Report by Fight Racism! Fight Imperialism!Over 100 asylum seekers and their supporters gathered today in the city centre of Glasgow to highlight the ongoing racist attacks which are being carried out by the Labour government, demanding the right to work and an immediate end to dawn raids.
The noisy and spirited demonstration attracted much support from the people of Glasgow and demonstrated that the asylum seeker community is fighting back, no longer prepared to sit idly by as the government continues to attack their rights and living standards.
Speakers from protest organisers Fight Racism! Fight Imperialism! made the link between the war abroad and the war at home: British imperialism is waging war against the people of Iraq and Afghanistan while engaging in a systematic campaign of terror against the asylum seeker community in Glasgow.
Speakers from Unity, the Scottish Union of Asylum-Seekers, stated that the community will continue to resist the attempts to criminalise asylum seekers and refugees. Members of Unity attended from Springburn, Sighthill, Toryglen and Pollokshaws and others from Kingsway, Maryhill and Gallowgate.
A representative from Tyneside Community Action for Refugees, who had travelled from Newcastle to be present at the event, spoke of the importance of organisation in the fight-back, and made the point that the resistance of asylum-seekers in Glasgow and Newcastle is part of a common struggle against dawn-raids and deportations.
Today’s protest occurred in a month of ongoing racist attacks led by the state; in Glasgow, evictions, dawn raids, detentions and deportations have all been carried out. Media coverage in recent weeks has been dominated by racist hysteria over the “foreign prisoners” scandal, which has been used to justify a general attack on the rights of asylum-seekers, refugees and immigrants.
Today’s event is further proof that asylum-seekers will not tolerate the racism of the British state and sections of the media. Today’s successful protest follows a several-hundred strong march of asylum-seekers and supporters through the streets of Glasgow on 8 April, when the demands of the community for the right to work and an end to all forms of criminalisation were clearly and visibly articulated for the first time. However, today’s event was not an end in itself but another important step towards the securing of all the asylum-seekers’ demands. These demands can only be achieved by building a movement of consistent protest, willing to mobilise on the streets.
Unity between all asylum-seekers and unity between asylum-seekers and the working-class must be a key part of this movement. Today’s demonstration clearly began to break-down the artificial barriers erected between the poor and oppressed in our society.
NO DAWN - RAIDS! RIGHT TO WORK FOR ALL!
Called by Fight Racism! Fight Imperialism!
Supported by
Unity, the Scottish Union of Asylum-Seekers
Revolutionary Communist Group
Tyneside Community Action for Refugees
Glasgow No Borders Network
