Academic says he has been barred from UK over event with Palestine Action founder

What the report says

Swedish climate scholar Andreas Malm says he has been told by the UK Home Office that he will not be allowed to enter the country, after he was due to appear on a London panel with Huda Ammori, a co-founder of Palestine Action. The BBC reports that Malm received a letter saying his presence was “not conducive to the public good,” but no fuller explanation was given. He said he could not see any reason other than the scheduled event, which was to be organised by the left-wing magazine Tribune.

Malm, a senior lecturer in human ecology at Lund University, has written books including How to Blow up a Pipeline and The Destruction of Palestine is the Destruction of the Earth. He told BBC Radio 4’s Today programme that he was not a member of Palestine Action, had not endorsed it publicly, and had not funded it. He described the decision as a restriction on free exchange and argued that the UK was treating him as guilty by association.

The BBC also notes that Malm has previously described the 7 October 2023 Hamas-led attacks on Israel as “fundamentally an act of liberation,” while also condemning the killing of civilians. He said those remarks may have played a role, though he pointed out that he had still been allowed into the UK as recently as May. The Home Office declined to comment on individual cases.

The case comes amid wider scrutiny of Palestine Action’s ban under UK terrorism law, which the government is defending at the Supreme Court. The BBC says the government has wide powers to exclude foreign nationals if their presence is judged to pose a risk to society.