International Protest Against Immigration Detention
In solidarity with protests across the world in April - Sydney, Perth, London, and Oxford.
We will march to places in Manchester where migrants' rights are under attack, in our name, with our tax-money.
Saturday 15th April
Assemble at HMP Stangeways - 12.00 noon
Great Ducie Street
Manchester
Called by an ad-hoc coalition of anti-deportation campaigns in the North West
Like America, and Australia, Manchester has benefited from migrants for centuries. We reject migrants being scapegoated, electronically monitored, made destitute, detained and deported. We demand justice for migrants, that they be recognised and valued, not criminalised and abused through an unjust and barbaric process. We demand their right to stay, marry, work, and contribute legitimately.
Contact : wastmanchester@yahoo.co.uk / 07947 996966
Mate, It's not only happening in Manchester. To put a personal slant on your admirable protest I've just lost contact with a friend I've known for almost five years. He was a doctor and a political activist from Albania. Paid a fortune to fly out out when the bullets started to target his family home. His family ended up in Halifax. I got to know him very well, helped him with learning English, helped when social services got him an emergency housing transfer when BNP thugs started to hurl bricks through his window. He had two young daughters, both of whom came to speak English with a thick Yorkshire accent. I did two appeals with him. Both were "postponed" right at the end of the day. But all along he insisted on playing the game correctly. He said his pride prevented him going "underground" as many - mostly single - of his compatriots actually did. Everyday was mired by the anxiety of a Home Office letter, who, stupidly, stupidly, deny the right of asylum seekers to work.
In the end a sympathetic barrister - like the rest of us - hugely impressed by the man's character, agreed to represent him free of charge.
The appeal failed. The family reported to a holding centre in Oxford last Tuesday. I understand that they were flown back to Albania the following day.
i wish your protest well.
Peter Good (TCA)