24-hour Guard on Hate Cleric Anjem Choudary: Police 'Fury' Over Security Patrols
MAIL ONLINE: Hate preacher Anjem Choudary is being given round-the-clock police protection following his controversial threat to march through Wootton Basset, the Daily Mail can reveal.

Even though the extremist cleric has now called off plans to stage the protest, carrying empty coffins through the town where Britain honours its war dead, he still receives hourly security checks at his East London home.

Metropolitan police officers have been told to give his protection priority above other local policing jobs such as muggings, theft and foot patrols.

The protection was revealed after Home Secretary Alan Johnson yesterday banned Choudary's Islam4UK group, making it a criminal offence to be a member.

As Choudary held a press conference to react to the ban, patrol cars and unmarked vehicles were still instructed to drive past his empty £320,000 rented home - which is funded by council benefits.

Officers tasked with carrying out these patrols have privately expressed their fury at being diverted away from what they regard as 'proper policing'.

But the Metropolitan Police's counter-terrorism unit fears a far-Right group may be plotting an attack on the fanatic.

Their concerns intensified after a Facebook campaign against the march attracted the support of more than 250,000 Britons and led to threats against Choudary's life. >>> Emily Andrews, Rebecca Camber and Claire Ellicott | Tuesday, January 12, 2010

Ayaan Hirsi Ali Asks EU for Protection
BBC: Ayaan Hirsi Ali, the former Dutch MP and outspoken critic of Islam, has appealed to the EU to create a fund to help protect people in her position.

She told the European Parliament in Brussels her life was in greater danger because the Dutch government had stopped paying for her security.

"I don't want to die, I want to live and I love life," she said.

Ms Ali added that the cost of her bodyguards was beyond anything a private person could raise. Islam critic asks for protection >>>

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Les Pays-Bas irrités par l'accueil réservé à Ayaan Hirsi Ali au Parlement européen
Photo d’Ayaan Hirsi Ali grace au Monde
LE MONDE: L 'ancienne députée libérale néerlandaise d'origine somalienne Ayaan Hirsi Ali, exilée à Washington et menacée de mort par des groupes radicaux pour ses critiques de l'islam, devait être reçue, jeudi 14 février, au Parlement européen, à Bruxelles. Elle devait y rencontrer le président Hans-Gert Pöttering, avant de participer à un débat.

Mme Hirsi Ali avait été conviée par des socialistes français, dont Benoît Hamon, auteur d'une déclaration écrite sur la prise en charge par l'Union européenne de sa protection. Ce texte a été signé par près d'une centaine d'eurodéputés, émus par la décision des autorités néerlandaises qui, depuis octobre 2007, refusent d'assumer le coût de ses gardes du corps.

L'initiative parlementaire et la rencontre avec M. Pöttering ont mis de mauvaise humeur le gouvernement de La Haye, déjà agacé par le meeting de soutien à Ayaan Hirsi Ali organisé à Paris, dimanche 10 février. Au cours de celui-ci avait été évoqué l'idée de créer un fonds européen pour assurer sa protection, ainsi que son éventuelle naturalisation française. Les Pays-Bas irrités par l'accueil réservé à Ayaan Hirsi Ali au Parlement européen >>> de Bruxelles Correspondent

Mark Alexander (Paperback)
Mark Alexander (Hardback)

Ayaan Hirsi Ali Without Protection
Photo of Ayaan Hirsi Ali courtesy of the BBC
BBC: The Dutch government says it will no longer pay for bodyguards to protect Ayaan Hirsi Ali, the Somali-born former MP and outspoken critic of Islam.

Ms Hirsi Ali earlier this week returned to the Netherlands from the US, where she has been living for the past year.

The Dutch justice ministry said it could not justify paying for Ms Hirsi Ali's protection while she was abroad.

She continues to receive protection while in the Netherlands, where Islamic militants have threatened her life.

"When Ms Hirsi Ali is in the Netherlands, protection measures will be taken for her on the basis of recent threat evaluations," the Dutch Justice Minister, Ernst Hirsch Ballin told parliament in a letter.

Ms Hirsi Ali could no longer be regarded as a representative of the Netherlands after she resigned as an MP in 2006, Mr Hirsch Ballin said.

"In stepping down, Ms Hirsi Ali's status changed. Since this time she has no longer served in an official function for the Dutch state," he said.

Her current status did not warrant "any place for protection abroad", he added. Dutch withdraw security for ex-MP (more)

Mark Alexander

Ayaan Hirsi Ali ‘Forced’ to Return to the Netherlands because of the Cost of Protection from Islamists

Fear of fanatical Islamists prompted Ayaan Hirsi Ali to leave the Netherlands, her adopted home, and now she has been forced to return. Paying for her bodyguards in the United States is too expensive for the Dutch government -- what a disgrace.

There are exactly five people that the Dutch government has to protect against death threats from radical Islamists.

This sort of protection is expensive. Society bears the costs because freedom of opinion, a cornerstone of our culture, is on the line. The extremists, for their part, are prepared to risk their own lives to kill those under government protection.

The costs of protection are completely disproportionate to the outcome: the continued existence of our values and norms.

Ayaan Hirsi Ali is the sixth person granted protection by the Dutch government. She began receiving threats when, as a Dutch citizen and member of the parliament, she spoke out critically against political Islam. After the so-called "passport scandal," when the Dutch minister of immigration and integration threatened to confiscate her passport after Ayaan had been accused of lying about her name and birth date when she first arrived in the Netherlands, she moved to the United States, which precipitated a sharp upswing in her career within only a few months. She wrote a bestseller and landed a job at the American Enterprise Institute. But as a Dutch citizen, Ayaan does not qualify for protection in the United States under US laws and regulations.

Contrary to what many in the Netherlands believe about the success of her autobiography, she is not wealthy. She could not pay for the kind of protection she needs out of her own pocket -- no matter how much she would like to do so. Besides, the Dutch government apparently failed to find the right US officials with whom they could have reached an agreement. Under a decision by Justice Minister Ernst Hirsch Balin, the protection paid for by the Dutch government expired on Oct. 1. Ayaan returned to the Netherlands, because without protection she doesn't have a day left to live. 'We Are Making Fools of Ourselves in the Eyes of the World' (more) By Leon de Winter in Amsterdam

Mark Alexander