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Right-wing B.C. activist questioned under terrorism act, barred from U.K.

Lauren Southern said she was questioned for six hours
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Lauren Southern. (Instagram photo)

A Langley-based right-wing activist has been barred from entering the U.K. by British border forces in a northern port city in France.

In a statement to Black Press Media, the U.K. Home Office said that Lauren Southern was stopped from entering the country in Coquelles on March 12.

A spokesperson said that Southern’s “presence in the UK was not conducive to the public good.”

A letter from UK Border Forces to Southern said that she had applied to enter the U.K. for five days.

In an Instagram post, Southern, who identified as Pakistani to the Border Force, said that she was permanently banned from the U.K. “after being questioned and held under schedule 7 (the terrorism act) for six hours. I was found guilty of ‘racism’ lol (sic).”

The letter to Southern noted that she was a “threat to the fundamental interests of society and to the public policy of the United Kingdom, “based on her distributing “racist materials” in Luton on Feb. 24.

In an interview with British political activist, and founder of the far-right, English Defence League Tommy Robinson, Southern said she has been stuck in Callais since Monday.

Southern told Robinson that because she was scheduled under the Terrorism Act, she lost her right to remain silent.

“They asked… if I was a Christian extremist,” she said.

Southern said she was asked how she would feel if “[drove] a car or a truck into a group of people, of Muslims.”

When she responded with a denial and incredulous laughter, Southern said the questioners told her that Britain had a problem with “right-wing terrorism.”

“I’m pretty sure I’ve never committed terrorism or wanted to commit terrorism in my life,” Southern told Robinson.

“You have no rights.”

Southern, who ran as a Libertarian candidate in Langley in the 2015 federal election, has a long history of falling afoul of border forces for her views.

She was detained by the Italian Coast Guard for trying to block a ship that rescues stranded refugees on May 12, 2017.

Southern, a former writer for the far-right online outlet The Rebel, grew up in Langley and Surrey before attending the University of the Fraser Valley.

She proved too controversial for the Libertarians for awhile before being re-instated as a candidate with support from The Rebel and U.S.-based news outlet Breitbart.


@katslepian

katya.slepian@bpdigital.ca

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