RIOTS IN LONDON: U.K. police upset over U.S. 'supercop' consultant

Several U.K. police organizations have rapped Prime Minister David Cameron for turning to a U.S. law enforcement expert to help tackle gang violence in Britain in the wake of recent riots in urban centres.

Former New York city police commissioner Bill Bratton was confirmed Friday as the government's anti-gang expert, offering his services for free and saying the British government cannot "arrest their way out" of systemic problems facing the country.

His hiring has upset the U.K. police. The Metropolitan Police Federation, which represents abut 30,000 London officers, said on Saturday U.S.- style policing was "inappropriate" to apply to Britain.

British officers "police by consent" whereas American cops "police by force," federation spokesman Paul Deller said.

The chair of the Greater Manchester Police Force, Ian Hanson, said police officers in the U.K. had been "given a slap in the face by the prime minister."

Hanson said better policing required more funding and that there just weren't enough officers on the ground during the riots.

Hanson went on to criticize plans to reduce the national police budget by 20 per cent during the next four years, with the loss of about 16,000 officers.

Bratton told the CBC on Saturday that it's better to have measures in place to get ahead of the violence, rather than just react to it.

He said he'll be talking to British officials about applying what he's learned in the United States from his his work in battling gang violence in Los Angeles, New York and Boston.

"I'll be over there several times to participate in discussions, specifically around the issue of gangs and gang violence and what the American experience has been, how we turned the corner here and specifically in Los Angeles, where I was chief of police for seven years."

"And it is the idea that you cannot arrest your way out of this problem. You have to have intervention activities, a broad-based approach," he said.

For six days in the Spring of 1992, Los Angeles was a battleground as demonstrations over the police beating of Rodney King spun out of control. In the aftermath, the city brought in Bratton to help clean up the mess.

Bratton said he believes British police need to focus on quelling racial tensions by collaborating more with community leaders and civil rights groups.

"Part of the issue going forward is how to make policing more attractive to a changing population," he told The Associated Press. "Los Angeles and New York have benefited from police forces that "reflect the ethnic makeup of the cities."

"Almost everything that was done in L.A. successfully can be applied in Britain," Bratton told the CBC. "When I left L.A. in 2009, almost 70 per cent of the city's Latino population were rating police performance as good or very good. Two years later, it's understood if there was a poll today, the ratings would be higher."

When Bratton stepped in as Boston's police commissioner in 1991, one of the steps he took to curb street violence was to deliver a list of about 400 of the city's gang and drug kingpins to Mayor Raymond Flynn.

Flynn said Bratton wanted direct indictments for as many as possible, sweeping some of the city's most violent criminals off the street for up to a decade.

"That's what he was good at; he was able to get those ringleaders off the streets," Flynn said.

Bratton, 63, said British police are doing an "extraordinary job" in rounding up suspects and investigating them, in part because they're using the same social media technology as some of the rioters, who boasted about committing crimes on Facebook and Twitter.

"That's the message that needs to be sent to them. You commit these crimes, we're going to film you, track you and get you," he said.

Police have faced a lot of criticism over how they handled nearly a week of rioting and looting, coming under fire for not responding strongly enough to the initial disorder.

Cameron said there were "far too few police were deployed onto the streets, and the tactics they were using weren't working." On Saturday, Bratton agreed that police were "stretched very thin."

In a BBC interview Saturday, British Finance Minister George Osborne said police did an "amazing job," but could learn to be more effective.

"We want to use the advice of people like Bill Bratton to really tackle some of the deep-seated social issues like gang culture in our community," Osborne said.

"But this is not just about police budgets. This is about a far bigger challenge, which is dealing with people who have been ignored for too long," he added.

Bratton said while there are "undoubtedly social issues" to be looked at following the riots, and the "underlying causes and resentment and anger," he stressed that "the first order of business" is public safety.

The nightly street violence that started a week ago is being blamed for five deaths. Rioting began in north London's Tottenham neighbourhood after a largely peaceful protest over the police shooting death of a local man, Mark Duggan.

Riots and looting then spread across London and other cities.

With thousand of police officers on patrol, Friday night was relatively quiet on British streets, despite fears that drinking at the end of the work week might lead to more violence.

...

The Iranian women's soccer team was in tears after being forced to forfeit a 2012 London Olympics qualifying match this past weekend because it showed up to play in hijabs. FIFA banned the Islamic head scarf in 2007, saying that it could cause choking injuries -- the same reason it gave for recently banning snoods (neck warmers). FIFA also has strict rules against any religious statements in team uniforms.


Since Iran refused to comply with these rules and didn't use the specially designed caps that its 2010 Youth Olympics team wore, Friday's match was abandoned by officials and a 3-0 win was awarded to Jordan as a result. The Football Federation of Iran said it will complain to FIFA about the ruling, but FIFA says assurances were made beforehand so that this situation would've been avoided.

"Despite initial assurances that the Iranian delegation understood this, the players came out wearing the hijab, and the head and neck totally covered, which was an infringement of the laws of the game," FIFA said in a statement. [...]

Jordan team officials also objected to the hijab rule before the game, but prepared to play by declining to select women who objected on religious grounds.

"The Iranian team and three Jordanian players were also banned from playing because they wore the traditional head cover," Rana Husseini, head of Jordan's women's football committee, told The Associated Press.

"The problem is that the head cover assigned and approved by FIFA for women players to wear does not suit them as it reveals part of the neck and this is not allowed and it is not acceptable," she said.

Iran also forfeited a second group match against Vietnam on Sunday, seriously damaging its chances of advancing to the London Olympics. It seems unlikely that its federation's complaints will help its case, though, since these rules are not new and compromises have been made in the past. It's just a shame these women were put in the middle of this debate between Iran's federation and FIFA and set up for disappointment.

Iran's women's soccer team may be sitting out the 2010 Youth Olympics in Singapore next month because of a dispute over their Islamic uniforms. The young athletes, all under 15, are at the center of a struggle over how to follow Iran's dress code and still compete in the international arena.


Last week the government unveiled the team's new outfits, a modest ensemble of pants, long sleeves, and high knee socks, with a cap that covers their hair. The outfits are designed in red, white and green to match the Iranian flag.

The top female official of Iran's physical education department was apparently offended by the uniforms, saying they were "inappropriate" and that the team would not compete in them. The uniforms had been a compromise; in 2007 FIFA, the organizing body of world soccer, had banned the old uniform because it included the hejab, or Islamic head scarf. The hejab violated FIFA safety regulations and a rule barring religious or political symbols on the field, Reuters reports.

Since the Islamic Revolution in 1979, Iranian women have been required to cover their heads and bodies in public. Fatima Adbollahian, an Iranian filmmaker who made a documentary about the country's female athletes, says women were kept out of athletic competition in the 1980s. As the playing field opened up to women in the 1990s, they joined sports that could accommodate the hejab, like archery and martial arts.

Within those limits, they excelled; in 2008 ABC News profiled Iran's first woman to earn a spot in the Olympics, Taekwondo champion Sara Khoshjamal.


"If there's one thing I love to do...it's sport," said Sonya Shahamati of the Iranian Baseball League. Baseball is a relatively new arrival in the Islamic Republic, and women have taken to running bases in baggy shirts and head scarves.

"On one hand, maybe it's difficult," she told ABC News in 2007, wearing a hejab under her baseball cap. "But in Iran we have to, and we don't have any problem."

But even in the sports they can play in public, Abdollahian, the filmmaker, says that women athletes face stiff challenges.

Iran's Women Athletes Fight for Equality

"They have to still fight for equality -- funding, infrastructure for them is not the same as for male athletes. And of course they also have to deal with certain social tension," she told ABC News.

"The classic role of women in Iran is still the wife, the daughter, the mother. To be a professional athlete in Iran means to pay a much higher price…that takes a lot more energy than it does for male professional athletes."

Still, she says, the past ten years have given women much more opportunity in sports. As for the controversy over women's soccer uniforms, she attributes it to a conservative government growing increasingly strict about Islamic dress.

"Sports have become a very, very important tool of [women's] self-expression…getting rid of extra energy they might not be able to lose or express when they are only bound to work and the private household," she said.

"This is something the government would not be allowed to take from them anymore. It's amazing…it's irreversible."

Iran president says headscarf ban in soccer imposed by 'dictators' FIFA

TEHRAN, Iran - Iran President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad described FIFA as "colonialists" on Tuesday for a headscarf ban in football that affect its women's team.


Mustafa Musleh Zadeh, Iran's ambassador to Jordan, went further by saying the ban was "inhumane" and "politically motivated."


The remarks by Ahmadinejad were the highest since the team forfeited a 2012 Olympic qualifier against Jordan last Friday because it wouldn't play without the hijabs.


"These are the dictators and colonialists who want to impose their lifestyle on others," Ahmadinejad said in a seasonal news conference.


The Iran president said he'd assigned Ali Saeedlu, the head of Iran's physical education, to pursue the case.


"We will deal with those who carried out this ugly job," said Ahmadinejad. "We follow definite rights of our girls."


Zadeh said Iran would complain to the Asian Football Federation.


FIFA said the ban on the Islamic scarf covering a women's neck was for safety reasons.


The ambassador called FIFA's ban "extremism," similar to Afghanistan's Taliban restrictions on women in sports.


FIFA banned the hijab in 2007 and has extended the safety rule to include neck warmers.


At the 2010 Youth Olympics, Iran's girls protected their modesty by covering their hair with specially designed caps.


FIFA rejects complaint over Islamic scarf ban






GENEVA - Iran's women's team was correctly prevented from playing a 2012 Olympics qualifier wearing Islamic head scarves, FIFA said Monday.


Iranian officials were "informed thoroughly" before Friday's match against Jordan that the hijab scarf is banned for safety reasons, soccer's governing body said.


"Despite initial assurances that the Iranian delegation understood this, the players came out wearing the hijab, and the head and neck totally covered, which was an infringement of the laws of the game," FIFA said in a statement.


FIFA banned the hijab in 2007 and this year extended the safety rule to include neck warmers, which were also judged a threat to cause a choking injury. Soccer's rules also prohibit religious statements in team uniforms.


Iran's soccer association has said it will complain about the FIFA delegate from Bahrain who ordered the match abandoned, and the decision to award Jordan a 3-0 victory.

"I will file a complaint to FIFA against the individual in charge of holding the match," Ali Kaffashian, the Iranian Football Federation president, said Saturday in comments reported by the Fars news agency.

Jordan team officials also objected to the hijab rule before the game, but prepared to play by declining to select women who objected on religious grounds.

"The Iranian team and three Jordanian players were also banned from playing because they wore the traditional head cover," Rana Husseini, head of Jordan's women's soccer committee, told The Associated Press.

"The problem is that the head cover assigned and approved by FIFA for women players to wear does not suit them as it reveals part of the neck and this is not allowed and it is not acceptable," she said.

FIFA addressed the problem at the 2010 Youth Olympics when Iran's girls protected their modesty by covering their hair with specially designed caps.

Husseini said Jordan's Prince Ali, who joined FIFA's executive committee last week, would seek talks to resolve the issue.

Iran also forfeited its match against Vietnam on Sunday as part of a round-robin group playing in Amman, Jordan, which also includes Thailand and Uzbekistan.

The winner enters a final group with Asia's five highest-ranked teams to decide which two countries advance to the London Games

British PM says FIFA at ‘all-time low’

LONDON - British Prime Minister David Cameron says FIFA's reputation is at an "all-time low" and needs to be more accountable as it tackles the worst crisis in its 107-year history.


Cameron told the House of Commons on Wednesday that it was "something of a farce" that Sepp Blatter was re-elected as president unopposed last week.

Blatter's only challenger, Mohamed bin Hammam, was suspended three days before the election along with fellow FIFA executive committee member Jack Warner on campaign bribery charges.

Cameron says "FIFA's reputation is now at an all-time low and obviously the election with just one candidate was something of a farce."

Cameron wants world football's governing body to "become more transparent and more accountable."