AN American professor who says that animal rights activists are justified in digging up people’s graves as a protest has been banned from Britain under the government’s anti-terror crackdown.

Steven Best, a philosophy professor at the University of Texas, El Paso, was told of the ban on Wednesday. He spoke at an animal rights rally in Britain only last month. New rules aimed at banning or deporting foreign nationals behaving “unacceptably” were believed to be aimed at Islamic fundamentalists preaching hate. Best’s order shows the government’s intention to widen the use of the rules.

Charles Clarke, the home secretary, issued the order after Best was billed as the speaker at a rally to mark the closure of Darley Oaks farm at Newchurch, Staffordshire, a guinea pig farm targeted by animal rights extremists. A five-year hate campaign against the farm’s owners culminated in a family member’s remains being removed from her grave last year.

The Home Office told Best that his presence in Britain would be “non-conducive to the public good”.

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