Hackney’s Kurdish residents protest against ‘harassment’ at hands of British security forces

Around 700 people sang, shouted slogans and waved placards

Hundreds of Kurdish protesters processed through the streets of Stoke Newington this weekend against police tactics used to target them.

Around 700 people sang, shouted slogans and waved placards as they marched from Dalston Junction along Stoke Newington High Street to the Kurdish Community Centre in Portland Gardens, Finsbury Park, on Sunday lunchtime (December 12).

They took to the streets against what they see as the criminalisation of their communities at the hands of British security forces.

Arzu Pesmen, managing committee member of the Kurdish Federation UK, which organised the march, said: “It was a message to the Home Office to reconsider their policy on ethnic groups.

“It was against the recent harassment of our members and it was basically against their criminalising of communities.

“They have been stopped and interrogated by police at home because of the Stop and Search policy and the Terrorism Act.”