10 year old Muslim boy badly beaten in racist attack in Bristol

The Guardian and The Mirror report on the release of images by the family of the 10 year old boy who was savagely beaten by racists on Monday evening, 5 September, in the Fishponds area in Bristol.

Awais Ali was called a “P***” by his attackers who demanded money from him before dragging him into a derelict building and beating him with a plank of wood and a pipe.

The papers report Ali was “kicked, punched and thrown against scaffolding” after being accosted on his way to meet some friends on Monday at around 5.30pm.

The images released to the public show injuries to the young boy’s head, back, arms, face and body. He also had a trainer mark imprinted on his back from where one of his attackers stood on him.

Awais was found by a passer-by who noticed him crawling out of the derelict building, bloody and crying. He was taken to Bristol Children’s Hospital for treatment for his injuries.

His mother, Anisa Iqbal, spoke on radio yesterday about the assault on her son. She said his attackers shouted “’Oi, Paki, stop, where are you going?’ And demanded money. My son said he didn’t have any.

“One of the boys pulled him up from the top and the other pushed him up from the bottom.”

She said ““I’ve lived in England my whole life and I’ve never experienced racist abuse. It was a very big shock. I read the paper a lot and when I hear of incidents like this I think how can that happen? But obviously it can happen because it happened to my son.”

Ms Iqbal said Awais was too frightened to return to school after the attack.

“He needed a lot of convincing from the schoolteacher and myself to come into school”, she said.

Avon and Somerset Police confirmed the incident was being treated as a racist hate crime.

In a statement, Det Insp Steve Cartlidge said: “We’re treating this as a racially motivated crime due to words used by the offenders during the assault.

“Two boys, aged 12 and 11, have been identified and spoken to by officers and we’re arranging for them to be formally interviewed.

“The victim is due to be video interviewed to gain a full picture of what happened.

“If anyone has information about this incident, or if you were in the Station Avenue South area of Fishponds at the time it happened, please call us as soon as possible.”