"Running battles in Sighthill..."

Date: 6th Aug '01

Name: Lion Rampant

Country: Alba

The Herald - 6 August 2001

Pleas to catch the asylum seeker killer

WILLIAM TINNING

HUNDREDS of Kurds who came to Glasgow to escape death and torture yesterday reacted with fury to the murder of a countryman in their new homeland.

The hurt they thought they had left behind was etched on their faces as they marched through Glasgow in protest at the first murder of an asylum seeker in Scotland.

The day had begun peacefully, with a meeting to elect a representative to a Kurdish council group in Sighthill.

But as news of the midnight killing spread, hordes of people turned up, and the anger spilled over, sparking a mini riot involving Kurds and local residents.

Stones and bottles were thrown, and punches and kicks were exchanged, as both sides became involved in a running battle on the street, some 400 yards from the dead man's home.

Dozens of police, including some in riot gear and wielding batons, soon quelled the trouble.

Locals looked on from embankments and their homes as police ushered about 250 Kurds - who had initially blocked traffic by sitting in the street in protest at the death before the riot - into a car park below the tower block where the dead man lived.

Allegations and counter-allegations were levelled by both sides over who had sparked the trouble.

After much argument and negotiation with police and among themselves, the Kurds, from Iraq, Turkey, and Syria, decided to march more than two miles to the headquarters of Glasgow City Council in George Square, to vent their anger at the landlord they blame for much of their troubles.

Flanked by police, men, women and children repeatedly chanted "Yildiz, Yildiz", the surname of the dead young Turk, as they made their way through the busy city streets.

A hand wiped away an occasional tear as slow progress was made towards the square. Others were slightly stooped, hands in pockets, as though still in disbelief that a young man from Mardin, in southern Turkey, who came to Scotland to seek sanctuary, could be dead.

By the time the march reached the city chambers, 20 police were on guard outside. Many of the protesters held hurriedly prepared posters above their heads, some of which said: "Catch the asylum seeker killer please", "Stop violence in Sighthill" and "No more racist murders".

Traffic was diverted away from the front of the chambers as protesters gathered at the back of the cenotaph and began chanting: "We want justice for murder" and the name of Yildiz once again.

While many sat down, and the chants faded, small huddles of protesters formed as representatives held sporadic talks with senior police officers to demand urgent meetings with Provost Alex Mosson and Charles Gordon, the council leader.

Many men waved sets of council house keys in front of police and some were thrown on the road in an angry gesture, warning that they were prepared to stay at George Square until council officials met them.

An hour-long meeting involving leaders of the protest group and council representatives failed to resolve the tension, although the asylum-seekers did agree to return to their accommodation in Sighthill for the night.

Aamer Anwar, a lawyer who is one of the spokesmen for the protesters, said: "We had a meeting with the council but not with the leader of the council, which is not good enough.

"They said they would get someone from housing or social work to meet with us tomorrow, but we said that that also is not good enough. We want to meet the leader of the council because this is not just about asylum seekers, it is about everyone in Glasgow."

Mr Anwar called for calm when the asylum seekers returned to Sighthill. He added: "The majority of people in Glasgow welcome asylum seekers and we don't want something to happen tonight because of tit-for-tat revenge."

Tension between local people and asylum seekers had risen in the Sighthill area, where most of the city's 3500 refugees are housed, over recent months.

The most recent of a growing number of violent incidents in various parts of the city involved attacks by asylum seekers on whites, but most attacks have been carried out against refugees.

Two men and a woman were rushed to hospital with stab wounds last month after allegedly being attacked by asylum-seekers near Fountainwell Square in Sighthill.

Four nightclub stewards were attacked by three men at The Garage nightclub in Sauchiehall Street, Glasgow on June 12. Two Albanian asylum-seekers were later charged with attempting to murder the security staff.

Two Palestinian refugees fled Glasgow in June after being beaten up by a white mob in Sighthill earlier in the year.

Race relations groups warned of a rising tide of violence against asylum seekers in May after three Sudanese men were assaulted by a gang of 10 youths in St Mungo's Avenue near North Hanover Street.

A six-year-old boy was among four children reported by police for racially abusing an asylum seeker in the foyer of flats at Mitchelhill Road in the Castlemilk area of Glasgow, also in May. The six- year-old boy was believed to be the youngest person in Scotland ever accused of racial harassment.

Two Palestinian refugees suffered serious head injuries after a vicious attack by a gang in Sighthill in April.

-Aug 6th

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