It turns out that a West Midlands police inquiry has found that officers made up the "evidence" against research student Rizwaan Sabir. Nottingham University hit the panic button when he had a friend photocopy an Al-Quaida document for his research (in ìnternational relations - the document is widely available on US government websites and can be bought in high street bookshops) and armed police went in. Rizwaan and his friend Hicham Yezza wound up having some very nasty experiences at the hands of the usual suspects.
The uni, for its part, had no intention of admitting that it had acted dimwittedly (and in ways completely counter to its stated goal of enabling students to research world politics). The attempt to save face led to the ousting of Dr Rod Thornton, who made the mistake of challenging uni management on the subject. Never let it be said that the emperor has no clothes... A full Guardian report here.
In completely unrelated news, the Garda Ombudsman "issued" a letter (the rest of us send them) on June 28th which went to at least some of those Maynooth staff who had been threatened with prosecution for supporting research student Jerrie Ann Sullivan over the recordings of Gardai discussing raping and deporting protestors at Rossport. "No further action will be taken", we are told. This is two months after they had told RTE that GSOC's role had finished - the wheels grind slowly over there. At that time, their spokesperson had backed off from the claims of criminal activity (directed at the student and her supporters, naturally) to the comment that Maynooth staff had done what they felt they had to do and GSOC had done the same.
Again, of course, "sorry" would be too simple a response for such an august body.
