably Mr Wilders, Denmark's People's Party and the late Pim Fortuyn, some in the EDL try to distance themselves from, in the words of the group's website, the "Adolf-worhipping neanderthals."

But these same monitors say that while the EDL is not an outright "fascist" or neo-Nazi formation, links with the traditional far right remain, with many leaders being ex-members of the British National Party. Its leader, Tommy Robinson, is an ex-BNP activist. One of the organisation's main strategists is 45-year-old IT consultant Alan Lake, who has advised the far-right Swedish Democrats on tactics.

Meanwhile, at every demonstration but two in the last year, dozens have been arrested. The group's marches regularly involve anti-Muslim sloganeering and frequently descend into violence. At a rally in Dudley in July, a Hindu Temple was attacked as well as a number of shops, restaurants, cars and homes.

Figures for the size of the organisation and its supporters are hard to pin down and no figures have emerged for the new continental franchises. The group claims it has "thousands" of supporters and has spawned a Scottish Defence League and a Welsh Defence League, both of which have held rallies in their respective countries, as well as an Ulster Defence League. Police meanwhile reckoned that 1,500 to 2,000 EDL demonstrators marched in Newcastle upon Tyne in May this year, one of its bigger rallies.

Ground Zero 'Mosque'

The EDL has received endorsements from Robert Spencer and Pamela Geller, two of the main agitators behind the right-wing movement opposed to a Muslim community centre being built two blocks away from the site of Al Qaeda's attacks on New York in 2001, the so-called Ground Zero Mosque. Geert Wilders, for his part, is scheduled to speak at a protest in Manhattan on 11 September this year by Stop Islamization of America (SIOA) against the building of the community centre.

Although Mr Wilders is not thought to have direct links with the EDL, SIOA is an affiliate organisation of Stop Islamisation of Europe (SIOE), which has marched alongside the English hooligan movement. SIOE itself was founded in 2007 by Anders Gravers, previously the leader of a tiny Danish party called Stop the Islamisation of Denmark (Stop Islamiseringen af Danmark), in reaction to the Jyllands-Posten Mohammed cartoon controversy. On 11 September 2007, the SIOE staged a demonstration in Brussels.

Other affiliate organisations have been created in 10 European countries including Denmark, Russia, Finland, France, Germany, Norway, Poland, Romania, and Sweden and the United States of America. Mr Gravers is reportedly on friendly terms with Mr Wilders, is his "friend" on Facebook and will be speaking alongside him at the anti-Mosque rally in New York.

The demonstration in Amsterdam is due to take place on 30 October, according to the EDL website. Mr Wilders heads to court at the end of next month on charges of inciting racism. The case begins 5 October, with a verdict expected 2 November.

Joining them there will be members of the recently formed Dutch Defence League' and French Defence League, both modelled on the EDL. The latter draws its members from the ranks of far-right supporters of the Paris Saint Germain football club, known in France for long harbouring a far-right element among the club's supporters, although elsewhere on the continent, according to EDL spokesman Steve Simmons, not all the defence-league-linked groups have their origins in football hooliganism.

Paris Saint Germain supporters

The French Defence League, which employs both an anglophone version of its name and "Ligue Francaise de Defense," founded in May and more latterly takes the name Ligue 732, after a group of Paris Saint Germain supporters, that, according the outfit, "tries to unify all French Casuals, Ultras and French Fans to fight against Radical Islam."

The 732 figure references the year that the French king Charles the Hammer, the grandfather of Charlemagne, won a victory at the Battle of Tours halting Islamic expansion in western Europe.

Mr Simmons told EUobserver that militants from the "anti-Jihad movement" in Germany, Belgium, Switzerland and "other European states" will join them in Amsterdam for the launch of what is termed the "European Defence League" or, alternately, the much cuddlier "European Friendship Initiative."

"I would also like to take this opportunity to announce a new demonstration that is to take the English Defence League global," Tommy Robinson, the pseudonym of the group's leader, Stephen Yaxley-Lennon, a former member of the BNP, wrote on the EDL website in a missive in July.

"You may be aware that the great man Geert Wilders is in court for race hate charges," he continued. "The EDL has been in contact with our European brothers and sisters and we have decided that on Saturday, 30 October the European Defence League will be demonstrating in Amsterdam in support of Geert. We hope that all of you will be able to join us for this, what promises to be a landmark demonstration for the future of the defence leagues."

"We feel that freedom of speech is being eroded and a lot of appeasing of radical muslims and Islam in general. Geert has the courage to take this on and we want to support him," the group's spokesman, Steve Simmons, told EUobserver.

Counter-Jihad conferences

In June this year, the EDL sent two representatives to Counter-Jihad 2010 - a conference in Zurich held by the International Civil Liberties Alliance, which does not focus on civil liberties at all but is instead an anti-Muslim movement. It was the fourth such pan-European conference in as many years.

The Zurich conference may have been where the idea for a European Defence League originated. According to an EDL report back from the meeting, which attracted "counter-Jihad" activists from Denmark, Sweden, France, Germany, Norway, Austria, Switzerland, the UK and the US, the conference "built on the important work that had already been done as well as doing the groundwork for new initiatives and the inclusion of new organisations and activists in the work of the global counter jihad."

Mr Simmons for his part in a slight detour from the announcement of Mr Robinson, told EUobserver that the Amsterdam rally will see the launch of the "European Friendship Initiative," and that a "European Defence League" will be just part of this broader alliance of "Defence-League"-branded movements.

He said that talks are ongoing with in particular German, Dutch, Belgian and French groups ahead of the Amsterdam demonstration. Already, in April this year, the EDL took part in a small pro-Wilders rally of 100 people in Berlin outside the Dutch embassy, organised by the Burger Bewegung Pax Europa (Pax Europa Citizens' Movement).

He also explained why the EDL and allied groups are heading to the Netherlands: "We feel that freedom of speech is being eroded and there is a lot of appeasing of radical muslims and Islam in general. Geert has the courage to take this on and we want to support him."

He downplayed the group's rowdy reputation: "We want to turn it into a sort of celebration rather than a protest, with food, drink and entertainment."

He claimed that off-duty serving UK, Dutch and German soldiers which had joined "Armed Forces Unite," (which grew out of "Armed Forces Defence League," a Facebook group for EDL-supporting soldiers and sailors) have offered to help Dutch police to steward the event.

The city of Amsterdam government for its part is aware of the plans for a demonstration and is tracking developments, but will not discuss details of preparations due to "security considerations."

In Bradford over the weekend, in what was a massive police operation, some 1,600 officers from 13 forces took part.

euobserver

Three injured at anti-fascist demo in Brighton

Two officers and a protester were injured when violence broke out at an anti-fascist demonstration in Brighton, police said.

The protest organised by the Unite Against Fascism (UAF) group took place at the same time as a demonstration by the English Nationalists Alliance. A Sussex Police spokesman said members of the UAF march clashed with police. Fourteen arrests were made for public order offences, assault and to prevent a breach of the peace. Two police officers and a protester were treated for minor injuries.

The force spokesman said: "Police attempted to ensure that both protests took place in a safe location, but close enough to one another to enable them to make their points peacefully. Unfortunately a small group from the counter-demonstration resisted this and threw missiles at the police. At no time did either group have the opportunity to physically confront one another, the only disorder being directed towards the police."

Chief Superintendent Graham Bartlett said: "It is our aim to allow protesters the freedom of speech to express their views safely, without causing disruption and disorder to residents, visitors and businesses in the city."

BBC

English Defence League rally in Bradford leads to 13 arrests

The EDL's version of a 'static protest'

Police praise calmness of local people during weekend's far-right protest over 'militant Islam'

Thirteen people were arrested after far-right activists threw missiles and attacked officers during a protest organised by the English Defence League at the weekend, police confirmed today.

A hail of smoke bombs, bricks and bottles hit anti-racist supporters and residents in Bradford on Saturday as about 700 EDL activists held a "static protest" in the city centre. Despite the violence, fears of a repeat of the riots that devastated the city in 2001 proved unfounded, and politicians, the police and community leaders today praised the reaction of residents in the city.

Chief Superintendent Alison Rose said none of those arrested lived in Bradford. "The mood of the district in general has been one of calm, and local people have co-operated and supported the police by behaving sensibly and avoiding conflict. Although there has been some disruption to the city centre, we are returning to normality and the people of Bradford should be proud."

Martin Love, a Green party councillor in Shipley, said there was a sense of relief in the city. "An awful lot of people heeded the warnings to stay out of the city centre. Ignoring the EDL shows them what people here really think and that has wider potential. If we can prevent them causing trouble in Bradford, other places which they target will take heart and follow our example."

The home secretary, Theresa May, authorised a ban on one march this month after a 10,000-strong petition from local people. But police and politicians claimed they were powerless to prevent the far-right group holding a "static protest" in Bradford.

Paul Meszaros, a co-ordinator of the Bradford Together campaign, which collected the petition signatures, paid tribute to people in Bradford.

He said: "In the face of that provocation and racist chanting, the way all the people of Bradford, but the particularly the Muslim people, reacted – the way we stood by this city – was wonderful. Hopefully this means we can finally put the events of 2001 behind us."

More than 1,600 officers from 13 forces were involved in the police operation on the day. The EDL, which has held demonstrations in urban areas across Britain over the past 12 months, formed in 2009, and has since become the most significant far-right street movement in the UK since the National Front in the 1970s.

The EDL says it is a peaceful, non-racist organisation, opposed only to "militant Islam". But many of its demonstrations have ended in confrontations with the police following activist violence, as well as racist and Islamophobic chanting.

The group had predicted that thousands of its supporters would turn out in Bradford at the weekend for what was dubbed "the big one", but the police said there were about 700 people. Coachloads of far-right activists arrived in the afternoon chanting anti-muslim abuse, and skirmishes continued throughout the day between EDL supporters and the police.

Guardian

Bradford: Smoke bombs thrown at English Defence League protest

EDL supporters and police clash in Bradford

More than 1,600 officers on horseback and in riot gear pen in 700 activists, including BNP members and soccer thugs

Far-right activists threw smoke bombs and missiles and fought with the police as trouble flared in a protest organised by the English Defence League.

Bricks and bottles and smoke bombs were thrown at anti-racist supporters and police as around 700 EDL activists – including known football hooligans and BNP members – held a "static protest" in Bradford city centre. Mounted officers and others in riot gear were attacked as they pushed the EDL into a penned area. Skirmishes continued as EDL speakers addressed the crowd and there was more violence as its supporters were put back on coaches.

More than 1,600 officers from 13 forces were involved in the police operation amid fears the demonstration would descend into violence. Police said there had been five arrests.

The EDL, which has held demonstrations in towns and cities across the country over the past 12 months, had predicted that thousands of its supporters would turn out in Bradford for what was dubbed "the big one", but police said there were around 700 people.

Earlier in the afternoon coachloads of EDL activists had chanted "Allah, Allah who the fuck is Allah?" and "Muslim bombers off our streets". One of the coach drivers said: "I didn't expect a job like this when I came to work this morning. We're a five-star firm. We don't usually take scumbags like these."

Thousands of anti-racists and local residents joined counter-protests and events organised around the city. Mohammed Khan, 29, said: "We want to show the people of the UK that Bradford is a united and peaceful place, where Asians, white people – everyone – gets along. Nobody here wants these people. They are just trying to divide this city and provoke trouble."

Several hundred people gathered at a community celebration at Infirmary Fields near Manningham, where running battles between youths and police took place in 2001. "Everyone wanted to join in to tell people how good this city is," said Surhra Bibi from Bradford's Fairbank Road. Hundreds of other demonstrators joined an event organised by Unite Against Fascism in the city centre.

Earlier this month Theresa May, the home secretary, authorised a ban on the march but police and politicians claimed that they were powerless to prevent the far-right group holding a "static protest".

Yesterday, as the demonstration came to an end, fights broke out among rival gangs within the EDL and local teenagers and anti racist campaigners were kept back by mounted police. A West Yorkshire police spokesman said: "Missiles have been thrown in the area around the Bradford Urban Gardens; however, this has been contained and the police are utilising their resources to manage the current situation."

The decision by Bradford council to seek a marching ban followed a formal request by West Yorkshire chief constable Sir Norman Bettison, made after his force carried out a risk assessment of the proposed event. Bettison said he was taking the action after considering the "understandable concerns of the community".

David Ward the local Liberal Democrat MP, who attended the event in Infirmary Fields, said the city had moved on in the past nine years.

"This is a celebration of all that is good about Bradford. We're not so much a big city as a collection of villages – communities which get along and today have got along. I want no part of the hatred some people are showing in our city centre. We have moved on from 2001. I hope today is the day that is made clear."

The EDL, formed last year, has become the most significant far-right street movement in the UK since the National Front in the 1970s. It claims to be a peaceful, non-racist organisation opposed only to "militant Islam". But many of its demonstrations have ended in confrontations with the police after supporters became involved in violence and racist and Islamophobic chanting.

In May, the Guardian revealed that the EDL was planning to step up its Islamophobic street campaign, targeting Bradford and Tower Hamlets in London.

Guardian

Bradford braced for arrival of the EDL

Nine years ago it was the National Front marching. Today it will be supporters of the English Defence League peddling a slightly different brand of xenophobia. But whatever name they go by, many residents of Bradford fear the outcome could be the same.

Faisal Nawaz Khan has good reason to remember the last time the far right sought to parade through his home city. He was just 15 when rioting erupted in the Manningham area of the city on the night of 7 July 2001.

In what was the latest pulse of violence to hit the North of England that summer, youths threw stones at police, a pub was burnt and a luxury car dealership was attacked. David Blunkett, who was Home Secretary, had stopped the NF demonstration planned for earlier that day – just as Theresa May has acceded to police requests to do the same with the English Defence League (EDL) this time. Yet trouble still flared and today it will be left to the police to keep the "static" gatherings of many hundreds of EDL supporters and their opponents from Unite Against Fascism under control.

Despite the ban on marching, the planned protests have already succeeded in rekindling unwanted memories in an area still rebuilding itself after riots in both 2001 and 1995. Mr Khan was convicted of throwing a stone at the height of the last disturbances and was sentenced to five years in prison – one of 200 people jailed from the community for a total of 604 years. Then a promising student today he hoses down cars for a living in the shadow of the burnt-out Upper Globe pub which remains derelict after being torched during that long night of violence.

"They put all the blame on us as if we were the culprits and wanted to burn these buildings down," he says. His friend agrees. "The fascists and racists came here 10 years ago to tear down the town and why have they been given permission to do that again?" said the older man who did not wish to be named. Rumours have already been swirling around, they say. A story of an Asian woman being attacked by white youths is circulating, possibly started deliberately to stoke up tension, the men working at the car wash believe.

"It's already escalating," said the older man. Mr Khan believes young Asians will be reluctant to go into the city centre today where police will corral the two rival protests into separate areas out of sight of each other. "We have told our community to stay at home. But we have received anonymous letters through the letterbox saying they want us to go into town and get into trouble. I don't know who it is but they say go there and fight and defend yourselves. But it is Ramadan and we will be fasting."

His friend Asif Khan, 25, said: "This is causing flashbacks for everyone. We don't want a repeat of what happened. They should ban them from coming here all together."

Opposition to the EDL has been well organised since news of the planned march broke. In Bradford city centre, Maya Perry, 35, was gathering signatures for a group called We Are Bradford. It is planning a multicultural celebration as the EDL gather at the newly created urban park – an area of land on the edge of a giant hole in the city centre which is to become a huge retail complex. She was doing brisk trade gathering signatures from passers-by putting their names to a statement denouncing the EDL as Islamophobic, adding to the 10,000 already gathered demanding the march be stopped.

Having grown up in Bradford but now living in London, she too recalls the effects of previous riots but believes people need to stand up and be counted. "We know that when there hasn't been any opposition such as in Stoke the far right can rampage through the town centre, attacking Asians and destroying businesses. They say they are against Islam but in Dudley they attacked a Hindu temple. They are violent racist thugs," she said.

For Bradford's traders, today promises to be one of lost business. Ayaz Muhammad, 33, who sells luggage in Kirkgate market, said he was planning to be there though others would not be opening their stalls. "No one wants trouble. The elder at the mosque has been giving us a lecture for the last two weeks not to go into the town centre. He has been warning us that it is like a fire. The dry sticks can ignite even the green wood. They fear everyone could get caught up if a few get involved," he said.

At the Oastler shopping centre Keith Taplin, 54, was manning his butcher stall which has been run by the family since before the War. The Union Flags on display were there to mark a recent sausage promotion and he said his customer base included as many Asian shoppers as white. "This is going to cause a lot of trouble. There are two or three different groups and that is going to cause a problem no doubt whatsoever," he said. Despite the planned presence of an extra 30 security guards at the market customers were getting their shopping in early. "We have seen a lot of our Saturday regulars already this week. Everybody is keeping out of the way. And who can blame them?"

Independent