You could be forgiven for thinking that Lancashire is a hot bed of international terror and espionage with the events of the past fortnight. But this is a sign of the times as an ever worried government and society tries to satisfy itself in a war of paranoia.

While I cannot write much about Sajid Badat for legal reasons, it has not gone unnoticed that the whole Muslim community is feeling the brunt of hostile comments and worse as the authorities are given further powers to detain and arrest under the 'Terrorism Act'.

Throughout Europe there has been a surge of arrests and detention of Muslim activists. And although MOST have been released without charge the worrying aspect of this exercise is that Muslims are being made to feel guilty without having committed an offence. It is fine to extend the searches and investigations to hunt out potential terrorists, but it seems there has been an almost deliberate attempt to implicate the Muslim communities through Britain with the messages that have been coming out of government offices.

Without doubt, the Muslim community condemns, and has continually criticised in the most powerful terms the atrocities that have been carried out throughout the world by suicide bombers. Murderers do not discriminate.

It seems though that the Western powers are beginning to reap what they sow. Any of us by association with the Western world are now targets of the terrorists. So the Muslims of Lancashire and Britain are facing the threat from both sides.

We risk prosecution with the assistance of ambiguous terror laws, and let's face it, having witnessed the goings on in Warrington training school the police, the authorities really don't need another excuse to persecute.

At workplaces in the region members of the indigenous population are now looking over their shoulder if they see a brown faced, bearded person, or a veiled woman walking on the street. This sense of anxiety and apprehension will not help to keep up the process of integration that has been occurring over the previous decades.

The sense of unease felt by all communities is a direct result of increasingly alarmed security forces which simply do not understand the mechanics of their enemy. By employing a 'sledgehammer to crack the nut' approach they are forcing the nation into panic and the Muslim communities to fear false accusations and insults.

When the IRA were blowing up all and sundry we did not see the British Army bombing the whole of Southern Ireland. It appears the real targets and culprits seem to be a step too far for the security and secret forces, and instead they are focusing on individuals and minorities to appease the problems.

Unfortunately this has had the adverse affect of damaging race relations, and forcing the Muslim communities in Britain to live in fear feeling they have been given the blame for acts occuring thousands of miles away.