UPDATE: Wednesday 6 January 2010

An obscure and extreme organisation called Islam4UK caused outrage this week by threatening to stage a march against Britain’s presence in Afghanistan in Wootton Bassett, the Wiltshire town that has become famous for honouring British troops killed in the conflict when they are returned home.

My niece Siân, who has lived in and around Wootton Bassett all her life, gave a moving and eloquent explanation on Nicky Campbell’s Radio 5 Live phone-in yesterday why the march should not take place in the town. (Shame Campbell called her Sharon throughout!) As Siân said, many people in Wootton Bassett oppose the war. But they have chosen to honour individual men and women who have died serving their country. The tributes to the fallen are totally non-political. Like others in Bassett, Siân believes in free speech and has no quarrel with anti-war protests but thinks it’s totally inappropriate for one to take in her Wiltshire town now it has become a symbol for mourning our war dead.

I can’t help thinking that the whole episode is a publicity stunt by a very dubious organisation. I’d be surprised if Islam4UK has any real intention to march in Wootton Bassett. But its stunt has threatened Britain’s rather good record for harmony between cultures. Our broadcasters and newspapers recorded a wave of revulsion against Choudary, with many telling him to go and live in an Islamic country if he objected to Britain so much. Like many, I have long believed the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan represented a terrible mistake by Tony Blair and Gordon Brown. But to portray them as the West against Islam misses the point. Would Choudary have supported Blair if he had invaded Sweden instead?

The whole episode shows once again that the modern media can be a blessing and a curse. Choudary achieved his aim thanks to blanket media coverage. Multi-cultural relations in Britain took a small knock as a result. And many in Wootton Bassett have felt uncomfortable for some time at the way their town has been treated by the media. My sister, Siân’s mother, was outraged when a Channel 4 reporter ruined a silent tribute during a repatriation by talking loudly to camera. But that’s the modern media: crass and insensitive. Wootton Bassett didn’t ask for worldwide fame. It just did what it felt was right.

PS: it would be nice if the media could spell Wootton Bassett correctly.

My sister has asked me to post the following comment. 

“As Rob’s sister, Siân’s mother and long-term resident of the Wootton Bassett area, I thought I’d add my tuppence’ worth.

Yesterday  I stood with Julio, my husband and Ben, my son at the latest Repatriation. It was bitterly cold, it was beginning to snow, and hundreds of people had been standing, some for hours, waiting. There was silence as the cortege arrived. There was silence – apart from the sobbing of the relatives –  as the hearses stood in front of our recent war memorial. Our war memorial is special. It’s only been in existence for a few years, and it has a beautiful design of hands holding a globe.

One of the fallen was 19, younger than my son. Several of those we have stood to remember have been 19 or 18. I wondered, and despaired, when we visited the war cemetries of the Somme, how young most of them were. It seems nothing has changed. 

I passionately believe in free speech. I passionately believe in democracy and berate those who do not vote – the price paid for the vote has been high. It seems that it is still being paid, in Afghanistan, in Iraq and in other parts of the world, by “our” servicemen and women, and by those they are sent to “help”.

Yes, Islam4UK should be able to enjoy the right of free speech denied so many in the world – including Afghanistan. But not here, not Wootton Bassett which just wants to be able to honour the dead. March in London, where the policies and decisions are made.

And yes, we do have quiet thoughts bout the loss of ALL life in Afghanistan, and the churches of Britain pray for all those killed in conflict, not just the British, not just Christian.

I have my own views about the rights and wrongs of the current conflict/war/whatever you want to call it. But I still think that our generation, and our children’s generation need to be aware of the cost, that our servicemen and women are risking their all.

So I will continue to go to Wootton Bassett on Repatriation days whenever I can, stand in whatever the weather throws at us, admire the elderly veterans who stand ramrod straight with dignity, and wipe the tears from my eyes at yet another family devastated, another life lost. I have just received the email telling me the  next one is next Monday. We will be there. “