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Join our picket every first Tuesday of the month! at Communications House Old Street

Seeking asylum – fleeing imperialism

No to deportations!

Defend asylum seekers and migrant workers!

Asylum seekers and migrant workers are organising in defence of their right to remain in Britain. Fight Racism! Fight Imperialism! supports this fight back. We understand that racism against immigrants in Britain is directly linked to Britain’s imperialist wars and plunder around the world.

The British Empire today

Britain is a wealthy country. It is spending £2.6 billion a year on the war in Afghanistan. British companies dominate and impoverish underdeveloped countries, making super-profits from plundering resources such as African oil and minerals or Asian textiles, and brutally exploiting the masses of workers all over the world. As well as stealing wealth from abroad, capitalists require cheap labour in this country and the British state therefore encourages the immigration of new workers into this country when it needs to do so.

Aliens, settlers, refugees, immigrants and asylum seekers

The history of Britain is the history of migration – a continual process of people moving into and out of this country. Over the centuries Romans, Vikings, Normans, Irish people, Africans, Jews, Italians, Chinese and Indian people, among others, have settled here and have contributed to forming the Britain of today.   At the same time, since the 17th century, 17 million people have left Britain to settle elsewhere in the world.

Wanted – cheap labour

In modern times the capitalists and ruling class have welcomed settlers because of the need for cheap labour, like the Caribbean and south Asian immigrants of the 1960s or the 300,000+ migrants from Eastern Europe who have come to Britain for work in the recent period, often at or below the minimum wage, in temporary jobs with no holiday or sick pay. Overseas labour has long been the backbone of the NHS, for example, where 50% of workers now come from abroad. Even when well paid, such workers are cheap, as Britain has not had to invest in their education or training.

Not wanted – victims of persecution

At the same time as encouraging the East European workforce into Britain, the British state has tightened controls on immigration from other countries. Since coming to power in 1997 the Labour government has introduced successive Immigration, Asylum and Nationality Acts, each more punishing than the last. These laws are institutionalised racism. They are designed to refuse entry to and deport asylum seekers from war zones like Iraq and Afghanistan, or Democratic Republic of Congo where British multi­nationals are violently plundering its gold, coltan, oil and other natural resources

Racism – divide and rule

Those who bear the brunt of imperialist domination, suffering starvation, unemployment, war crimes and brutal exploitation, are then met by further brutality from the British state when they seek asylum here. Asylum seekers are not allowed to work. Employers who take on workers without permits are fined; teachers and health workers are being encouraged to spy and report on pupils and patients. Dawn raids, detentions and deportations are tearing families apart. Britain has spent £81,525,765.97 on deporting people in the last four years. This is the price the government is prepared to pay to hide the human disaster resulting from its foreign policy of wars and occupations.

Making fools of us

Prime Minister Gordon Brown speaks of ‘British jobs for British workers’, while British banks, businesses and industries invest around the world, create jobs in other countries, close them down and move on. Their only interest is profit. The government and media play the patriot game to turn the anger of British workers who face cuts in jobs and services onto the immigrants and away from the bosses.

Join the fight back

Where there is repression there will be resistance and asylum seekers, migrant workers and their supporters are fighting back. Schoolchildren petition and protest against deportation threats to their friends, communities protest against dawn raids and low-paid immigrant workers are organising to defend their rights.

Fight Racism! Fight Imperialism! supporters around Britain are active in support of these struggles. In London we organise regular demonstrations outside Communications House Immigration Reporting Centre, where asylum seekers have to report monthly, weekly or more frequently, and from where they can be suddenly arrested and taken to detention centres. The racist state’s attack on asylum seekers in Britain cannot be separated from Britain’s imperialist wars and plunder throughout the world. Let us unite to increase and build resistance to these attacks. Fight racism! Fight imperialism!

Join the monthly protests at Communications House on the first Tuesday of every month 1-2pm

Outside the UK Immigration Service, Communications House

210 Old Street, London EC1V 9BR (nearest tube: Old Street)

Immigration reporting centres are places of fear for asylum seekers, who have to report to them monthly, weekly or even several times a week. From reporting centres asylum seekers are often detained without warning and sent to removal centres to await deportation.

Called by London FIGHT RACISM! FIGHT IMPERIALISM!

Fight Racism! Fight Imperialism!

BCM Box 5909, London WC1N 3XX (0207 837 1688 * This e-mail address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it