stood in front of me pointing to a cassette and said, "You can't sell that." I said, "What do you mean I can't sell that?" Who was this man? Anti-terrorist police. I said to him, "Listen, this is my shop and I can sell anything I like in here as long as it is not a damage to the public." He said, "Well, that is a damage to the public." I said, "How do you know?" Anyway, the shop was full and he gave me his card telling me to call him. When we spoke, he asked me about some cassettes and told me not to sell them. I said to him, "There are 101 titles on Jihad and Holy War being sold in Foyles and Dillons bookshop, and you're telling me I can't sell that which simply quotes from the Qur'an? No, I will sell them." He asked me for my date of birth and told me he will be arresting me. I enquired if he was calling from the local police station and told him, "It's only a couple of minutes walk so come over and I'll have a cup of tea waiting for you. How many sugars do you take? If you think you can just bully me, you've picked the wrong guy." And I just slammed the phone down. On the 5th of May, the same year, I was going to Pakistan on charity work and the local Maulana was with me. We were at Gatwick Airport. As soon as we entered, I was pulled to the side and asked if I would cooperate in having my shoes checked. In front of passers by, the man put some chemicals on them scanned them with a machine, and said they were fine and that we could go. We then went to the departure lounge to wait for our flight. When we were called, there were two MI5 people standing there. There was a lady and a man searching us. I was interviewed by the lady and the Maulana by the man. She asked, "Where are you going" and I replied, "Am I at
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the wrong gate? If so, please tell me." I said to her, "I'm going where this plane is going. You know where I am going and I know where I'm going." She then asked, "How much money do you have on you?" I asked, "Have you asked all those people who are going on to the plane, this question? Firstly, there's no exchange control; I can take as much as I like and secondly, why are you choosing me out of the 250 passengers?" She said, "It is a random check." I said, "This is not a random check." Anyway, this went on for a while and I didn't want the plane to be delayed so I told her what she already knew; that I was going for charity work for an orphanage and the help of poor people in Pakistan. My luggage contains educational equipment and you can check that if you like; I didn't want the hassle of a missed flight. So this is an example of a search. For no reason, they stopped us. What evidence did they have for this search? I think they have a system; once they see someone, that person is marked and tracked. I'm quite sure of that because later that year I went to Kenya to see my mother. On the way back at Dubai airport, they let everyone back but I was stopped and told to remove by shoes, belt and jacket. I have had other similar experiences also. What do they achieve from such actions? They are just hassling people for nothing and they are making things worse. They are inviting problems by harassing people so much. It seems that you were not worried, but do you think such experiences are affecting some Muslims? Oh yes. They will not be able to live a normal life, believe me. People have nightmares. If I give my example; after the events I've just explained I went to Kenya and after I returned there was a bomb blast in Kenya. And you start thinking, maybe they will come after me. Even though I did nothing, I began thinking in the back of my mind that they could do anything they like and link me to anything they want. Wouldn't they protect your human rights in this country? Human rights are not worth the paper they're written on. What about the British human rights activist who was shot in Israel, where
were his human rights? Yesterday, they just shot a Palestinian child, six years old; they shot him in the neck. And I'll tell you another thing; a lot of Muslims have stopped giving talks on Islam. This is what they want; they want us to stop using The Book (Qur'an). You will notice in Iraq, they have the constitution and all that, but they've said you can't have shari'ah. You can do your namaz (salah) but you can't follow the Qur'an. You see, we need a manual for everything. For example, you need a manual for this (pointing to the recorder used to record the interview). Our manual is the Qur'an and they want us to follow their manual. I'll give you another example. My son he went to America last year. This was his tenth visit. They stopped him and kept him for 5 hours even though he had a British passport. And they were so rude. When asked why they were hassling him they said, "You know what your ***** (expletive) problem is? You're born in Pakistan and your name is Mohammad." They tell you to your face, they abuse you. And there are many other examples. Even in Pakistan, you're not safe there now. I wanted to ask you what you think about the guilt or otherwise of Muslims who are, for example, in Belmarsh Prison under terrorism charges in this country. They just want to show us, they can lock us up whenever they like. It has nothing to do with guilt or innocence. First of all they have to explain what terrorism is. You see, I could have nothing to do with terrorism, but have some books on holy war, America's military might and other similar topics in my home just for general interest. I could have these at home in my library and for some reason a crime has been committed, let's say a robbery in my house and they come to my house. They'll see a book on America's military might, a book on terrorism etc. and they won't think these are books available anywhere. They'll think this guy's into terrorism, you see, that's the problem today. And some people like this will end up in Belmarsh Prison; for no reason. How is this affecting the non-Muslims? Clearly part of the agenda is to make their own public hate the Muslims. Of course, they are wrong, we are peaceful citizens. They need to define what terrorism is; you can't lock people up for just little things.