Police investigate threat to burn venue hosting FiLiA Women's Rights Conference in Cardiff

Nazanin Zaghari-Ratcliffe is due to speak at the conference. Credit: PA

Police are investigating after an online threat emerged to burn a venue where a conference is due to be held in Cardiff.

The FiLiA Women's Rights Conference is scheduled to take place from October 22 to 24 in the capital.

Screenshots of the conversation between two Twitter users were widely circulated.

Following reports, the police said: "We can confirm that the matter of an online threat has been reported to South Wales Police."

One of the users asked: "Is it in a building that would be a loss if it burnt down?"

Both users' accounts have since been set to private mode.

Nazanin Zaghari-Ratcliffe is due to speak at the event which claims to be the largest annual grassroots feminist conference in Europe.

The people making the alleged threat used the term "Terf" to describe the feminist group, which means "trans-exclusionary radical feminist".

FiLiA has previously responded to accusations of being a transphobic organisation. It has denied that FiLiA "work[s] to diminish the rights and recognition of trans women."

In a statement in July, the trustees said: "FiLiA is a women-led volunteer organisation which seeks to build sisterhood and solidarity, amplify the voices of women and defend women’s human rights. We organise the largest annual grassroots feminist conference in Europe, bringing together women from around the world who organise and campaign on a wide range of issues.

"FiLiA supports sex-based rights. There exist some situations in which women need access to female-only spaces: in refuges, in recovery from male violence, in shared accommodation, sports, and of course in the right of our lesbian sisters to determine their own sexual orientation. Our stance on this reflects the current state of the law.

"We support campaigns and projects which advance reproductive rights, work to end male violence against women and girls, celebrate lesbian lives, and challenge racism, classism, ableism, militarism and environmental destruction through feminism."

The exact location of the conference, which was subject to the online threat, is not publicly known.