'Political Correctness' & 'Genuine Fear' of Being Seen as Racist Hampers UK Terror Threat Reporting

“Political correctness” is preventing people from reporting potential threats, according to an independent UK government adviser for social cohesion.

Dame Sara Khan warned that “a genuine fear” of being perceived as racist was what made many individuals hesitate to contact the authorities over possible terrorism.

Speaking to Nick Robinson on the BBC's Political Thinking podcast, Khan also criticised the country’s Prevent anti-terror scheme, which was conceived to stop people from becoming radicalised by increased "community engagement".

According to the British human rights activist, in reality the Prevent programme is creating a “vacuum” for extremists by failing to engage with Muslim communities across the UK. She lamented the fact that the purpose of Prevent had not been adequately explained to these groups. As a result, they displayed deep-rooted “mistrust” towards it.

The leading British expert and policy specialist on counter-extremism said she had encountered councillors who “just could not talk about” Islamic extremism and the radicalisation of Muslims in their area, clarifying:

“There's a genuine fear, a lack of confidence, a lack of understanding”.

The human rights activist deplored the fact that people felt they were going to be somehow offending Muslims, and their reporting a potential threat might come across as Islamophobic.

“I thought ‘you're not doing a service to Muslims in this country if you think that'. Not talking about the threat of Islamist extremism is totally unacceptable. You're actually discriminating against Muslims because you're more concerned about political correctness and the fear of being labelled racist [than] actually helping Muslims”, Khan stated.

Prevent is set up to address threats from across society, she explained.

“There's … Islamist, Sikh, Hindu nationalism, there's all different types of extremism … You've got to deal with all of those types of problems, and only trying to focus on one at the expense of others is totally counterproductive. They didn't go out and explain to Muslim communities what Prevent is about. In essence, they left a vacuum”.

She accused some Muslim groups of making claims of Islamophobia to “use it as a cover for Islamic extremism”, trying to “silence dissent”. In effect, Khan said, this was sowing a “climate of censorship and fear”.

Dame Sara Khan’s appearance on the show came a day after the five-year anniversary of the London Bridge and Borough Market terror attack.

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Eight people were killed and 48 sustained injuries when Islamist terrorists on 3 June 2017 drove a van into pedestrians on London Bridge and then Borough Market. They proceeded to stab people in pubs and restaurants in the area until being shot dead by police.

Earlier, London’s mayor paid tribute to members of the emergency services who “ran towards danger”, as he marked the fifth anniversary of the London Bridge and Borough Market terror attack.

On Friday morning, ahead of the service at Southwark Cathedral, near the site of the attacks, Mayor of London Sadiq Khan said the capital’s residents will “always stand united in the face of terrorism”.

People observing a minute's silence in St Ann's Square, Manchester, England, in honor of the London Bridge terror attack victims, Tuesday June 6, 2017.

However, counter-terror expert Sir Ivor Roberts said it remained “unclear how much has been learned from this tragedy”.

“The 2017 London Bridge attack can be attributed, in significant part, to the failure of the intelligence community to monitor appropriately subjects of interest. The primary perpetrator of the attack, Khuram Shazad Butt, was known to both the police and MI5 from as early as 2015. At that time he was investigated, but the investigation was quickly ‘moved into the lower echelons’ and his file was classed as ‘low priority’”, he said in a statement on the anniversary.