Non-violent protesters are not terrorists and it's time the police accepted that | Kevin Blowe

The labelling of the likes of Extinction Rebellion as 'extremists' must stop, as must the state surveillance that goes with itPriti Patel probably thought she was helping when she tried to defend counter-terrorism police from the condemnation that followed last week's story in the Guardian revealing the inclusion of Extinction Rebellion (XR) in a guide on supposed "extreme or violent ideologies".The document has apparently now been withdrawn. Nevertheless, the home secretary's insistence that the police always make decisions based on the "risk to the public, security risks, security threats" does inevitably lead to an obvious, unanswered question. If she is right, how exactly did Counter Terrorism Policing South East (CTPSE), which wrote and published the guide, manage to make what even it admits was a significant "error of judgment"? Continue reading...