Home Office Prevent unit linked to Iraq ‘black ops’ PR firm

‘The head of a Home Office communications team and staff at a media consultancy responsible for promoting the British government’s Prevent strategy previously worked for a PR company tasked by the US military to deliver “black ops” propaganda in Iraq, Middle East Eye can reveal.
Richard Chalk was appointed head of the Research, Information and Communications Unit (RICU), part of the Home Office’s Office for Security and Counter-Terrorism (OSCT), in 2012 as part of efforts by the government to revamp its counter-extremism communications strategy.
Prior to joining RICU, Chalk worked in Baghdad between 2005 and 2006 for Bell Pottinger, the British PR firm revealed on Sunday by the Bureau of Investigative Journalism (BIJ) and the Sunday Times newspaper to have earned hundreds of millions of dollars from the US Department of Defense during the American military occupation of Iraq.’
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