London: Noor Mia was a student when riots broke out in northern England in the summer of 2001, and angry young British South Asians clashed with police after a series of racist attacks and incidents.
The northern city of Burnley was engulfed in riots that began an hour away in Oldham, as far-right activists blamed racial tensions and minority communities accused police of failing to protect them.
More than two decades later, Mia recalls that dark period when she tried to calm Muslim youth in Burnley after many Muslim graves were defaced in local cemeteries and right-wing riots targeted mosques in nearby towns.
“2001 was a difficult time for Burnley. Since then we have moved on, picked ourselves up. There is a lot of hope for the next generation,” said Mia, now the secretary of the local mosque.
On Monday, Mia received a message from a friend who found a family member's grave covered in paint.
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“When I got to the cemetery, there were already two families there, who were really worried, really emotional,” Mia said, adding that about seven tombstones had been vandalized with brown paint.
The local police are treating the act as a hate crime.
“Whoever has done this is trying to provoke the Muslim community to react emotionally. But we have tried to keep everyone calm,” Mia said.
“It's a very small thing to do. No one deserves this … in this day and age things like this shouldn't happen.”
The attack has fueled fears among Muslims in Burnley after anti-immigrant, Islamophobic riots in other northern towns and cities over the past week.
The violence erupted after a July 29 mass stabbing in Southport, near Liverpool, in which three children died, which was falsely blamed on a Muslim migrant on social media.
Miah is worried about his wife wearing a hijab to the town center and has asked his father to pray at home instead of the mosque “to limit how much time he spends outside.”
“I helped build that mosque, I physically moved the bricks there. I was part of that mosque, but I had to think about the safety of my family,” he said.
But Mia still hoped there would be no violence.
“We have not had riots here yet. Hopefully the riots don't come to Burnley.
In Sheffield, violence broke out near the home of Amina Blake. A few miles away in Rotherham, hundreds of far-right rioters attacked police and torched a hotel for asylum seekers on Sunday.
While Blake, a community leader on the boards of two local mosques, said Sheffield is a place of “sanctuary”, Rotherham is “literally on our doorstep”.
Since the weekend riots, there has been a “tremendous sense of fear,” especially among Muslim women, Blake said. “I have Muslim sisters who wear the hijab contacting me saying, 'I'm worried about going out wearing a hijab.'”
Like Mia's family in Burnley, here, too, “people are staying in their houses.”
“I often know sisters who are very independent… who no longer go out without dropping off and picking up male family members because they don't want to go out in the car alone.”
Mosque-goers in Southport were reportedly trapped inside the building during the clashes, with the government announcing extra security for places of worship in response to the violence.
In the last two major riots that rocked England in 2001 and 2011, fueled by mistrust and anger against the police by minorities, this time police forces have joined forces with Muslim community leaders to call for calm.
“Historically, there's been a lot of mistrust of the police among BAME (black, Asian and minority ethnic) communities, Muslim communities,” said Blake, who is also a chaplain for South Yorkshire Police in Sheffield.
“Communities have almost put to one side the mistrust and historical issues of joining together (with the police) to solve this very real problem.”
The support from the police and the government has been “really amazing, and to be honest, quite unexpected,” Blake added.
Muslims in Sheffield were feeling “very anxious and vulnerable” when Friday prayers were signaled this week.
But people will go to mosques, Blake said. “There's fear, but there's also a sense that we have to carry on as normal.”
