Thursday, September 28, 2006

BAA quiz researcher of Indian origin on Middle East allegiance

A PhD researcher claims he was grilled about his affiliation in the Palestine Israel conflict by a British Airport Authority (BAA) employee as he returned from a month long research in Jerusalem. Samuel J Kuruvilla was stopped and asked about his political views at Gatwick airport on August 21.
Kuruvilla, researcher at the School Of Politics, at the University of Exeter, says he had just come to “the end of a very tiring day of travel from Tel Aviv after a wait of 8 hours in Budapest on transit” when he was targeted at a non-European arrivals queue.
Kuruvilla, of Indian origin, told The Muslim News, “I could see that the people standing behind the regular passport controllers had identified me as the only South Asian figure in a sea of black and a few white faces.”
He added, “I was standing in a line in front of passport control when I was profiled and picked by a group of immigration officers I presume, standing behind the regular passport controllers.”
Explaining his ordeal Kuruvilla said, “As soon as the passport controller cleared me after asking a few questions which I answered and as soon as he had scanned my passport, my passport was taken by one of these men who returned after 15 minutes who then proceeded to rudely question me. He proceeded to ask me the silliest questions dealing with my work and purpose of travel to Israel. He asked why I was travelling transit via Budapest airline and told me whether I was aware that the Israeli stamp on my passport meant I couldn’t travel to some countries in the Middle East.”
28/09/06 Elham Asaad Buaras/The Muslim News, UK
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