| Sajjad Karim MEP | |
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| Incumbent | |
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Assumed office 13 June 2004; 7 June 2009 |
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| Majority | 423,174 |
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| Born | July 11, 1970 Blackburn, Lancashire, UK |
| Political party | Conservative |
| Website | sajjadkarim.eu |
Sajjad Haider Karim also known as Saj ( born 11 July 1970) is a Member of the European Parliament for North West England.[1]
Karim was the first British Muslim elected to the European Parliament on 4 June 2004.
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Karim, who is of Pakistani origin, was born in Blackburn in Lancashire.[2] He attended Walter Street County primary school Brierfield and thereafter Mansfield High School, Brierfield. He completed his A levels at Nelson and Colne College. His earliest political activity started with leafleting at the age of seven for the then Conservative MP for Pendle. He later joined the Liberal Democrat party in 1989. Karim attended the College of Law in Chester studying Law. He qualified as a Solicitor of the Supreme Court of England and Wales in 1997. Sajjad was elected a member of Pendle Borough Council in 1994 and served until 2002 representing Brierfield ward.
Karim was first elected to the European Parliament for North West England in 2004 as a Liberal Democrat. On 26 November 2007 he re-joined the Conservative Party. Karim was re-elected to the European Parliament in June 2009.
In his first term Karim served on the International Trade Committee, Committee of Judicial Affairs and Human Rights Committees and was a Member of the European Parliament's 'Committee of Investigation into alleged CIA extraordinary renditions and secret prisons' after having been the first European Parliamentarian to officially raise the matter. He was the European Legal Affairs Spokesperson and served as a Conservative whip. He was the European Parliamentary rapporteur for the EU-India Free Trade Agreement.
In 2005 he established the European Parliament Friends of Pakistan Group which he cahirs. He is also a member of the Friends of India and Friends of Bangladesh Groups also.
He is Vice-President of the European Parliament's Anti-Racism and Diversity Intergroup and Co-Chair of the European Muslim Forum. He has focused on the rise of intolerance in Europe in recent years, notably the rise of Islamophobia and anti-Semitism. He was the European Liberal and Democrat Group (ALDE) Spokesperson on the WTO.
Karim is interested in human rights issues including child labour and the civil liberties of EU citizens in the War on Terror.
He led the successful European Union contribution to the campaign for the commutation of the death penalty of British man, Mirza Tahir Hussain, who had spent half of his life on death row in Pakistan, for a crime he maintains he did not commit.
Sajjad now serves on the Industry, Research and Energy Committee.
On 26 November 2008, whilst visiting India as part of a European Parliament Committee on International Trade delegation (ahead of an EU-India summit), he was caught up in the Mumbai attacks in the lobby of the Taj Mahal Palace & Tower hotel.[3] Speaking to the Associated Press while holed up in the hotel's restaurant shortly after the terrorists gained control of the hotel, Karim said "I was in the main lobby and there was all of a sudden a lot of firing outside...all of a sudden another gunmen appeared in front of us, carrying machine gun-type weapons. And he just started firing at us ... I just turned and ran in the opposite direction." [4]
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