Muslim removed from Blair’s security

London: A Muslim police officer responsible for guarding British Prime Minister Tony Blair and other senior dignitaries has been taken off the sensitive duty because his children attended a mosque associated with a cleric who has been linked to a terrorist group. Amjad Farooq, 39, is reported to be an experienced firearms officer, but has now been removed from the close protection unit, The Independent reported on Tuesday.

The officer has been also told that his presence might upset the American secret service, which worked closely with the Metropolitan Police’s close-protection group. The report said that Farooq was a firearms specialist working for the Wiltshire Constabulary when he was transferred to the Diplomatic Protection Group SO16 (DPG) whose main role is to provide static protection at government, diplomatic and Metropolitan Police sites.

All officers within the DPG are required to undergo security vetting including a counter-terrorism check (CTC). Farooq was told he would not be transferred until he had received full counter-terrorism clearance. On December 16, 2003, he was approached by a detective chief superintendent from Special Branch who informed him that he had failed his CTC. By then, Farooq had been with the DPG for six weeks.

Farooq was told that they had evidence to justify the refusal of the CTC and referred to the fact that his children, two sons aged nine and 11, had attended their local mosque for religious studies when the building was associated with a cleric whom the police suspected of links to an extremist Islamist group.

Farooq has strongly denied any such links or inappropriate behaviour, the report said and added that at a tribunal to be held next year, Farooq is expected to say that his colleagues had said words to the effect of "what will the American secret service make of him when he turns up there?" (Referring to the likelihood that Farooq would be posted on duty at the US embassy in Grosvenor Square, London).

Farooq has challenged the decision to remove his CTC by lodging an appeal with the Security Vetting Appeal Panel (SVAP), which is administered by the Cabinet Office, itself headed by the Prime Minister. As a result of the clearance refusal, Farooq was transferred from the DPG to Hammersmith & Fulham constabulary. When he returned to collect his belongings, on December 31, 2003, he was asked to meet a police sergeant.

He claims that he was taken to a basement room where he was searched in front of other officers. Inayat Bunglawala, Assistant Secretary-General of the Muslim Council of Britain, told the newspaper that details of Farooq’s case would "not come as a great surprise to many British Muslims. Smear and innuendo appear increasingly to have taken the place of hard evidence when it comes to finding Muslims guilty of misdemeanours. "There is no suggestion that Amjad Farooq himself represented any kind of security risk or that the cleric in the mosque had been convicted of any actual crime."

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