http://www.guardian.co.uk/religion/Story/0,,2195538,00.html

There will be no sex, drugs or rock and roll at Wembley Arena tomorrow
night. The venue's 200-seat restaurant - sample dish: pork loin with
mash - will be closed and converted to a prayer room, and alcohol has
been banned from the premises.

The charity pop concert for Darfur has been described as a Muslim Live8
and features artists who, although unknown to mainstream audiences and
record companies in Britain, have sold millions of albums in
Muslim-majority countries.

 It is the first event of its kind to be held at Wembley and special
arrangements are in place for the 10,000 people expected. The start time
was changed from 5.30pm to 6.30pm after the organisers, Awakening
Entertainment, realised that thousands of people would rush out to pray
at 5.59pm. To respect Islamic dietary requirements - and for one night
only - Wembley will be dry and halal.

Sharif Banna, from Awakening, said the concert would be an eye-opener
for non-Muslims. "People want to see what this show is about.

"We think they'll enjoy the music and the songs, even the ones that are
specifically Islamic in content. Figures from the music industry are
also coming. They're not clued up on this scene. They know Bollywood and
Middle Eastern music but they're unfamiliar with the new generation of
Muslim western artists. Yusuf Islam is unique because of his history,
but this concert will give a different perspective on this niche
market."

Headlining the show is singer-songwriter Sami Yusuf, 27, who has sold 3m
albums and is a household name in Turkey, Egypt and the Gulf states,
where he needs bodyguards and blacked-out windows to protect him from
being mobbed by fans. In London this month, he spoke about his
fact-finding trip to Darfur and urged fellow Muslims to confront the
genocide in the region.

"Our objective is to raise money and awareness of this humanitarian
crisis amongst British Muslims. I'm flattered by the comparisons to Bob
Geldof and Bono but I don't see myself like that."

His latest song - Asma Allah - is a recitation of the 99 names of Allah
and the official video has been viewed 174,246 times on YouTube. His
material, which focuses on spiritual and social issues such as the
prophet Muhammad and hijab, is not the pop anthems normally heard at
Wembley.

Tonight's performers are the Police, and in two weeks' time chubby
rocker Meatloaf will be at Wembley Arena singing about bats out of hell.

Other artists on tomorrow's lineup include Kareem Salama, America's only
Muslim country and western singer, and Outlandish, an award-winning
multi-faith hip-hop group from Denmark.

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/pages/live/articles/news/news.html?in_article_id=488791&in_page_id=1770&ct=5

The BBC's hottest new comedy star Peter Serafinowicz yesterday abandoned
an attempt to use the Human Rights Act to stop newspapers revealing his
grandfather was the first man in Britain to face a trial for Nazi war
crimes.

The 35-year-old mimic – currently starring in a 30-minute BBC2 satirical
show that carries his name – has been anxious someone will make the link
as his fame grows.

His grandfather Szymon Serafinowicz appeared at the Old Bailey in 1997
accused of killing Jews while he was a police chief in his native
Belarus when it was occupied by the Nazis.

However, the jury eventually ruled the former carpenter, who fled to
Britain at the end of the war, was not fit to stand trial because of
dementia.

He died that year aged 85. 

The alleged war criminal's grandson has received rave reviews for The
Peter Serafinowicz Show, a fast-moving mix of absurd sketches featuring
the comedian's outlandish take on stars such as Sir Paul McCartney,
Simon Cowell and Al Pacino.

The BBC is convinced he is their next major star and has ordered a huge
publicity drive to ensure his success.

This includes prime-time trailers, a starring role on last week's Friday
Night With Jonathan Ross alongside Take That and Terry Wogan, plus
interviews and profiles in selected newspapers.

Serafinowicz's unflinching self-confidence is lauded, along with his
Bafta nomination for his Tomorrow's World spoof Look Around You and the
fact that he has just had a baby son Sam with the Stardust and Green
Wing actress Sarah Alexander.

What never comes up is what his grandfather did in the Second World War
that led to him being the first man in Britain charged under the 1991
War Crimes Act.

When The Mail on Sunday approached Serafinowicz to ask him why he never
spoke about his grandfather, he contacted showbusiness lawyers
Schillings, who represented BP boss Lord Browne in his disastrous court
case – also brought under the Human Rights Act – which led to the peer's
resignation.

Schillings insisted that the allegations against Serafinowicz's
grandfather were a private matter under the Human Rights Act.

It demanded that the paper gave an undertaking never to publish the
comedian's connection to the war crimes case.

When The Mail on Sunday refused, it said it would advise Serafinowicz to
go to a High Court judge to secure an emergency injunction banning
publication of the story.

It appeared last night that he had decided to reject its advice.

It was 12 years ago – just as the comic was starting on the comedy
circuit – that his grandfather was arrested at home in Banstead, Surrey.

He was remanded in custody for his alleged role in killing three Jews in
the town of Mir in 1941. At subsequent committal hearings it was decided
there was a case to answer.

Serafinowicz does not talk about his background much except to say his
family loves comedy.

However, he jokes about his own roles, saying: "I prefer the evil ones
because I'm quite evil in real life, so it's not much effort."

But a friend he told about his grandfather said: "Peter is horrified by
it all. It haunts him."

Apart from the one spectacular, dark family secret, the Serafinowiczes
appear the epitome of British working-class respectability.

The grandfather and his Polish-born wife Jadwega had a son they also
named Szymon.

The family fled to Britain after the war and were granted refugee
status. The former police chief became a carpenter and lived quietly in
Surrey.

In the Sixties, his scaffolder son moved to Liverpool and met post
office worker Catherine Geary.

They married in 1971 and had Peter a year later. The peaceful existence
was shattered more than 20 years later when a special unit at Scotland
Yard was formed to review more than 350 reported cases of atrocities by
non-Germans who fled to Britain.

All were dismissed with the exception of the Serafinowicz case, which
was given the go-ahead by the then attorney general Sir Nicholas Lyell.

Sixteen witnesses from as far away as America and Siberia gave evidence
during the 22-day committal proceedings.

All alleged Serafinowicz, who had been promoted to district commissioner
by the Nazis, had enthusiastically helped eradicate the 3,000-strong
Jewish population around the capital of Minsk.

Holocaust survivor Oswald Ruffeisen, who translated for Serafinowicz
during the war, said the police chief was involved when a group of
Jewish families were frogmarched from their homes and executed in the
snow behind a barn.

Regina Bedynska said that in 1941 she saw four Jewish men and a woman
with a child running from a death squad. 

Serafinowicz raised his rifle and shot the woman dead.

Others claimed he was present during a Nazi house-to-house search for
Jews, in which all those found were taken in groups to pits in the woods
and shot. They said he was seen with a sub-machine gun.

Serafinowicz senior denied all charges. The comedian went to his
grandfather's funeral months later.

Schillings said yesterday: "Our client's grandfather died before he was
able to demonstrate that there was no truth in the allegations."