Racists target Dad on the net
Barrie Hudson
A PEACE campaigner has had his home address
posted on a white extremist website by people claiming to be from the
British National Party's Swindon branch.
And the BNP says it couldn't care less.
Andy Newman fears the entry on the
British page of the American Stormfront site could provoke a terrorist
attack on his young family.
And he was disgusted to see someone
calling himself White Terror had posted a comment asking whether his
name was Newman or Neumann the Jewish spelling.
Mr Newman, 43, chairs the Swindon Stop
the War Coalition and is secretary of the local Socialist Alliance
branch.
He said: "As I have a young family,
including a newborn baby, I take it very seriously that an organisation
which has been linked with violence has posted my home address on a
fascist webpage."
Another unidentified writer, who calls
himself Steve 219, talks of recently leafleting the Swindon area. He
says: "The Marxist group the Socialist Alliance has also been out with
their smear [sic] and lies.
"If you would like to express your views,
write to Andy Newman."
Mr Newman is married to fellow activist
Sarah, a teacher.
He said: "If it was just me who was
affected, I would not be worried at all, but I have a family I
have a four-year-old and a baby of three weeks.
"Having my address on this website could
be very unpleasant. My wife is very concerned."
But Mr Newman defiantly added: "I'm not
going to be intimidated. I have political beliefs that not everybody
agrees with, and they are entitled to disagree because that is
democracy.
"But people are not entitled to
intimidate others for being politically active.
"What has happened will not deter me,
because then they will have won."
The Evening Advertiser contacted the
BNP's press officer, who calls himself Dr Phill Edwards but is in fact
called Dr Stuart Russell.
He said the party did not condone the
placing of political opponents' personal details on such websites and
added: "We do not tell them to do this. They do it spontaneously."
He also accused left wing parties of
employing similar tactics against right wing activists but was unable to
cite examples.
He then accused successive governments of
having allowed the country to be populated by immigrants who brought
disease and social problems and renewed his attack on the media.
He said: "All you can do in the media is
phone up and waste my time about a man who's had his name and address
published on a website. I couldn't care less."
The BNP has been hitting the national
headlines in recent weeks. In a recent documentary, a party member
boasted to an undercover BBC reporter of kicking and punching a man
during the 2001 Bradford riots.
Another member spoke of his desire to
attack mosques with a rocket launcher, and another claimed to have put
dog excrement though the letterbox of an Asian-owned takeaway.
Party leader Nick Griffin sparked
widespread protest by describing Islam as vicious and wicked and
suggesting it had been spread through rape and other violent means.
August 2004