BRITAIN: Islamist threats followed the release of British detainees, reports Lynne O'Donnell in Birmingham.
The return home of the last four Britons from the American naval base at Guantanamo Bay has been greeted with government plans for stricter measures for dealing with suspected terrorists. It is a move that threatens to further alienate young Muslims who already feel they are unfairly targeted in the war on terror.
Hours after a Royal Air Force jet carrying the men home touched down on Wednesday, local media reported that posters began appearing in Birmingham, Britain's second city and home to a large Muslim community, hinting at the anger fomented by the men's ordeal as suspected "enemy combatants".
Lampposts along Ladypool Road, where one of the freed men, Mr Moazzam Begg, ran a shop selling radical Islamist literature, were plastered with images of New York's World Trade Centre bearing the message: "Remember September. You are either with the Muslims or with the Kaffir," the London Independent reported.
It's not a sentiment that garners much open support in Birmingham's Balsall Heath neighbourhood, where 60 per cent of the population are south Asian immigrants, many women wear full black burqas and the streets are dominated by halal butchers and Pakistani restaurants.
With Muslims accounting for less than 4 per cent of Britain's population, areas like Ladypool Road represent the country's multicultural face. Shop windows display Arabic advertisements for Koran lessons, restaurants hang certificates from Islamic colleges on the walls, and the lunchtime clientele reflects the city's immigrant history as Europeans, Africans and Asians eat together in a convivial, alcohol-free atmosphere.
"Those sort of people, who would put up posters like that, just make life more difficult for ordinary Muslims, giving us a bad name and complicating our lives," said a British-born Pakistani grocer, who asked not to be named, of radicalised Muslims who promote violence.
"It's a good thing the men are being released; three years is a long time," said a man wearing a traditional salwar-kameez as he stood smoking a cigarette in the doorway of the Lahore Cake Shop. "I signed a card that came around to welcome Begg back home. I'm happy for him."
Asked about the posters, he said he had not seen them and added: "No one would be stupid enough to put that sort of thing up here."
Nevertheless, the feeling that Muslims are being specifically targeted by the British and American governments in the fight against international terrorism simmers beneath the surface in Birmingham.
"It's clear that some people, especially young lads, do feel that Muslims are being treated unfairly, that we're picked on just because we're Muslims and for no other reason," said the grocer. "Some of them get involved in things they shouldn't because they feel powerless otherwise." As the returned Guantanamo inmates - Mr Richard Belmar (25), Mr Feroz Abbasi (24), Mr Martin Mubanga (32) and Mr Begg (36) - were arrested and questioned by anti-terrorist police before being freed and reunited with their families on Thursday, the British government detailed plans to circumvent court rulings that suspects cannot be held indefinitely without charge.
Mr Charles Clarke, the Home Secretary, said suspected terrorists could be placed under house arrest, and that family and associates could also be subject to sanctions that could ban them from using the telephone and internet.
These new methods of dealing with British citizens suspected of terrorism but not convicted of any crime would enable authorities to get around laws preventing the use in court of evidence collected through wire taps.
Mr Clarke said the threat Britain faced since September 11th, 2001, justified the draconian measures.
"There are serious people and serious organisations trying to destroy our society," he said. "We are in a state of emergency."
The latest returnees, and five men repatriated from Guantanamo Bay last year, have denied, through their lawyers, involvement with Osama bin Laden's al-Qaeda terrorism network. They were released after months of high-level talks between the British and American governments and pressure from British advocacy groups.
Lawyers for Mr Abbasi and Mr Begg said the men were held in solitary confinement for almost two years, and Mr Begg told his wife in a letter last year that he had been subject to "vindictive torture" by his captors.
Mr Begg was under surveillance by British authorities before he left with his family for Afghanistan, ostensibly to set up a school. His book shop was raided in 2000 by anti-terrorist police in a move that a spokesman for one anti-western group, al Muhajiroun, said raised his profile among young radicalised Muslims.
Newsweek reported that Mr Begg had revealed to his captors in Cuba details of al-Qaeda plans to fly remote-controlled aircraft packed with explosives into the White House.
A London newspaper yesterday cited US Justice Department documents it said were transcripts of interviews with the men in which they admitted to receiving weapons and warfare training at al-Qaeda camps in Afghanistan, Pakistan and Africa.
The Sun said Mr Belmar admitted meeting Osama bin Laden in the Afghan city of Kandahar, and receiving "basic weapons, war tactics and nativation training at a terrorist training camp".
Mr Abbasi, the paper said, had allegedly received similar training to Mr Belmar, and was quoted as saying Allah would honour him for becoming an "enemy combatant" of the United States.