The British National Party leader Nick Griffin told a crowd in West Yorkshire that young Asian men were raping white girls with the consent of their community leaders as "part of their plan for conquering countries", a court heard today.

Mr Griffin, 45, and his fellow party activist Mark Collett, 24, face a series of race hate charges arising out of speeches featured in an undercover BBC documentary on the party.

Leeds Crown Court heard that both men addressed a crowd at the Reservoir Tavern in Keighley, West Yorkshire, on January 19, 2004. Rodney Jameson QC, prosecuting, told the jury that Mr Griffin concentrated on allegations of paedophile drug rapes by Asian Muslims in Keighley during his speech.

Reading excerpts from the speech, Mr Jameson quoted Mr Griffin as saying: "White society has been turned to a multiracial hell-hole - vote BNP so we can ensure the British people really realise the evil of what these people have done to our country."

Mr Griffin went on: "The bastards that are in that gang, they are in prison so the public think it’s all over. Well it’s not. Because there’s more of them.

"The police force and elected governors haven’t done a damn thing about it. Their good book (the Koran) tells them that that’s acceptable. If you doubt it, go and buy a copy and you will find verse after verse and you can take any woman you want as long as it’s not Muslim women."

Mr Jameson said that the speech then turned to allegations of violence by Asian Muslims against whites and Mr Griffin said: "These 18-, 19-, and 25-year-old Asian Muslims are seducing and raping white girls in this town right now."

The BNP leader added that Asian community leaders would condemn the attacks to the press, but not to the attackers themselves. "It’s part of their plan for conquering countries. It’s how they do it," he said.

Mr Griffin added that this would expand to cover the UK "as the last whites try and find their way to the sea".

Mr Griffin, of Llanerfyl, Powys, denies two counts of using words or behaviour intending to stir up racial hatred and two of using words or behaviour likely to stir up racial hatred. Mr Collett, of Swithland Lane, Rothley, Leicestershire, denies four counts of the first offence and four of the alternative.

Mr Jameson told the jury of eight men and four women that a BBC journalist, Jason Gwynne, posed as a BNP supporter in Bradford, joining the party in December 2003.

The subsequent documentary programme, The Secret Agent, was broadcast on July 15, 2004. The next day West Yorkshire Police began an investigation based on the content of the programme which eventually led to the two men being arrested and charged.

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