Statement on the first anniversary of the Failed Immigration Raid on Kenmure Street
14 May 2022
As public sympathy for the plight of refugees and immigrants continues to grow, the Home Secretary Priti Patel is expected to see more humiliating failures as in the form of peaceful civil disobedience.
Kenmure Street - Westminster raid stopped in its tracks
13 May 2022
Robina Qureshi, Director of refugee and migrant homelessness charity Positive Action in Housing based in Glasgow said:
“It is almost a year since the failed immigration raid instructed by the U.K. Home Office on the holy day of Eid in a large Muslim community. A similar immigration raid failed only a few days ago in Edinburgh - again on the Holy Day of Eid. The raid failed because of the huge public sympathy for refugees and migrants , which is growing day by day.
“Scotland stopped Westminster dawn raids 17 years ago when a small group of people peacefully locked the gates of the Home Office in Brand Street, Glasgow to drive home the point, that immigration raids on peaceful law abiding members of our community are a hostile act committed against all our communities.
"Our charity led the campaigns against dawn raids since 2005. And we condemn it again. We urge the Scottish Government to withdraw the cooperation of Scottish police forces. Because without Scottish police cooperation, these immigration raids are simply unviable.
"Many hundreds of war refugees from Africa and the Middle East are languishing without the right to work or study in hotels across Scotland and the UK. Many risk being sent to Rwanda simply because of how they travelled here. There is no doubt that the Home Secretary Priti Patel - a "daughter of immigrants" - can expect to see further acts of peaceful civil disobedience in opposition to such plainly immoral acts."