British Council accused of being highjacked by “woke leftists”
The British Council – the organization created to promote Britain overseas, has ranked the UK alongside countries with appalling human-rights records such as Afghanistan, Libya and Russia.
The list appears in an internal guide that also claims that racism ‘permeates’ British institutions such as the police and Civil Service. Critics last night said that the British Council had been ‘hijacked by woke Leftists’.
Using Freedom of Information laws, The Mail on Sunday obtained the organisation’s 44-page race equality guide, which is produced for staff internally.
It states: ‘Ethnic conflicts, civil disturbances and genocides have been witnessed in all continents. By some estimates, one or more of these are currently prevalent in around a quarter of countries worldwide.
‘They include but are not restricted to Afghanistan, Australia, Bosnia, Colombia, Darfur, France, Germany, Libya, Russia, South Sudan, Syria, Spain and the UK. They have claimed billions of victims.’
Missing from the list is China, accused of genocide and crimes against the Uighur minority, as well as authoritarian Iran.
The British Council’s guide, which is available to staff via its intranet and website, also highlights what it claims is ‘unlawful unjustified discrimination’ in Britain. It adds: ‘With these come negative economic, social, cultural, and personal consequences, including racial traumas as a result of exposure to racism, racial discrimination and harassment, racial hostility intolerance, and xenophobia.’ It also claims that ‘racism permeates institutions, laws, policies, procedures and practices’ and that ‘deeply entrenched stereotypes’ have led to ‘harsher judgments and treatment.’
Distinguished historian Andrew Roberts said: ‘To liken the British experience to genuinely genocidal countries is probably politically motivated and certainly factually inaccurate.’
Author and commentator Douglas Murray said the list provided proof that the organisation had been hijacked by ‘woke Leftists’, adding: ‘The British Council has been led for a long time now by incredibly Left-wing people who don’t like Britain very much.’
The organisation, set up in 1934, last year received £189 million of taxpayers’ funding. The Mail on Sunday revealed in December how it had issued ‘a non-discriminatory’ guide to staff, advising against terms such as the ‘Queen’s English’.
