Current mood:	angry
Current music:	"Get Up, Stand Up!" - Bob Marley & The Wailers

Something important
Hey, folks! Sorry about the gap between postings - have been a tad bummed-out of late by various stuff (including, but not limited to, the whole LJ debacle - will post on that at some point, but not today.)

However, I thought that some of you UK folks (and others, for that matter) might like a heads-up on this. I just found out that tomorrow night the UK is planning to deport one Pegah Emambakhsh, a lesbian from Iran, back to Iran after denying her request for political asylum after escaping her home country. Her partner has been arrested, tortured and sentenced to death by stoning. Her father has also been arrested, interrogated and tortured for information about her whereabouts. I'm really not sure why on Earth they're declining her request for asylum, given that there appears to be excellent evidence that she faces imprisonment, torture and quite likely execution by stoning if returned to Iran. The case is documented here. Whilst the article says she's due to be deported next week, the editor of the UK Gay News service, Andy Thayer, said in an e-mail earlier this week that "I have just heard that Pegah Emambakhsh is to be deported by the British Government on Thursday August 23 on the British Airways flight to Tehran (BA 6633) which departs from London Heathrow at 21:35..."

I'm not really 100% on the procedure for contacting the government over this sort of thing, but some ways you may be able to make your voice heard may be by contacting one (or preferably more) of these places :

• Send an e-mail to the Prime Minister via this form
  
• Send a fax to the Prime Minister : 02079250918
  
• Send an e-mail to the Home Office at public.enquiries@homeoffice.gsi.gov.uk
  
• Phone the Home Office : 020 7035 4848
  
• Send an e-mail to the minister of State for Borders and Immigration (I believe that this would be the correct minister to contact), Liam Byrne MP : byrnel@parliament.uk

If you're from outside the UK, you might want to try contacting the local British Consulate/Embassy - or for that matter, I suppose you could still just use the above info!

I know that this is very last-minute, but as I said, I only just found out about it, but I think that it's still very much worth the effort.