Church aiding asylum claims on mass scale, say Patel and Braverman
Ezedi still not caught by police four days after allegedly dousing mother, 31, with chemicals
SUELLA BRAVERMAN and Dame Priti Patel have criticised churches over their alleged support for “bogus asylum claims”.
Writing in this newspaper, Mrs Braverman says that during her time as home secretary she “became aware of churches around the country facilitating industrial-scale bogus asylum claims”.
Separately, Dame Priti, also a former home secretary, accused church leaders of “political activism” in their approach to asylum seekers, claiming that institutions supported cases “without merit”.
The clergy’s role in offering conversions to asylum seekers and support for their applications is likely to be considered by ministers in the wake of the chemical attack in London. Abdul Ezedi, the suspect, was twice denied asylum before being allowed to stay after claiming he had converted from Islam.
A government source said: “There are clearly general questions about whether it is really possible to credibly substantiate the solidity of a religious conversion.”
Dame Priti cited the case of Emad Jamil al-Swealmeen, a Christian convert who detonated a bomb outside Liverpool Women’s Hospital in 2021, having been confirmed at Liverpool Cathedral in 2017. In 2016, the then dean of the cathedral said he had converted 200 asylum seekers in four years, but not one “already had British citizenship”.
Mrs Braverman states: “Attend Mass once a week for a few months, befriend the vicar, get your baptism date in the diary and bingo, you’ll be signed off by a member of clergy that you’re now a God-fearing Christian who will face certain persecution if removed to your Islamic country of origin. It has to stop.”
A Church spokesman said: “It is the role of the Home Office, and not the Church, to vet asylum seekers.” It was not aware of any links with Ezedi.
AN AFGHAN refugee who has been hunted by police for three days was reportedly in a relationship with the woman he allegedly doused with chemicals in Clapham on Wednesday night.
As pressure mounted on police to catch Abdul Ezedi, a “close relative” confirmed he had been in a relationship with the 31-year-old mother he is alleged to have attacked. The relative said they were concerned about Ezedi and vowed to “bring him in by myself if I have to”. Urging Ezedi to give himself up, they told Sky News they were “worried about” him and wanted to “find out if he is alive or dead”, adding: “His injury is very bad and he needs medical attention.”
The woman attacked with a corrosive alkaline substance remains “very poorly” and sedated in hospital, with her injuries thought to be “life-changing”. The injuries to her daughters, aged three and eight, are “not likely to be life-changing”. Police had previously said the suspect and the injured mother were known to each other.
It came as the search for the fugitive went into its third day, with police urging the public to remain alert after he was last seen at London’s King’s Cross Tube station where he boarded a southbound Victoria Line train.
As the manhunt continues, a Royal Air Force helicopter believed to be helping in the hunt for Ezedi was pictured circling Hampstead Heath in north-west London yesterday. Photos showed crew scouring the landscape from the cockpit as walkers looked on.
Police have urged the 35-year-old from the Newcastle area, who is described as having very “significant injuries to the right side of his face”, to hand himself in.
Ezedi’s younger brother said he would not hesitate to hand him over to police. Hassan Ezedi, 21, spoke after riot squad police officers in Hazmat suits raided his east London home at 2am on Friday in the search for his brother.
Officers wearing gas masks and blue chemical suits and carrying shields stormed the hostel in Leyton, east London, where Hassan lives.
Urging his brother to give himself up, Hassan said: “If I knew where he was, I’d turn him in for what he did. I don’t know if he’s alive or where he is now.”
He added: “I saw him briefly last week. He wasn’t living with me. He was in Newcastle.”
Another resident, 20-year-old Kami Bowden, said: “It was scary because the police had Tasers in their hands.
“They were shouting quite loudly. We could hear them smacking on my door. They told me to walk backwards out of the room with my hands on my head.
“They took us to the other side of the road and said it wasn’t safe to be in the premises.”
In footage of the raid, police can be heard telling residents “Basically we’re here because we are looking for someone... but it’s not safe for you to be in here.”
An officer later asks: ‘Have you seen anyone with an injured eye at all?’
Asked about the Hazmat suits, officers reply: “There’s a hazard in there that we have to be aware of.”
Metropolitan Police Commander Jon Savell said “significant and important pieces of evidence” were recovered in the searches carried out in east London and Newcastle.
Two empty containers labelled with corrosive warnings were found at an address in Newcastle, and forensic tests are being carried out to check if they held the substance used in the attack.
Making a direct appeal to Ezedi, Commander Savell said: “Abdul, you clearly have got some very significant injuries. We’ve seen the images. You need some medical help, so do the right thing and hand yourself in.”
It is understood that Ezedi, a pizza shop worker who lived in the Byker district of Newcastle, may be receiving help from relatives in Afghanistan.
A friend told The Telegraph Ezedi topped up an international pay-asyou-go mobile phone in Newcastle shortly before he travelled to London.
The fugitive had visited a shop in the Byker area near where he was living in a hostel for the homeless.
Pay-as-you-go devices are often used by county lines criminal gangs because non-contract mobile phones cannot easily be traced by police. Ezedi’s use of a contract-free phone means he could be getting support from friends or relatives in Afghanistan, helping him stay one step ahead of police.
Meanwhile, the row over the way Ezedi was granted asylum in the UK despite having a conviction for a sex offence has continued. He was convicted of a sexual assault/exposure offence at Newcastle Crown Court in 2018 and handed a suspended sentence and an unpaid work order, which was completed two years later. He was also put on the sex offenders register for 10 years. His application to remain in the UK was approved by an immigration judge in 2021 or 2022 after he claimed he had converted to Christianity and would be persecuted if he was returned to Afghanistan. Ezedi was allowed to stay in the country after a priest confirmed he was “wholly committed” to his new religion.
Alan Mendoza, of the Henry Jackson Society counter-extremism think tank, said: “That he was allowed to stay after an obviously false conversion to Christianity highlights the continued problem of the complicity of various British institutions in what has become a pro-asylum industry. The consequences of this are frequently devastating.”
Catholic Church leaders in Newcastle said they do not believe Ezedi converted to Catholicism before he was granted asylum. Sources told The Telegraph they had “found no evidence” Ezedi had used its churches to convert, although he had been given help by a Catholic charity in Newcastle in the form of food, clothes and toiletries. The Church of England said it is not aware of any links to its churches, with a spokesman adding it was “the role of the Home Office, and not the Church, to vet asylum seekers and judge the merits of their individual cases”.
Ezedi left Newcastle in the “very, very early hours” of Wednesday, travelled south to the capital and was in the Tooting area by about 6.30am, police say. His vehicle was seen again in Croydon, south London, at about 4.30pm and by around 7pm he was in Streatham. During the attack, at 7.25pm, he allegedly threw the mother’s younger child to the ground, before trying to drive away from the scene, crashing into a stationary vehicle and fleeing on foot.
Scotland Yard said its investigation team had received dozens of calls and was working with a number of police services and other agencies.
Mr Savell urged the public “to contact police immediately if they may have seen Ezedi or have information about him” but not to approach him.
‘Abdul, you clearly have some very significant injuries .. so do the right thing and hand yourself in’