Racist author is "sorry" and says nobody complained when it was...

Racist author is "sorry" and says nobody complained when it was originally published last April.

(maybe the Arabophobia has died down a tad since then)


Kilroy-Silk sorry for Arab article as BBC shelves his show

Brian Whitaker
Saturday January 10, 2004
The Guardian

The talk show host Robert Kilroy-Silk publicly apologised for the first time yesterday for offensive remarks about Arabs he aired in a newspaper column which have forced the BBC to suspend his programme and prompted a referral to the police by the race and equality watchdog.

The column, headlined We owe Arabs nothing, carried in the Sunday Express of January 4, has caused outrage. It had originally been run, albeit with different editing, last year by the newspaper.

In a statement last night, Kilroy-Silk said he "deeply regretted" the article's re-publication, but stood by the original. He added: "When the article was originally published last year, it caused no comment or outcry and, I was told at the time, generated only a couple of letters to the paper. "I would never have wished it to be re-published in this manner and it is not what I would have said today."

He went on: "It was originally written as a response to the views of opponents to the war in Iraq, that Arab states 'loathe' the west, and my piece referred to 'Arab states' rather than 'Arabs'.

"Out of that context, it has obviously caused great distress and offence, and I can only reiterate that I very deeply regret that."

Nevertheless, the BBC took Kilroy off the air with immediate effect pending an investigation."The BBC strongly dissociates itself from the views expressed in an article by Robert Kilroy-Silk in the Sunday Express of January 4. We stress that these comments do not reflect the views of the BBC," it said in a statement. BBC1's Breakfast show will fill the gap in programming.

The Kilroy-Silk article branded Arabs as "suicide bombers, limb amputators, women repressors" and said they contributed nothing useful to the world. The decision to suspend his programme came hours after the Labour MP for Birmingham Selly Oak, Lynne Jones, tabled a Commons motion condemning Kilroy-Silk's "racist comments" and called on the BBC to consider his position within the corporation.

"It was a disgusting article that incites hatred and lumps all Arabs together," she said.

The Commission for Racial Equality referred the article to the police under the Public Order Act.

BBC guidelines say that freelance writing by staff "should not bring the BBC into disrepute or undermine the integrity or impartiality of BBC programmes or presenters".

Arab ambassadors in Britain intend to discuss the issue at a meeting next week, and the Arab League's representative in London, Ali Muhsen Hamid, sent a protest letter to the BBC.

"The BBC has a huge influence in the Arab world and a wide audience," Mr Hamid said. "We welcome the suspension as a temporary measure while they investigate."

The Muslim Council of Britain, one of the first groups to complain about the article, also welcomed the BBC's move. The council's secretary-general, Iqbal Sacranie, said: "Britain's Muslim and Arab communities, indeed all right-thinking people in this country, will be relieved to see that the BBC is treating this matter in a prompt and serious way.

"Mr Kilroy-Silk's evident delight in inciting hatred against Arabs and Muslims meant that British Muslim and Arab communities were feeling increasingly uncomfortable participating in his chat shows. We hope that the Sunday Express will also now follow suit and scrap Kilroy's weekly column, which has regrettably become a platform for furthering bigotry and Islamophobia."

The Sunday Express has published the offending article twice under different headlines - on January 4 this year and April 6 last year.

The newspaper accused the BBC of "grossly overreacting" and called on the corporation to reinstate the presenter immediately.

"The article was not a racist article and it was a rewrite of a previous article that appeared in April without complaint."

A spokeswoman for the newspaper yesterday refused to discuss the reason for the repeat publication. The paper added: "It was legalled by lawyers and there is absolutely no case to answer. The Sunday Express believes that the BBC is gagging free speech and is absolutely appalled."