Race crime figures in Britain pre-7/7 London blasts do not paint a rosy picture. A report put forward by the Crown Prosecution Service on Friday said a record of 4,660 defendants were prosecuted for racially-aggravated offences between March 2004 and March 2005 - up from 3,616 the previous year.
Cases were dropped against a further 1,128 people accused of race crimes, many because witnesses refused to testify or failed to turn up in court. The number of religiously-aggravated cases, however, dropped to 34 from 49 the year before.
However, in every two of three cases, the victim was a Muslim. Out of the 34 cases, the 'actual or perceived' religion of the victim was a Muslim in 23 cases, Christian in four, Hindu in two and Mormon in one. In four cases the religion was unknown, according to the report.
Leaders of Britain's Asian and black communities said the new figures were a source of grave concern. Dr Ghayasuddin Siddiqui, the leader of the Muslim Parliament of Great Britain, claims the figure shows that Britain's 'war on terror' had made British Muslims a target for racists.
"I think that a whole community (Muslims) has been identified as the enemy and this is the reason why people think it is a fifth-column community and the cause of this country's miseries. Now they want to settle scores by making us scapegoats," he says.
Sir Iqbal Sacranie, head of the Muslim Council of Britain, called the figures 'troubling' and said, "What is of added concern is that these figures are before 7 July. After the bomb attacks in London we saw a spate of racist incidents. What will the figures be next year?"
The report shows that the number of racist incidents passed to prosecutors by police rose 22 percent to 5,788 year-on-year.
Raj Joshi, vice-chairman of the Society of Black Lawyers, said, "The figures prove that there is a lot of talk of policy initiatives and about sympathy but there is little comfort for the black and minority ethnic community."
