Five Palestine Action activists face being sentenced as terrorists for breaking home windows and throwing pink paint at a department of Barclays Bank in Lancashire.
Brendon O’Hagan, 28; Amanda Kelly, 31; Hmeera Atiqnisar, 31; Mohammed Malik, 28; and Alma Yaniv, 70, have been discovered responsible of inflicting £212,000 of damage throughout a direct motion protest in Burnley in August 2024. They focused the bank as a result of it held shares within the Israeli weapons agency Elbit Systems.
After final month’s verdicts the decide, Philip Parry, informed the prosecution and the defence he meant to think about a “terrorist connection” to the offending, regardless of neither the jury nor the defendants having beforehand been knowledgeable of the likelihood.
Four different Palestine Action activists final month grew to become the primary defendants convicted of property damage whose offending – throughout a raid on Elbit’s Filton manufacturing unit close to Bristol – was deemed by Mr Justice Johnson post-conviction to have a “terrorist connection”.
Parry hooked up Johnson’s judgment when asking attorneys for submissions on whether or not there was a terrorist connection within the Barclays case.
Malik mentioned: “The judge and the CPS [Crown Prosecution Service] are now seeking to sentence us as terrorists for red paint and a few splintered windows. This goes far beyond the charges before the court and raises serious concerns about the increasing use of counter-terrorism legislation to persecute political dissent.
“The attempt to now sentence us as terrorists demonstrates the extremely dangerous precedent set by Judge Johnson, who sentenced four Palestine Action protestors as terrorists for destroying Israeli quadcopter drones.”
The Palestine Action co-founder Huda Ammori mentioned it was an instance of “the floodgates flowing” from Johnson’s resolution.
The bank protest passed off earlier than Palestine Action was banned as a terrorist group and was not assessed by the house secretary nor officers to be a terrorism incident.
Responding to Parry, the CPS argued that the Barclays 5 needs to be sentenced as terrorists, regardless of prosecutors having not raised the likelihood earlier than or in the course of the trial.
The Guardian understands the CPS is arguing that the terrorist connection solely got here to mild from admissions made by the defendants at trial, together with referring to their affiliation to Palestine Action and that the protest was a part of a wider marketing campaign towards Barclays.
The director of the human rights organisation Liberty, Akiko Hart, mentioned the case additional highlighted “the deep flaws in the UK’s counter-terror laws which capture activity most people would never consider terrorism”.
The Labour MP and former shadow chancellor John McDonnell mentioned: “Trying direct-action protesters under criminal law but then sentencing them under terrorist legislation cannot be seen in any way as fair or just. It is a practice that seems to be specifically targeted to silence the voices of people speaking out against the genocide in Gaza.”
Similar offending by local weather activists has not been deemed to have a terrorist connection. For instance, seven Extinction Rebellion protesters have been given suspended sentences for inflicting greater than £100,000 of damage by breaking home windows at Barclays’ London headquarters in 2023.
In the Filton case, the activists acquired prolonged custodial sentences. They can even be topic to fifteen years of terrorist notification necessities on launch, which incorporates informing police of any new system, relationship, bank account or deal with. Amnesty International and Liberty have been amongst critics of the terrorist connection discovering, describing it as a misuse of counter-terrorism powers.
A terrorist sentencing additionally means defendants’ serve not less than two-thirds of their tariff in jail, for much longer than is the norm. To receive parole they have to rescind their political beliefs.
It was reported in October 2024 that Barclays had bought all its Elbit shares. The bank had beforehand mentioned it held them solely in relation to consumer pushed transactions, being neither an investor nor shareholder within the arms firm.
The sentencing within the Burnley case is scheduled for 4 September. The CPS and judiciary declined to remark.
