Stoke Newington is CRAWLING with police this morning. You’ve never seen so many police. All over the frigging place.

“What are they doing?”, you ask. Busting a major crack ring? On the trail of a terrorist cell?

Nope.

Catching cyclists.

Yep - you heard me right. They have Stokey on lock-down so that they can bust people for riding down alleys without dismounting, running red lights, etc.

OK - bad cycling annoys me as much as the next person. I can’t stand the little toads that ride at speed down the pavement - I just shout at them: “are you too frightened to ride on the road?” And running a red light when there are pedestrians around is a no-no for me too.

But seriously - a police crackdown, utilising this many officers to catch a few mildly anti-social cyclists is just absurd. Is this what I pay them for?

A friend of mine was fined £30 by a copper the other day. The crime: going across the pavement with his bike in order to lock it to a railing. He freewheeled the bike, standing on the pedal, like you do. Result a £30 fine. Frigging ridiculous.

So - the question is: now that cycling has begun to really take off as a form of green, healthy transport for Londoners (post-Olympic effect too), who has ordered the police to crack down on cyclists in this absurd manner?

Hey police cadets - looking forward to a glorious career of hassling cyclists?

Those of you who are aware of Twitter may be amused to hear that Tower Bridge is now at it. What a happy, eventful and productive life the old girl seems to be leading. Hurrah for Tower Bridge, and her endless opening and closing!

If you feel tempted to become a follower of Tower Bridge (and, let’s face it, who could resist?), here’s a link

President Pervez Musharraf has lifted the state of emergency in Pakistan, but the debate rages hot and heavy at our sister blog in Karachi–it’s our network’s most-discussed post. Author MB includes this image on his post, saying, “This photo of a man on the street of Karachi probably explains overall situation better than any of us could.”

After today’s farcical cack handed debacle of the 25million records now out in the ether maybe its time to be thankful in one respect that the ID Card must surely be dead in the water. Night night.

A very interesting addition to formal news coverage is available on our sister sites in Pakistan:
Karachi: http://karachi.metblogs.com/
Lahore: http://lahore.metblogs.com/
Islamabad: http://islamabad.metblogs.com/

It’s so amazing to read the day-to-day, personal experiences behind the headlines.

From Karachi: “I woke up early morning, went to TV lounge , turn on TV and found it dumb & dead again. No channels. Its indeed a question to ponder how much we are a laughing stock for the rest of the world which is planning for MARS in 2025. Media is supposed to be the only hope people have to reach out to truth in difficult times but being unique our government blocked tools of news/information not allowing people to know what’s happening around.”

Forget family fun at the British Museum’s exhibit of terracotta warriors — take the kids to this week’s London Arms Fair!

You might as well, since you paid for it: four million pounds of our tax dollars are being used to police it. Thank god our money is going to such worthy causes as arresting peace demonstrators.

The Independent reports,

The exhibition organisers say the event is “not an arms fair”. A spokesman said: “You can’t just walk in off the street and buy weapons.” He stressed that only a small proportion of exhibitors sold actual weapons and that the majority were concerned with such areas as disaster relief, peacekeeping and humanitarian activities and homeland security.

You certainly wouldn’t know it based on the fair’s home page, which prompts gleefully: “CLICK HERE FOR Night Vision, Electronic Warfare,” with no mention of humanitarian products.

An interesting overview of the latest arms trade news, including the BAE bribery scandal, is on the Guardian website.

Next time you go to the polls in your borough and for mayor, remember who opposed this travesty in our city.
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A statue of Nelson Mandela was unveiled in Parliament Square today.

It’s wonderful to see this great man honoured, but it’s a bit ironic that the statue has been placed where the free-speech-crushing SOCPA (Serious Organised Crime and Police Act 2005) aims to prevent Brian Haw and other peaceful protesters from exercising their civil rights.

Comedian Mark Thomas, writer of the excellent As Used on the Famous Nelson Mandela book about the British arms trade, writes that Gordon Brown will scrap SOCPA.

The statue is beautiful, but scrapping SOCPA and closing loopholes in arms trade legislation would also be fitting tributes to this man’s lifetime of work.

The on-the-ground coverage of the showdown between the government and the fundamentalists of the Red Mosque, on our sister site Metroblogging Islamabad, is an excellent companion to the regular mainstream news coverage.

The comments, in particular, are always an interesting insight into life in Islamabad.

After the attempted bombings this month, the media focused heavily on the fact that some of the people arrested are doctors.

People seem to be shocked by this for two reasons: that doctors would murder, and that the culprits may not be young, ignorant and disaffected.

Addressing the latter point only, the Wall Street Journal reports:

When Princeton economist Alan Krueger saw reports that seven of eight people arrested in the unsuccessful car bombings in Britain were doctors, he wasn’t shocked. He wasn’t even surprised.

“Each time we have one of these attacks and the backgrounds of the attackers are revealed, this should put to rest the myth that terrorists are attacking us because they are desperately poor,” he says. “But this misconception doesn’t die.”

Link to the article in the Wall Street Journal

Wonderful, wonderful. BBC reporter Alan Johnston has been freed by his kidnappers in Gaza.

Hamas, who was heavily involved in negotiations for his release, asked that we take time to consider the Palestinian prisoners held in Israel. I suggest that we think of all hostages and prisoners held without trial, around the world.

But Alan Johnston is a special case. His job as a journalist makes his safety and freedom even more important. Journalists risk themselves to report the news, for all of us and our well-being.

Welcome back, Alan Johnston.

Photo from the BBC news in pictures article