Academics have no “right” to research terrorist materials and they risk being prosecuted for doing so, the vice-chancellor of the University of Nottingham has told his staff..

The article is raises a glaring contradiction between the police account in a letter to Rizwaan Sabir and the reported views of Sabir’s lecturers. The police claim in a letter to Sabir that (my emphasis):

“The university authorities have now made clear that possession of this material is not required for the purpose of your course of study nor do they consider it legitimate for you to possess it for research purposes.”

Yet the article says (again my emphasis):

Mr Sabir’s personal tutor Bettina Renz, a lecturer in international security, and his MA supervisor, Rod Thornton, a terrorism specialist and former soldier, have both said they told police that Mr Sabir’s possession of the document was legitimate given his research interests.

So, which is it?

A commentator at the Times Higher Education website notes that the other man arrested (but also never charged) alongside Sabir, Hischam Yezza, has received no help from the university despite studying and working there for over a decade.

One question not addressed by the article is whether Rizwaan Sabir would have been arrested had he been called, say, ‘Roger Simpson’. I honestly hope this is not interpreted as an attempt to keep Muslims away from pursuing degrees in similar fields (terrorism, international security, war and peace studies, etc).

Dr Farhan Nizami CBE, a key adviser on Islam to the Prince of Wales, accused British Muslims of failing to make sure their children learn to speak English or supporting them in their education [...] He said this leaves them alienated from mainstream society and exposed to being groomed by radical Islamic groups.

Underlining his distance from ‘everyday’ life, he adds:

“They need to make them aspire to things higher rather than just being self-employed and looking for small-jobs.”

My thoughts:
1. I am sure all those British Muslims who engage in terrorist activities, or get into the ‘jihadi’ underground, speak English as a first language. Developing a polyglot community should be encouraged (the worst aspect of Britain to ‘integrate’ into is becoming entirely monolingual).
2. What is wrong with being self-employed? Not everyone can get a well-paid job where you have to suck up to establishment figures all day.

I have no problem with people encouraging improvement in education, but these comments were awful.

Nizami’s reported comments also remind me of an arrogant article of the life of British Muslims by Muqtader Khan I once came across. Khan, who also praises Prince Charles’ official Muslim pet in this article, also decried the fact that too many Muslims were ‘only’ engaged in running small businesses and wouldn’t cross the street to enter Oxford University; after all getting into Oxford is merely a question of crossing the high street, isn’t it?

Stupid academics.