By Graham Huband

DUNDEE’S MUSLIM community was last night urged not to co-operate with Tayside Police’s Special Branch community contact unit.

Osama Saeed of the Muslim Association of Britain told a packed meeting at Dundee University last night that members of the Muslim community should not interact with officers from the SBCCU.

The unit, formed by Tayside Police last year, has come in for heavy criticism for its methods of obtaining information predominantly about Muslims.

Mr Saeed said, “What Special Branch are doing is isolating the Muslim community. There is no extremism in Dundee—they are barking up the wrong tree.

“My message to the police is ‘lay off,’ but my message to the Muslim community is we have got to be stronger in our defiance of this.”

He continued, “There can be no excuse for being scared of the police. If we look at the history of our faith, what else is there other than the Prophet’s example to stand up to tyranny and stand up to oppression.”

He added, “The police are doing their jobs and their job is to push the boat out and push the limits they can push. Our job is to resist that, and resist that we must.”

Dundee University and College Union president Dr Carlo Morelli told the meeting there was no place for racism within education.

He said, “As a union, we are calling on all members not to participate in any kind of monitoring of ‘Asian-looking’ students. What you and I want to see is a wider campaign of opposition to this kind of racism, this kind of Islamophobia.”

Esther Sassaman of the Scottish Palestine Solidarity Campaign said, “The unit takes the kind face—the smiley face—of political correctness and says it wants to build community relations, and uses that as a fictitious fig leaf for political policing.”

Richard Haley of Scotland Against Criminalising Communities echoed the thoughts of his panel members. He said, “The message is we would like them to cancel this operation. Don’t talk to them, you are undermining democracy in this country if you talk to them.”

Dundee East MSP Shona Robison said she supported police in their efforts to combat crime, but it was important that whole sections of society were not “alienated” in the process.

She said, “If the police have evidence a crime may be or has been committed then they do have my full support in investigating that crime or potential crime.

“That is a very different matter than putting whole communities under suspicion. Muslims, and particularly young Muslim men, have been interviewed (by police) simply because they are Muslim. That is wrong and must be stopped.

“The best way of tackling criminal intent is through good community intelligence. You are only going to get community intelligence coming forward where there is an atmosphere of mutual respect.”

Tayside Police was not represented at the meeting.

However, Detective Chief Superintendent Angela Wilson, who has overall responsibility for Special Branch operations, has previously told The Courier that it was not the force’s intention to intimidate people, and the force was open to suggestions as to how the unit could work better.