00:00 Exterior,
New Scotland Yard, London
c.u.
New Scotland Yard sign
Police
officers on the street
Police
car in traffic
Wide
– CCTV camera
c.u.
of above
Wide
– exterior, MI5 HQ, Vauxhall Cross, London
Union
Jack flag
GVs
newspaper headlines (x5)
Guide Voice: Internal security issues have
become a primary consideration for many countries around the world
– the so-called “War on Terror” has focused
attention on potential enemies within, and surveillance and
intelligence gathering are at the very heart of policing agendas as
governments and security forces seek to better protect their
citizens.
But what happens when the intelligence proves to be wrong?
Recent events in the UK have highlighted the problems of failed
intelligence and the impact it can have, both on minority groups
within society and society as a whole.
00:32 SOT: Dr.
Tahir Abbas, Director, Centre for the Study of Ethnicity
and Culture, University
of Birmingham –
“Well, the impact of the Forest Gate
raids has been devastating. Many in the community feel outraged by
what is pretty poor policing in terms of the kind of the behaviour
of the police officers but also the intelligence that lead to the
actions in the first place. Based on clearly rumours and
speculation it was simply not concrete enough to be able to carry
out the raid in the way it was so people are up in arms about this
and there have been demonstrations over the weekend and it’s
going to create a lot of frustration, a lot of reporting, a lot of
negative press and a sharp focus on policing for a while I
think.”
01:09 Wide
– University of Birmingham campus
Dr.
Hewitt enters University building
c.u.
top of Mosque Dome
Wide,
Dr Abbas & Dr Nazeem on steps of Mosque
Guide Voice: Research at the UK’s
University of Birmingham is focusing on the growing problems of
failed security, the damage it can do to communities and the
probability that it actually makes the security situation
considerably worse.
01:22 SOT: Dr. Steve Hewitt, Department of American
and Canadian Studies, University of Birmingham –
“I’m looking at the rise of the modern informer in
terms of not only intelligence services but also police services in
the UK, the US and Canada principally, but also around the world
because what I’ve found is that there’s a common
pattern in terms of the importance of informers and the way that
they’re used and
recruited.”
01:44 CCTV
Camera
c.u.
of above
Exterior
– Police Station
Wide
– street shot with Muslim pedestrians (x 2)
GVs
– Newspaper headlines (x 5)
Public
display – tribute to Jean Charles de Menezes
c.u.
detail from above
Newspaper
article
Guide Voice: The media and popular culture
usually stress the importance of electronic surveillance –
but human intelligence in the form of informers is just as
significant if not more so. Encouraging the co-operation of
minority groups within society is increasingly shown to be the best
source of reliable information and over-reacting to information
before accusations are proven undermines the relationship between
the security forces and the very people they need to go to for
reliable information.
Repeated raids where nothing is found alienates communities -
and wrongly targeted victims make minorities feel threatened, which
can lead to a rise in radicalism. This is, currently, especially
true in Muslim communities in the West, who often feel demonised by
policing methods that seem to unfairly target them.
02:30 SOT: Dr. Tahir Abbas -
“Its been a long term focus on Muslims, its been in play
for quite some time but these recent events have sharply
accelerated that interest, that focus, that concern and we have
some writers and thinkers who talk about this problem of
civilisations, that this is an inevitable return to an old age
conflict etc but that’s just buying into cheap analysis
really – I think there are certainly concerns of how people
conceive the problem to be but the reality is a bit more complex.
There are lots of grey areas in terms of where there are many
commonalities and many shared norms and values between Muslims and
non-Muslims, Christians and other faith groups and I think
sometimes it’s possible to over-egg these differences for
political/ideological concerns and I think that’s what
we’ve seen to a large extent.”
03:20 Wide
– Birmingham Central Mosque
Detail
– minaret
Pan
across sign at Mosque
Guide Voice: So how do we combat such concerns
and prevent the rise of radicalism? Dr Mohammed Naseem of the
Central Birmingham Mosque in England offers a simple solution.
03:30 SOT: Dr. Mohammed Naseem, Chairman,
Birmingham Central Mosque –
“I think the government should lean on its own traditions
rather than breaking away from them. If they go back to the
perception that a person is innocent unless proven guilty, and the
rule of law, and the process of law should be open and independent
– then there won't be a problem.”
03:52 Pan
across newspaper headlines
2
x headlines - static
Guide Voice: Terrorism is a threat that strikes
at the heart of society. If terrorists can capitalise on the
mistakes of the intelligence gathering agencies to turn communities
against each other then the war on terrorism is a long way from
being won, as Dr Hewitt’s research highlights.
04:07 SOT: Dr. Hewitt –
“Co-operation is absolutely crucial for good
intelligence; co-operation of the communities where you need to go
and get information from because the people who know their
communities best are obviously people who are members of these
communities are within these communities, they’re the ones
who know what’s going on they’re the ones who hear the
rumours and anything – they know what’s happening where
they live. So, it’s absolutely crucial to have these people
onside or keep people in these communities onside and that’s
why heavy handed tactics will ultimately fail and will lead to us
being less safe instead of having a more secure and safe
society”.
04:47 End
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