Far-Right group allied to Scottish separatists The Vlaamse Volksbeweging (VVB), or Flemish People's Movement, was an official participant at Saturday's major rally for Scottish independence in Edinburgh, organised by the SNP-dominated campaign for a Yes vote in next year's referendum. Steven Vergauwen, the VVB's chairman, attended alongside Alex Salmond, the SNP leader and First Minister of Scotland. Mr Vergauwen had said on Friday: "Scotland and Flanders are one, joined on their way towards independence and real democracy." The VVB seeks Flemish independence from Belgium. But Prof Kris Deschouwer, the head of the politics department at Brussels Free University, said: "The VVB are ultranationalists and the SNP should watch who they mix with. The ethnic component is extremely present in Flemish nationalism and in the VVB. In a speech last month, Wim de Wit, the president of the VVB's general assembly, attacked the "Islamisation of our Flemish cities" as an "act of aggression importing an alien religion and ideology to reduce the Flemish to second-class citizens." The SNP said it is avowedly non-discriminatory and one of its ministers is a Muslim. But the independence debate has recently taken on a more hardline nationalist tinge.