A RELIEF worker helping to give aid to the victims of the south east Asia earthquake has been arrested.

Arshad Shahzad was working as a volunteer for Nelson-based Muslim Global Relief (MGR) when he was arrested while arguing against police trying to move the charity's refugee camp in the Kashmiri village of Bagh.

Farooq Bashir, spokesman for MGR today criticised police for not saying that the survivors were only going to be moved 100 yards.

He said: "Most of the survivors had already walked seven hours from their village of Azad Bara covered in 3ft of snow.

"The way they came across when everyone was working flat out in freezing weather was not needed.

"These are desperate people trying to take refuge and looking for shelter.

"The people said they did not want to move because they did not know where they were going. If they knew it would have been better."

Mr Shahzad was released after three hours following his arrest two weeks ago which was discovered when MGR's managing director Mohammed Razaque recently visited Kashmir to see how the charity's relief effort was going.

Mr Bashir claimed the camp was moved because of security reasons.

He added the camp was there for humanitarian reasons and should not have been moved.

Mr Bashir said: "The tent village had been recognised as a model camp by the U.N. team and many NATO officials had also visited it.

"Mr Shahzad wanted to do more than survive in a tent, he wanted to help people and when he tried to defend the survivors he was arrested.

"Thankfully the aid effort was not affected."