It was depressing to read that Muslims in our community are still coming under attack and living in fear three months after the September 11 terrorist attacks ('Muslims under attack', Times, December 13).

Despite pleas against such behaviour from community leaders at local level and at international level, there remains a minority of under-educated thugs who will seek any excuse to put forward their prejudices.

What is more worrying from your article, however, is the fact that many victims of race hate crime including women and children are afraid to report any such attacks.

The police, the local authority and health services must be informed of such behaviour if they are to be able to effectively work together in putting a stop to it.

If such crimes remain unreported, they will be allowed to continue and the situation within our community will escalate.

This must not be allowed to happen.

As a resident who is proud to count many Muslims as friends (even though I am of Catholic religion), I call on my community to start acting in unison to fight back against these mindless thugs.

We should embrace our neighbours, not seek to shun them, and we should report any incidence we see of abuse or racial violence.

The perpetrators need to be identified and dealt with by the criminal system.

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