Prevent strategy risks promoting extremism, UN special rapporteur warns

According to UN special rapporteur Maina Kiai, the UK government’s strategy to counter-terror and extremism, Prevent, could risk affecting the discussion of terrorism. Prevent was designed to safeguard people and communities from the threat of terrorism and aims to provide practical help to stop people from being drawn into extremist ideologies. Since last summer, teachers have been compelled to refer pupils who are suspected of exhibiting radical behaviour to the police. However, at the end of a three-day visit to the UK, Kiai has warned that the programme could cause ‘unease and uncertainty around what can be legitimately discussed in public’. He argued that the programme risked dividing, stigmatising and alienating segments of the population, which could actually end up promoting extremism, as opposed to stemming it. Kiai noted the UK government had made some improvements to addressing the concern of extremism, but warned recent measures could reverse its progress. The news comes after the National Union of Teachers (NUT) voted to reject the programme, after concerns that it causes ‘suspicion in the classroom and confusion in the staffroom’.