Aamer Anwar | |
---|---|
Personal details | |
Born | Manchester, England | 30 December 1967
Political party | Scottish National Party (since 2015) |
Other political affiliations | Independent (until 2015) |
Children | 1 son, 2 daughters [1] |
Alma mater | University of Glasgow University of Strathclyde University of Liverpool |
Occupation | Lawyer |
Aamer Anwar (born 30 December 1967) is a British political activist [2] and lawyer of Pakistani origin. He was an active participant in the Stop the War Coalition, and campaigned against the 31st G8 summit at Gleneagles. [3] [4] He has been a longstanding critic of the Dungavel Detention Centre for failed asylum seekers, [5] and is a trustee of the Time for Inclusive Education charity for LGBT-inclusive education in Scottish schools. [6]
Anwar was born in Manchester, England to Pakistani parents on 30 December 1967 and lived in Liverpool before moving to Glasgow, Scotland, in 1986 to study mechanical engineering at the University of Glasgow to join the Royal Air Force. [7] [1] He became a student activist and led a campaign against alleged racism at the city's Dental Hospital, which helped introduce anonymous marking across all faculties at the university. [8]
He left engineering to study sociology and politics and was still a student when he was arrested by police officers for illegally flyposting on Ashton Lane in 1991. During Anwar's arrest, he was pushed to the ground, and he took civil action against Strathclyde Police. In 1995, Sheriff Evans found that one officer had assaulted Anwar and that it appeared to be a racially motivated attack. Anwar was awarded £4,200 in compensation and the policeman was temporarily suspended. Anwar, however, found himself criticised by the ruling sheriff in regards to the release of "bloated confrontational material" surrounding the case, with the sheriff stating that the allegations of racism did not influence his findings. [9] He became a solicitor in 2000, initially as part of a Glasgow-based partnership, before founding Aamer Anwar & Co, Solicitors & Notaries in 2006. [10] He has a teenage son and two daughters. [1]
Anwar came to prominence campaigning on behalf of the family of Surjit Singh Chhokar, a waiter who was murdered in November 1998 in Overtown, North Lanarkshire, Scotland. The case had some parallels to the murder of Stephen Lawrence in England, which led to a radical overhaul of the criminal justice system and several inquiries. The inquiries were boycotted by the Chhokar family as they were not public, and were considered by the family to be a "whitewash". The Jandoo Inquiry, which the family boycotted and refused to give evidence to, heavily criticised Anwar and said he took on too many roles and also took liberties in interpreting for the family. [11] In the latter case, Anwar led the campaign on behalf of the Chhokar family. He also served on the Stephen Lawrence Steering Group, set up in 2000. [12] [13]
In 2012, following the reform of the double jeopardy law, he approached the Lord Advocate on behalf of the Chhokar family to request that the case be reopened and reinvestigated. On 2 May 2014, Anwar and the Chhokar family met with the Lord Advocate, who confirmed that the following reinvestigation by Police Scotland the Crown was seeking to have the original acquittals of three men set aside in an application to the Appeal Court for a retrial over the murder of Chhokar. [14]
In October 2016, Ronnie Coulter was found guilty of the murder of Chhokar. [15] Following the conviction, Police Scotland and the Lord Advocate acknowledged the role of campaigning by the Chhokar family and Anwar. [16]
Following the sentencing of Ronnie Coulter to a life sentence, a Crown Office spokesman said:
The sentencing today for the murder of Surjit Singh Chhokar has finally delivered justice for the Chhokar family. The family has shown great courage and dignity throughout their long wait to see if someone is jailed for his killing. The family along with Aamer Anwar, campaigned tirelessly for improvements in the way allegations of racial crimes were dealt with and the justice system has transformed how it deals with racial crimes as a result. [17]
In 2004 Anwar was the solicitor for "TC" Campbell and successfully appealed to have Campbell's murder conviction overturned. Campbell had spent 20 years in jail for the arson and murder of a family, an incident that had been part of the Glasgow Ice Cream Wars. [18]
In 2010 Anwar acted as solicitor for Tommy Sheridan in HM Advocate v Sheridan and Sheridan. Sheridan sacked Anwar after a dispute between the two men over Anwar's refusal to stop writing a column for a newspaper owned by Rupert Murdoch. [19]
In July 2011, Anwar presented a dossier along with Tom Watson to Strathclyde Police into alleged criminality at the News of the World , allegations of phone hacking and data breaches, and police corruption as part of the wider News International phone hacking scandal. The dossier led to a full-scale police inquiry by Strathclyde Police termed Operation Rubicon and the subsequent arrest of Andy Coulson and Bob Bird, Scottish editor of News of the World. [20]
On 2 October 2012, Anwar gave evidence to the Scottish Parliament's Justice Committee arguing against allowing cameras in criminal trials. [21] On 5 June 2014, it was announced that Anwar had lodged an appeal on behalf of the family of Abdelbaset Al-Megrahi, who was convicted of the bombing of Pan Am flight 103 in 1988 over Lockerbie. Al-Megrahi died from cancer following his compassionate release from prison while an application was being lodged with the Scottish Criminal Cases Review Commission, who sought to review his case and return it to the appeal court as a "miscarriage of justice". Anwar was also instructed by 24 British relatives of passengers who died on the flight, including Jim Swire. [22]
In September 2014, Anwar represented the family of Jihadi bride Aqsa Mahmood, a 20-year-old woman from Glasgow who travelled to Syria to join the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant. [23] In 2017 he was instructed by the family of Sheku Bayoh. The family met the Lord Advocate, believing that PIRC's investigation had been fundamentally flawed. [24]
In February 2017, Anwar represented the family of murder victim Emma Caldwell. [25] He also represented two Scottish National Party MPs: Michelle Thomson [26] and Natalie McGarry. [27]
In 2021, Anwar represented Rangers F.C. player Glen Kamara, who claimed that he suffered from racial abuse by Slavia Prague player Ondrej Kudela in a Europa League Last-16 2nd leg game at Ibrox Stadium in March 2021. [1] He was subjected to an increase in abuse and death threats following Kudela's ten-match ban. [28]
In 2008, Anwar was runner-up in the election for Rector of the University of Glasgow and lost to Charles Kennedy. [29] Edward Snowden [30] followed Kennedy for a three-year term of office which finished in 2017, when Anwar was re-nominated for the role. [31] On 21 March he was announced as having been elected by the students with over 54% of the vote (4,458). All the candidates were eliminated in the first round due to the "landslide" result in Anwar's favour. [32] He took office on 31 March 2017 [33] and was installed at a ceremony on 19 April 2017. [34] The Times Scottish edition reported in June 2018 that Anwar had failed to hold a single surgery for the first 11 months of his rectorship, which was supported by Glasgow University. [35]
Anwar has been criticised for publicly accusing the university of showing "callous disregard" for students and staff, treating international students as "cash cows" and claiming to have uncovered serious cases of racism and sexual harassment. However, officials at the university insisted that when they asked for specific details so they could launch investigations, none were provided. [35] A report issued in 2021 detailed hundreds of incidents of racial abuse at the university. [36]
Anwar made controversial statements in the aftermath of the 2007 Glasgow International Airport attack, in which he claimed "[t]hat there is no difference between a stealth bomber and a suicide bomber, the effects are still the same." In further remarks, he argued that there was a moral equivalence between the 9/11 hijackers and the United States when they bomb innocent civilians. [37]
On 9 January 2008, Sheriff Charlotte Coutts described Anwar's evidence as "not credible" during a trial in which he claimed to be the victim of racial abuse. [38] In 2008, he faced allegations of contempt of court in light of a complaint by the presiding judge in the case, Colin Sutherland, after Anwar directly attacked the jury following the trial and conviction of Mohammed Siddique in the High Court of Justiciary. Sutherland accused Anwar of making unprofessional, defamatory, and factually inaccurate attacks on the judiciary, the jury, and the wider legal process, stating that Anwar was "hiding behind the cloak of his client" to make politically motivated attacks on anti-terrorism legislation. [39] Anwar was the first lawyer in the UK to be put on trial for contempt of court for comments he made on behalf of his client at the end of a trial. Iain Banks joined Labour politician Tony Benn, George Galloway, Bashir Maan, Gareth Peirce, and others to argue that such a prosecution was detrimental to free speech. [40]
While finding Anwar's comments to be "misleading", Kenneth Osborne did not find him in contempt of court, but strongly criticised Anwar's behaviour, stating that statements from the lawyer were politically motivated and largely consisted of "angry and petulant criticism". [41]
Following a full investigation by Law Scotland, Anwar was cleared of all charges of misconduct. In January 2010, he was successful in having one of Siddique's convictions overturned at the Court of Appeal; as a result Siddique was freed from prison but remains a convicted terrorist. [42]
Anwar was named Solicitor of the Year in the Herald's Law Awards of Scotland 2018. He was also named "Lawyer of the Year" at the fourteenth Scottish Legal Awards in March 2017, [43] [44] and "Solicitor of the Year" in the Herald's Law Awards of Scotland in November 2016. [45] His firm picked up "Criminal Law Firm of the Year" at the Law Awards of Scotland in 2006 and 2014. [46] [47] [48]
At the Lloyds TSB Jewel Awards in 2007, he received the Professional Excellence Award as a "recognition of his outstanding achievements and the huge impact his work has had UK wide". [49] In December 2007 the law magazine The Firm placed him ninth in a feature of top 100 most powerful and influential people in the Scottish justice system and legal profession. [50] In January 2013, he was nominated for the Services to Law award at the British Muslim Awards. [51] In 2014 he was awarded the Scottish Muslim Award—Al Adl Ihsan for Public Services. [52]
The University of Glasgow is a public research university in Glasgow, Scotland. Founded by papal bull in 1451 [O.S. 1450], it is the fourth-oldest university in the English-speaking world and one of Scotland's four ancient universities. Along with the universities of St Andrews, Aberdeen, and Edinburgh, the university was part of the Scottish Enlightenment during the 18th century. Glasgow is the largest university in Scotland by total enrolment and, with over 15,900 postgraduates, the fifth-largest in the United Kingdom by postgraduate enrolment.
Thomas Sheridan is a Scottish politician who served as convenor of Solidarity from 2019 to 2021. He previously served as convenor of the Scottish Socialist Party (SSP) from 1998 to 2004 and as co-convenor of Solidarity from 2006 to 2016. He was a Member of the Scottish Parliament (MSP) for the Glasgow region from 1999 to 2007.
Robert Gordon Wilson was a Scottish politician and solicitor. He was the leader of the Scottish National Party (SNP) from 1979 to 1990, and was SNP Member of Parliament (MP) for Dundee East from 1974 to 1987. He was Rector of the University of Dundee from 1983 to 1986.
Lady Elish Frances Angiolini is a Scottish lawyer who is a Pro Vice Chancellor of the University of Oxford and has served as the Principal of St Hugh's College, Oxford since 2012; she is a candidate in the 2024 University of Oxford Chancellor election. In June 2023, she was appointed to the office of Lord Clerk Register by King Charles III, the first woman to hold the role since its creation in the 13th century.
Donald Russell Findlay KC is a Scottish advocate. He has also held positions as a vice-chairman of Rangers Football Club and twice Rector of the University of St Andrews. He is now chairman of his hometown football club Cowdenbeath.
John Beckett, Lord Beckett is a Scottish lawyer who was appointed in 2016 as a Senator of the College of Justice, a judge of the Court of Session.
The ice cream wars were turf wars in the East End of Glasgow, Scotland, in the 1980s between rival criminal organisations selling drugs and stolen goods from ice cream vans. Van operators were involved in frequent violence and intimidation tactics, the most notable example of which involved a driver and his family who were killed in an arson attack that resulted in a twenty-year court battle. The conflicts generated widespread public outrage, and earned the Strathclyde Police the nickname of "Serious Chimes Squad" for its perceived failure to address them.
Strathclyde Law School was established in 1964 and operates within the Faculty of Humanities & Social Sciences at the University of Strathclyde, in Glasgow, Scotland.
Francis Mulholland, Lord Mulholland, is a Scottish judge who has been a Senator of the College of Justice since 2016. He previously served from 2011 to 2016 as Lord Advocate, one of the Great Officers of State of Scotland and the country's chief Law Officer, and as Solicitor General, the junior Law Officer.
Osama Saeed is a Scottish communications professional and politician. Formerly he was Head of Media and Public Relations at Al Jazeera Media Network, and was a parliamentary candidate for the Scottish National Party in Glasgow Central in 2010. He is of Pakistani descent.
John Herbert McCluskey, Baron McCluskey was a Scottish lawyer, judge and politician, who served as Solicitor General for Scotland, the country's junior Law Officer from 1974 to 1979, and as a Senator of the College of Justice, a judge of Scotland's Supreme Courts, from 1984 to 2004. He was also member of the House of Lords from 1976 until his retirement in 2017.
Paul McBride QC was a Scottish criminal lawyer based in Edinburgh. He was a board member of the Scottish Legal Aid Board, and a former vice chairman of the Faculty of Advocates Criminal Bar Association. He died suddenly on a trip to Pakistan.
Her Majesty's Advocate v Thomas Sheridan and Gail Sheridan was the 2010 criminal prosecution of Tommy Sheridan, a former Member of the Scottish Parliament and his wife Gail Sheridan for perjury in relation to an earlier civil case called Sheridan v News Group Newspapers. Tommy Sheridan was found guilty and sentenced to three years in prison, whereas Gail was acquitted.
Alex Prentice KC is a leading Scottish lawyer.
Natalie McGarry is a Scottish former politician who served as the Member of Parliament (MP) for Glasgow East from 2015 to 2017. She was elected as a Scottish National Party (SNP) candidate in the 2015 general election but resigned the SNP whip after six months and sat as an independent until the end of the parliamentary session in May 2017.
Tasmina Ahmed-Sheikh OBE WS NP is a Scottish politician, serving as chair of the Alba Party since 2021. She was also the Member of Parliament (MP) for Ochil and South Perthshire from 2015 to 2017. A former member of the Scottish Conservatives, Labour, and the Scottish National Party (SNP), Ahmed-Sheikh served as the SNP's Trade and Investment spokesperson, Deputy Shadow Leader of the House in the House of Commons, and the SNP's National Women's and Equalities Convener. A solicitor and businessperson, and a former actress, Ahmed-Sheikh founded and formerly chaired the Scottish Asian Women's Association.
Rita Rae, Lady Rae is a Scottish lawyer, judge and a former Senator of the College of Justice.
Jelina Rahman-Berlow is a British solicitor whose practice J R Rahman Solicitors specialises in human rights, asylum, family and immigration legal advice and assistance.
The murder of Surjit Singh Chhokar occurred in November 1998 in Overtown, North Lanarkshire, Scotland. Two prosecutions – in 1999 and in 2000 – were unsuccessful. Two inquiries were held that reported in 2001. Eighteen years after the crime, in October 2016, a conviction was made. This was only the second time in Scottish legal history that a person was tried twice for the same crime. This controversial case raised a number of complicated legal issues, including the double jeopardy rule, as well as institutional racism on the part of investigating police and prosecutors.