Salvaj Kareer in jaw dropping moment

It is generally accepted that man of principle Sajjad Karim the former Lib Dem MEP joined the Tories due to a great love.


A love for his own seat. It was obvious that the Lib Dems were going to tank in the 2009 elections, so, with the Tories on the up, and the Tories selection rules in place it became a no brainer for  him to jump ship. By joining the Tories as a sitting MEP it meant that he leapfrogged up to an unassaibalble position on the Tory list. After all he had only recently been selected as number 2 on the Lib Dem list - a unwinable slot. For that he earned the sobriquet Salvaj Kareer.


So imagine my surprise when I read this in today's Guardian,

The power of the cabal will be broken when we learn to trust the citizen and involve them in the decision-making process. We must debate directly electing commissioners and make the council transparent. And first to go must be the closed list system for electing MEPs.

He is so het up about the democratic defeciet that he must have supported calls for an EU referendeum, mustn't he?

On second thoughts maybe he didn"t as his approving tweet here makes clear

@SHKMEP Sajjad H Karim MEP

William Hague urges Tory MPs not to vote for a referendum on the UK's membership of the European Union, saying it... fb.me/Gf2d2feE

Oh well another coalition hypocrite.

Is this man a conservative?

It's Salvaj Kareer again. This time his problem seems to be that because of security issues in Pakistan, people might be forced to integrate more with the UK or their host country and become British rather than remaining in a half way house.

I am afraid we will now see the coming generations losing touch and becoming distant from Pakistan. This is a loss for both them and Pakistan.

Surely if people have moved here then it is only reasonable that over time they become British rather than be seen and see themselves as Pakistanis who happen to live here.

Now of course the security situation in Pakistan is ghastly, but I would suggest that that is a matter for Pakistan, not for Britain or indeed the EU.

I note that his website describes him as "Putting the North West First". Really?

That Brok immunity

I have already reported on the odd decision of the Legal Affairs Committee to grant Elmar Brok, veteran federast supreme, immunity from prosecution in his legal case about tax evasion.

Now Mary Ellen Synon has taken up the cudgels about the case.

The German authorities last September requested the European Parliament to waive the immunity from legal proceedings enjoyed by Brok and all other MEPs. The Public Prosecutor of Bielefeld wants to bring a criminal action against Brok for failure to report a €5,000 (£4,300) fee paid to him for giving a speech (one speech? Five k for 30 minutes? It was paid to him by HypoVereinsbank Group, a large Munich-based bank now owned by Italy's Unicredit. There may be another story in there, but I'll stick to the one about the tax for the moment).

The Public Prosecutor said in a letter to the committee that 'it is not possible at this stage to exclude the possibility that he [Brok] has received additional income form similar sources of which the relevant tax authorities are as yet unaware.'

What was the committee's response to that? Speroni declared the attempt at prosecution was 'a clear case of fumus persecutionis.' That means it showed signs of persecution for political reasons.

And the evidence of such persecution is what, exactly? That since the prosecutor hadn't told Brok of all the evidence they had against him and the story had run in news reports, 'It is therefore plain that the case is one of fumus persecutionis in that is appears the proceedings were brought with the sole aim of damaging the reputation of the Member concerned.'

An interesting aside. If you look at the report itself you can see that the only British MEP involved in the debate (and yes he did vote to grant the immunity) was Sajjad Karim, the former Lib Dem who became a Tory, so earning himself the moniker 'Salvaj Kareer'.

Mr Karim is obviously a doughty defender of the rights of politicians to be a law unto themselves.