“Liberte!” – That was the last word spoken by the heroine of Churchill’s elite spy network before being executed by her Nazi captors.

On 13 September 1944, the glamorous British agent, [...]]]>

By Divya Talwar Producer, BBC Asian Network

“Liberte!” – That was the last word spoken by the heroine of Churchill’s elite spy network before being executed by her Nazi captors.

On 13 September 1944, the glamorous British agent, code named “Madeline,” was shot dead at Dachau concentration camp.

Despite being tortured by the Gestapo during 10 months of imprisonment, she had revealed nothing of use to her interrogators.

Noor Inayat Khan, died aged just 30, but her story has gone down in history.

She joined Winston Churchill’s sabotage force, the Special Operations Executive (SOE), and became the first female radio operator sent into France in 1943, with the famous instruction to “set Europe ablaze”.

The role was so dangerous that she arrived in Paris with a life expectancy of just six weeks.

Gestapo arrests

Noor became the last essential link with London after mass arrests by the Gestapo had destroyed the SOE’s spy network in Paris.

As her spy circuit collapsed, her commanders urged her to return, but she refused to abandon what had become the principal and most dangerous post in France because she did not want to leave her French comrades without communications.

For three months, she single-handedly ran a cell of spies across Paris, frequently changing her appearance and alias until she was eventually captured.

Despite having a full description of her and deploying considerable forces in their effort to break the last remaining link with London, it was only her betrayal by a French woman that led to Noor’s capture by the Gestapo.

Noor’s decision to stay in Paris to fight Nazism was a decision that cost her her life.

Despite carrying a passport of an imperial subject she had no innate loyalty to Britain.

Born in Moscow to an Indian father and an American mother, she was a direct descendant of Tipu Sultan, the renowned Tiger of Mysore, who refused to submit to British rule and was killed in battle in 1799.

Her father was a Sufi Muslim who moved his family first to London and then to Paris, where Noor was educated.

But when war broke out in 1939, Noor and one of her brothers, Vilayat, decided they had to travel to London, dedicating themselves against what they saw as the evil of Nazi Germany.

Her fluent French, quiet dedication and training in radio transmitting were quickly spotted by SOE officers.

Highest sacrifice

Noor’s bravery has long been recognised in France, where there are two memorials and a ceremony held each year to mark her death.

However, in Britain, although Noor was posthumously awarded the George Cross in 1949, her courage has since been allowed to fade in history.

That is about to change with the launch of a campaign to raise £100,000 to install a bronze bust of her in London, close to her former home.

It would be the first memorial in Britain to either a Muslim or an Asian woman.

Shrabani Basu, who spent eight years researching Noor’s history in official archives and family records, said: “I feel it is very important that what she did should not be allowed to fade from memory.

”Noor died for this country. She made the highest sacrifice. She didn’t need to do it. She felt it was a crime to stand back.

”She was an incredibly brave woman and I think it is important that her bravery is permanently recognised in this country.”

The project, which has the backing of 34 MPs and prominent British Asians, including human rights campaigner Shami Chakrabarti and film director Gurinder Chadha, is being led by Noor’s biographer, Shrabani Basu who wrote The Spy Princess in 2006.

Around £25,000 of the cost of the bust has been raised and permission granted to install the sculpture on land owned by the University of London in Gordon Square, close to the Bloomsbury house where Noor lived as a child in 1914, and where she returned while training for the SOE during World War II.

The memorial is scheduled to be completed and installed by early 2012.

Noor Inayat Khan’s story will be featured on Asian Network Reports on Tuesday 11 January at 1230 and 1800 GMT and afterwards on BBC

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-12151715

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http://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/home-news/child-asylumseekers-targeted-in-home-office-budget-cuts-2103184.html

Thousands of child asylum-seekers are to be removed from Britain under savage budget cuts being drawn up by the Home Office ahead of this week’s comprehensive spending review.

A briefing document sent to ministers sets out detailed proposals [...]]]> By Robert Verkaik, Home Affiars Editor, The Independent on Sunday Monday, 11 October 2010

http://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/home-news/child-asylumseekers-targeted-in-home-office-budget-cuts-2103184.html

Thousands of child asylum-seekers are to be removed from Britain under savage budget cuts being drawn up by the Home Office ahead of this week’s comprehensive spending review.

A briefing document sent to ministers sets out detailed proposals to remove child refugees before they reach 17 years old, and recommends bearing down on benefits given to asylum seekers. The UK Borders Agency (UKBA) plans to cut a third of its staff by 2014, prompting fears of security risks at British ports and airports Under the proposals, the UKBA says it would be able to reduce its annual £2.45bn budget by £346m.

Setting out a number of options for cutting costs, the document reads: “We need to resolve underlying trend on asylum support … On asylum support this will involve, for example, continuing recent tightening of entitlement to support, removing minors before they reach the age of 17 …”

But the Home Office is also considering saving money by offering a partial amnesty to asylum-seekers whose claims have been delayed by processing backlogs. The paper recommends “continuing to consider grants [of the right to stay in the UK] where agency delays mean even failed asylum-seekers are still in-country after several years”.

There are further plans to end the right of appeal to those applying for migration visas outside the UK, to reduce costs. But of greatest concern will be a policy of mass removal of unaccompanied children before they reach 17 and a half, the age when they are deemed to be adult asylum-seekers. Under current rules unaccompanied child asylum-seekers are usually granted leave to remain in the UK until they can make a fresh asylum application as an adult.

There are more than 4,200 unaccompanied child asylum-seekers in Britain, with most being supported in local authority social services homes. Emma Ginn, of the charity Medical Justice, said last night: “Many unaccompanied children are orphans. Many have escaped various forms of slavery, war and being made into child soldiers. To deport vulnerable unaccompanied children is despicable. To do it to save money is indecent … How we treat asylum-seeking children is already uncivilised, but to sink this low would cost our international reputation dearly.”

The document says: “In total these [cuts and policies] could deliver up to £346m of annualised cash savings by 2014/15 which would allow a reduction in taxpayer funding of £53m. It would mean around 3,500 more staff cuts (ie more than 7,000 from 2010/11 to 2014/15 or almost a third of our current complement).

This would imply a virtual doubling of caseworker productivity as a result of management culture and technology enabled redesign. It would mean a large percentage of travellers passing through automated gates at the border and more risk-based controls based on improved intelligence and scanning capability.”

But the officials warn: “These changes obviously involve significant level of management, project and implementation risk. … If bigger budget reductions are needed or to be able to deal with some of the funding and cost pressures from manifesto commitments we will need to go further.” Paul O’Connor, the Home Office group secretary of the Public and Commercial Services union (PCS), said that cutting staff would lead to security risks from international criminal smuggling gangs and child and sex traffickers. He said: “There should be no compulsory redundancies. In terms of frontline security our members are the first port of call to maintain proper border controls. If they decide to cut one in three this country will be less safe and lead to a massive exploitation of young people.” He warned that job losses would also have an effect on the backlog of asylum cases built up over the last few years. “We expect services to be diminished because there will be fewer people to deal with the backlog, which will get worse … All this experience and skill built up over the years must not be jettisoned on the altar of the cuts.”

One of the proposals outlined in the document has already been implemented. The £50m Immigration Impact Fund, which gives aid to local authorities to help support asylum-seekers living in their region, was quietly dropped over the summer. And it was reported earlier this year that the Home Office was preparing to set up a £4m “reintegration centre” in Afghanistan so that failed Afghan child asylum-seekers can be returned home. An organisation is being sought to run the centre in the capital, Kabul, which would aim to help their resettlement. The aim is to assist 12 boys a month, aged 16 and 17, and 120 adults.

A spokeswoman for the UKBA said no decisions would be taken until the Government had completed its comprehensive spending review. She said no budget figures or policies had been confirmed.

Since this era of financial austerity began, newspapers and magazines have hurried to publish advice on how to get by on a [...]]]> They can’t work, they can’t claim benefits, they have nowhere to live. And their only means of survival is one £10 food voucher a week. Four failed asylum seekers tell their desperate stories.

Since this era of financial austerity began, newspapers and magazines have hurried to publish advice on how to get by on a straitened budget. So here is one to beat all others. Today we offer a guide to surviving on under £10 a week. Without a roof over your head! Without a bed to lie on! With no support from family or friends!

It’s quite possible, and here’s how. These helpful tips come from four failed asylum seekers in Birmingham, who remain in this country, preparing to appeal the Home Office decision, sleeping meanwhile in hedges, doorways, old garages and staircases.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/uk/2010/jun/16/asylum-seekers-survive-on-streets?CMP=twt_gu

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Since August, France has deported about 1,000 ethnic Roma to Romania and Bulgaria. In a resolution passed Thursday, the European Union called for France to bring it to a stop.

European Parliament member for London Jean Lambert says France’s [...]]]> The European Parliament has criticized the move by the French government to expel its Roma migrants.

Since August, France has deported about 1,000 ethnic Roma to Romania and Bulgaria. In a resolution passed Thursday, the European Union called for France to bring it to a stop.

European Parliament member for London Jean Lambert says France’s Roma policy is discriminatory.

“It is not saying you have committed a crime and therefore you as an individual should be expelled from this country,” Lampert. “It really is sort of state discrimination of a group, which is already one of the most disadvantaged in the European Union.”

The resolution was passed with 337 votes; 245 voted against.

Lampert says it is unusual for the European Parliament to make such an open criticism of a member state, but she says the current situation demanded it.

“Today a majority of the members of the European Union took the position that this was so bad that, yes, they were going to name member states responsible,” said Lampert.

The resolution was also critical of the European Commission. It said the Commission, as guardian of the EU treaty, should have made a strong, quick response when the expulsions first started.

Discrimination against national or ethnic groups is forbidden under EU law. The French government says it is not stigmatizing Roma or breaking EU law. It says the deportation is a question of public safety. Roma were recently involved in a few public order incidents, including a riot in southeastern France.

Christian Schweiger from Britain’s Durham University says discrimination is an ongoing problem in Europe.

“This has been an ongoing issue,” said Schweiger. “Racial division, religious division has been an issue and countries very often do not abide by these rules.”

The resolution passed by the European Parliament also criticized the treatment of Roma by other member states. This week, Italian authorities dismantled illegal Roma camps around Milan and Rome.

http://www.google.co.uk/search?q=roma+expulsion+from+france&ie=utf-8&oe=utf-8&aq=t&rls=org.mozilla:en-GB:official&client=firefox-a

The Black Presence in Britain website was set up in 1998 due to a lack of information about Black people in Britain to be found on the Internet.

I was studying politics [...]]]> The Black Presence website was formerly the Black Presence in Britain, history site about the contribution of African descended people in British history.

The Black Presence in Britain website was set up in 1998 due to a lack of information about Black people in Britain to be found on the Internet.

I was studying politics at the time, the course included a history module called; ” The black Presence in Britain 1550-present day”.

Whilst doing my research I found a serious lack of Black British info online. So, I decided to build my own site where this information could be documented. The site has had many incarnations since then. ?I built the first version of it using Netscape composer, later moving on to Dreamweaver. Today the site uses comtent management software.

http://www.blackpresence.co.uk/

The Lesbian and Gay Foundation provides more direct services and resources to more lesbian, gay and bisexual people than any other charity of its kind in the UK.

We deliver first class and accessible community, health and support services

We provide [...]]]> The Home of the Lesbian and Gay Foundation on the net.

The Lesbian and Gay Foundation provides more direct services and resources to more lesbian, gay and bisexual people than any other charity of its kind in the UK.

We deliver first class and accessible community, health and support services

We provide high quality and accurate information and advice, including a range of leaflets and booklets, a monthly magazine.

We help influence public policy and opinion on LGBT issues by liaising with leaders in education, religion and politics, and by involvement in events such as the LGBT Health Summit.

http://www.lgf.org.uk/

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http://www.guardian.co.uk/

See especially:http://www.guardianunlimited.co.uk/racism/

http://www.voice-online.co.uk/