News

Welcoming the announcement on funding for the World Service, Co-Chair of the Liberal Democrat Parliamentary International Affairs Committee, Martin Horwood said:

“The BBC World Service is a fantastic example of Britain’s soft power. We don’t lecture people on democracy and free speech – we demonstrate it through the World Service’s output.

Aneeta Prem (pictured left), friend and associate of OBV will make history tomorrow by launching the nation’s first 24/7 helpline for those seeking help and refuge from forced marriages and ‘dishonour’ violence. The launch of this historic helpline coincides with the launch of her book, ‘But it’s not fair’.

Godfrey Brandt, Associate Research Fellow at Birkbeck University of London, writes for OBV about the closure of Pandora’s Box at the Oval House Theatre and what it means for Black theatre productions.

As the Labour Party embarks on its radical agenda to reorganise the workings of the party Jyoti Bhojani (pictured left) writes a timely and well argued piece over at LabourList about how the party can reconnect with Black and Minority Ethnic (BME) communities.

A new online petition calling for the deletion of all innocent records from the Police National Database (PND) at the same time that innocent DNA is deleted has been launched Black Mental Health UK (BMH UK).

The human rights campaign group has renewed calls for the deletion of all innocent records amid fears that without this commitment millions of innocent people will continue to be criminalised by the new Police National Database.

The startling development the tragedy of Black male deaths in police custody continues after yet another black man ends up dead after contact with the West Midlands Police.

OBV welcomed students from BSix College, Hackney on Tuesday, 21st June 2011 to experience political campaigining first hand.

After a short introduction by Jyoti Bhojani and Teasha Bayles the young people had to explain their thoughts on what they felt about politics just with one word. And it was not really surprisingly that most of the words had a negative expression, for example: corrupt, cheated, inequality and nonsense.

I love tennis but I hate Wimbledon. It’s not the annual hype of, ‘Can Andy Murray’, or before him, ‘Tim Henman win Wimbledon’. I get that. It’s a bit like supporting the English football team; you really want them to do well even though you secretly know they might not be quite good enough. But your hope never fades.

The First Lady Michelle Obama and her daughters had a surprise in store for them on their African tour when former South African President and hero of the anti - apartheid movement Nelson Mandela made a request to meet with them.

The First Lady received word that Mandela had wanted to meet her and her daughters, Malia and Sasha, while they were in town as part of the tour of Africa which resulted today in a speech where the call to advance women’s rights was made.

A US-based lesbian and gay rights group All Out has joined UK-based 38 Degrees to jointly campaign against the deportation of a Tanzanian gay rights activist who is seeking refuge in Britain.

The groups have launched a global campaign and are asking supporters to write to Home Secretary Theresa May in a bid to stop the process.