Muslim “shocked” by racist abuse incident at airport

The Chronicle reports on an alleged incident of verbal abuse at Newcastle International Airport where a Muslim male was subjected to “vile” comments as he waited for his flight to depart.

Amir Khan, 39, said that he was walking through the departure lounge at the airport on June 30, when a man sat at a bar with a group of people directed racist comments at him.

“It was some sort of monkey reference”, he told the local paper.

Amir said the comment was overheard by other people and left him “shocked” at the racist outburst. It took him a couple of minutes to get himself together before he decided to confront the perpetrator. He returned and followed the man to a WHSmith store.

Amir said the man denied making any such comments but a restaurant worker “told an airport security guard what had happened, and he got an officer from the police team based in the terminal.”

Amir, who has lived in Newcastle all his life blamed the post-Brexit environment for open expressions of racism saying “I do not expect this in my hometown airport. I was really upset and really angry. I have had racist abuse before but this really struck a chord.

“I do feel like it’s important to make a stand now. There has been so much going on since the referendum and there are people out there who think they can get away with casual racism.

“It’s really important that anyone who experiences this stands up.”

Northumbria police confirmed that an incident was reported at 10am on 30 June at Newcastle airport. A spokesperson for the force told the paper, “Enquiries into the incident are ongoing.