Category: Justice

Why we should take non-Brits from Guantanamo

Posted on by David Landon Cole

Iain Dale asks why we should accept people who aren’t connected with Britain from Guantánamo Bay. These are my reasons why we should.

Firstly, it is in our strategic interest for two reasons. I will look at the morality and legality later, but it is enough to say that many states and people, friendly, neutral and hostile, regard both Guantánamo as immoral and the UK as very close to the United States. By acting to expedite the closing of Guantánamo, we are acting to right a perceived wrong. It also improves our standing within the EU and NATO if we can demonstrate an ability to act as an effective link or broker between the western and eastern sides of the Atlantic. I would add that there might well be (although I do not know this for a fact) people who would be repatriated to, say, Bosnia-Herzegovina. While I do not wish to impugn Bosnia-Herzegovina and am using it just as an example, I do not believe that it, or many other states, have the state-capacity to effectively monitor these people. If we look slightly more widely around the Balkans, the apparent ease with which people evaded the ICTY, I believe the point is proven. In the long-term, taking in detainees here is more secure than leaving them in limbo or Ruritania.

Secondly, it is expeditious. Whether Mr Dale likes it or not, President-Elect Obama has made it clear that Guantanamo is to be closed. As I mentioned, we are seen as close to the US in foreign policy terms. One of the big problems with Guantánamo was the lack of clarity as to what was going to happen to people held there. We now have a resolution; however, we will have to accept people who do not have an immediate connection to the US for a few reasons. One is that some states will not accept people who have a prior or stronger connection to them. We can exert more moral pressure on them to accept people from Guantánamo if we show how much we are doing; in any case, it will not work for everyone. There are some states that it would be wrong to ‘export’ these people to; they are those states that would torture them. They would go from a frying pan to a rather hotter fire and many of the problems we face because of Guantánamo would be reinforced.

Thirdly, it is morally right. Guantánamo was an abrogation of rights, poorly implemented and conceived, that took away some of our moral high ground and constitutes a serious threat to habeas corpus in the USA. Its closure rectifies at least some of those issues. Moreover, the USA is our friend and ally; if it seeks our support on this, given that the costs are minimal and the benefits great, I would have hoped it would have been a no-brainer.

If I may refer to the title of Iain’s post – “Guantánamo is a problem made in America” – I would contend that the problem may have been made there, but that does not relieve of us our obligations to justice and due process, or to our ally, or the effects its existence and the method of its closure may have on us.

In short, it is both morally right and in our strategic interest.

xD.

Secret inquests, revisited

Posted on by David Landon Cole

I wrote on the first of April of this year about provisions in the Counter-Terrorism Bill for restricting the openness of inquests. It seems that it wasn’t just me who was concerned about some of the proposals; the Guardian reports that section 64 is under fire1:

A cross-party committee of peers, including a former lord chief justice and two former attorney-generals, has told the government that any decision to hold an inquest without a jury must be taken by a judge and not a minister.

I cannot help but think that this would be a good thing. The bill is not necessary – as I said on the original post, things can be heard in camera if necessary – and, while I don’t think the Government would abuse the powers, this is handing a power to obfuscate government actions resulting in deaths to every future government. I don’t trust future governments, their members as yet unborn, sight unseen.

xD.

1 – the article says 63, but I think they mean 64.

We are ZCTU

Posted on by David Landon Cole

A little while ago, I wrote a post here and on the Wardman Wire called ‘Help Zimbabwe from your chair’.

We Are ZCTU: Defend unionists on trial in ZimbabweLovemore Matombo and Wellington Chibebe, respectively the President and General Secretary of the Zimbabwe Congress of Trades Unions (ZCTU), were being charged with ’spreading falsehoods prejudicial to the state’. Those falsehoods are, in fact, criticisms they made on May Day of Mugabe’s government and telling the truth about the violence today in Zimbabwe.

The TUC, the UK equivalent of ZCTU, and ITUC, the international version, organised a mosaic depicting Lovemore and Wellington made up of faces of trades unionists from around the world. You can see it at WeAreZCTU.org. There are also tools to spread the word, add your support and to lobby for justice. There are model letters to send there as well.

xD.

The Counter-terrorism Bill and coroners

Posted on by David Landon Cole

Section 42 (4) (b) (ii) of the Counter-Terrorism Bill, as it seeks to extend detention without charge to forty-two days, has attracted some considerable criticism. Unfortunately, it is not the only part of the bill that is, at best, distinctly ill-considered and with considerable scope for abuse. Serious consideration must also be given to clauses 64 and 65, which can be found on page 50 of this PDF of the bill. Clause 64 allows the Home Secretary to issue a certificate requiring an inquest to be held without a jury or discharging a jury mid-inquest. Clause 65 allows the Home Secretary to discharge a coroner and appoint a coroner of their own choosing. The two powers can be exercised simultaneously; that is to say, the Home Secretary would have the power, if they thought the an inquest would embarrass the government, to discharge the jury and the coroner and have the inquest started again without a jury and with a coroner of the Home Secretary’s choosing.

Inquests are unusual in English law in that they are the only inquisitorial proceeding, as opposed to the adversarial form that every other legal proceeding takes.

It is worth remembering that there are two main objections to the provision for forty-two days’ detention provided for in S42 (4) (b) (ii). The first is deontological; the period of time that any entity or person acting under the law (ultimately dependent on Weber’s definition of the state) should detain anyone else should be kept to the absolute minimum as the potential exists that, before trial, the person is innocent and so their detention is unjust. It is the same logic that insists justice should be speedy; detention before charge should be speedy1.

The second is utilitarian. While I’m sure some people will disagree with me1, I do not think that the current government is an evil monster that wants to abolish all our civil liberties. However, I do not think that the current government should hand a carte blanche to every single, future government. The risks and potential harms of the 42 days’ detention, and the deeply unsatisfactory safeguards – that people could be taken off the street if they threatened a future government (say, 41 days before an election) and held incommunicado – far outweight any potential benefit. Liberty make that point very well in this briefing document (PDF).

I feel the same applies to S64 and S65. Firstly, the idea that someone in the executive should be able to wander into a judicial proceeding and change things is opening the process up to abuse. It is different from making provisions for national security – things can be heard in camera – and, in any case, it should not be possible to change things in the middle of the proceeding, but only a priori. Secondly, the risks are significant as they would allow interference, as I have said, and set a worrying precedent for expansion.

If nothing else, connections will be made between a stroppy Oxfordshire coroner, a move to Gloucestershire for repatriating the bodies of people who have died in Afghanistan and Iraq, a stroppy Gloucestershire coroner and then this bill; it does look as if the Government is trying to cover its tracks.

xD.

1 – the definition, not the blogger.

Bloggerheadsgate continues

Posted on by David Landon Cole

Tim Ireland is back online at b-heads.blogspot.com. In other news, the London Friends of Craig Murray report that Schillings are not going to sue Craig Murray because they don’t want to give him any more publicity. While that’s good for Murray, the words ‘stable door’, ‘horse’ and ‘bolted’ spring to mind.

SpyBlog has also kindly posted Schillings’ IP range. It’s 217.33.207.160 – 217.33.207.191. You can use a widget like Tracksy to see who’s visiting your website.

Tom Wise MEP (UKIP/I&D, East of England) has, under the protection of parliamentary privilege, repeated some of the accusations made against Usmanov by Murray. The Atlantic Free Press has an MP3 of it here. The transcript of Mr Wise’s speech is now online.

xD.

We’re all Bloggerheads now – part two

Posted on by David Landon Cole

I hadn’t really heard of Alisher Usamnov until today; I’d seen his name mentioned on a couple of blogs, but he was barely on the radar. I suspect the same was true for quite a lot of Arsenal fans – perhaps heard a bit about him, maybe read about him on a blog, nothing more.

His SLAPP against Tim Ireland of Bloggerheads has backfired spectacularly. MediaGuardian has picked it up and Boris Johnson’s site is down, too. With no disrespect to Bob Piper (whose politics I vastly prefer to Johnson’s and whose site has also gone down), the prospective Tory candidate for Mayor of London is pretty high profile. I’m sure this will make the Evening Standard, which will alert Londoners straightaway to Usmanov’s, ahem, position regarding free speech.

Mr Eugenides sums things up well:

I don’t give a shit about this character, or Arsenal FC (no offence to any Gooners out there); nor do I share all or even most of Tim Ireland or Craig Murray’s politics. But that’s far from the point. If you can be silenced for calling a businessman a crook, then you can be silenced for calling a politician a crook, too. Then it’s everyone’s problem.

(emphasis added).

Bloggers also react because it immediately affects them; while I don’t want to diminish the importance of what Usamnov has done, I wish as many people would support the Iraqi interpreters.

I hope that this will raise awareness of SLAPPs, as the case of the McLibel Two did. However, I rather doubt that it will prevent Usamnov from gaining the blocking stake in Arsenal that he desires unless pressure is put on existing shareholders not to sell to him because of his contempt for freedom of speech.

xD.

We’re all Bloggerheads now

Posted on by David Landon Cole

One of my favourite blogs, Bloggerheads, has been taken down because of the actions of one Alisher Usamnov. From Chicken Yoghurt:

Tim Ireland’s Bloggerheads site is currently down after his webhost pulled the plug. You can thank the latest Russian (that should be Uzbek) billionaire to reach the UK. The details will come out in due course.[…]

This also means that the family of websites that Tim and Clive (whose site is also down) look after are also currently AWOL. So if you’re missing the online presences of Craig Murray, Bob Piper or prospective candidate for London mayor Boris Johnson, now you know why they’ve gone.

Sufficiently worrying is this that Iain Dale (another blog I like), who does not at all get on with Tim Ireland, has written in support of Bloggerheads.

Other people talking about this: Curious Hamster, Pickled Politics, Harry’s Place, Tim Worstall, Dizzy, Iain Dale, Ten Percent, Blairwatch, Davide Simonetti, Earthquake Cove, Turbulent Cleric (who suggests dropping a line to the FA about Mr Usmanov), Mike Power, Jailhouse Lawyer, Suesam, Devil’s Kitchen, The Cartoonist, Falco, Casualty Monitor, Forever Expat, Arseblog, Drink-soaked Trots (and another), Pitch Invasion, Wonko’s World, Roll A Monkey, Caroline Hunt, Westminster Wisdom, Chris K, Anorak, Mediawatchwatch, Norfolk Blogger, Chris Paul, Indymedia (with a list of Craig Murray’s articles that are currently unavailable), Obsolete, Tom Watson, Cynical Chatter, Reactionary Snob, Mr Eugenides, Matthew Sinclair, The Select Society, Liberal England, Davblog, Peter Gasston Pitch Perfect, Adelaide Green Porridge Cafe, Lunartalks, Tygerland, The Crossed Pond, Our Kingdom, Big Daddy Merk, Daily Mail Watch, Graeme’s, Random Thoughts, Nosemonkey, Matt Wardman, Politics in the Zeros, Love and Garbage, The Huntsman, Conservative Party Reptile, Ellee Seymour, Sabretache, Not A Sheep, Bartholomew’s Notes on Religion, The People’s Republic Of Newport, Life, the Universe & Everything, Arsenal Transfer Rumour Mill, The Green Ribbon, Blood & Treasure, The Last Ditch, Areopagitica, Football in Finland, An Englishman’s Castle, Freeborn John, Eursoc, The Back Four, Rebellion Suck!, Ministry of Truth, ModernityBlog, Beau Bo D’Or, Scots and Independent, The Splund, Bill Cameron, Podnosh, Dodgeblogium, Moving Target, Serious Golmal, Goonerholic, The Spine, Zero Point Nine, Lenin’s Tomb, The Durruti Column, The Bristol Blogger, ArseNews, David Lindsay, Quaequam Blog!, On A Quiet Day…, Kathz’s Blog, England Expects, Theo Spark, Duncan Borrowman, Senn’s Blog, Katykins, Jewcy, Kevin Maguire, Stumbling and Mumbling, Famous for 15 megapixels, Ordovicius, Tom Morris, AOL Fanhouse, Doctor Vee, The Curmudgeonly, The Poor Mouth (109).

Update 23/09/07 2334: other people blogging on this include: 1820, Hangbitch, Crooked Timber, ArseNole, Identity Unknown, Liberty Alone, Amused Cynicism, Clairwil, The Lone Voice, Tampon Teabag, Unoriginalname38, Special/Blown It, The Remittance Man, 18 Doughty Street, Laban Tall, Martin Bright, Spy Blog The Exile, poons, Jangliss, Who Knows Where Thoughts Come From?, Imagined Community, A Pint of Unionist Lite, Poldraw, Disillusioned And Bored, Error Gorilla, Indigo Jo, Swiss Metablog, Kate Garnwen Truemors, Asn14, D-Notice, The Judge, Political Penguin, Miserable Old Fart, Jottings, fridgemagnet, Blah Blah Flowers, J. Arthur MacNumpty, Tony Hatfield, Grendel, Charlie Whitaker, Matt Buck, The Waendel Journal, Marginalized Action Dinosaur, SoccerLens, Toblog, John Brissenden East Lower, Electronic Frontier Foundation, Peter Black AM, Boing Boing, BLTP, Gunnerblog, LFB UK, Liberal Revolution, Wombles, Focus on Sodbury…, Follow The Money, Freedom and Whisky, Melting Man, PoliticalHackUK, Simon Says…, Daily EM, From The Barrel of a Gun, The Fourth Place, The Armchair News Blog, Journalist und Optimist, Bristol Indymedia, Dave Weeden, Up North John, Gizmonaut, Spin and Spinners, Marginalia, Arnique, Heather Yaxley, The Whiskey Priest, On The Beat, Paul Canning, Martin Stabe, Mat Bowles, Pigdogfucker, Rachel North, taking the total to one hundred and ninety three.

xD.

The myth of victims’ rights

Posted on by David Landon Cole

Many blog inches have gone to discussing the case of Learco Chindamo, the murderer of Philip Lawrence. The opposition to Chindamo’s being able to stay in the UK could be charitably described as shrill. Kris Stoke Newington‘s entire post reads

Hang on. This killer does not have a British passport and because of his murder conviction can never get one, yet somehow it is his “human right” to remain in the UK at the end of his sentence?!

It is all a little bit like The Daily Mail. Fortunately, the Ministry of Truth has pointed out some of the Mail‘s, ahem, oversights. Iain Dale asks a simple question in response to the Human Rights Act being cited in allowing Chindamo to remain in the UK – “What about THEIR human rights?” – what about the human rights of the family of the victim, Philip Lawrence.

There is an immediate and very strong answer from none other than Tim Worstall:

[H]e [Chindamo] won an argument under the Human Rights Act that he was entitled to respect for a family life and that removal in his case would be disproportionate. But this was secondary to his case under EU law. Under articles 27 and 28 of the EU Citizens Directive 2004, which took effect last year, an EU citizen can be expelled only on grounds of public policy, public security or public health.

So all the criticism of the Human Rights Act in this case is misplaced.

Nevertheless, people are attacking the Act more and more often and the ghastly spectre of victims’ rights has started to rear its head. There are some things that should be called victims’ rights; amongst these are effective investigation by the police, speedy resolution of the case, support from the counselling part of the police, financial compensation and keeping the media at arms’ length; not all of these apply in every case, and there may be more.

Victims do not, IMHO, have rights against the person who committed a crime and their rights to appropriate treatment and sensitivity certainly do not extend to the penal process. This is for three reasons.

Rights are not zero-sum; that is to say, there is no logical necessity for the duty of care that state owes a victim of crime resulting in that person having rights against the criminal. Put another way, we do not demand ‘an eye for an eye and a tooth for a tooth’ or ‘a lifetime of vengeance for a life cut short’.

Secondly, victims are not special. In the case of Chindamo, I fail to see, if he is such an unpleasant character (which I dispute based on the evidence available) why I should be pleased that the problem is removed to Italy. I do not see why, judicially, a second crime on a person should be feared any more than a first crime on second else.

Thirdly, they lead to unacceptable variations in the law. If someone were to steal a Snoopy stuffed toy, you might say that it was a minor offence. If someone were to steal my Snoopy stuffed toy – my companion since birth – I would be devastated and probably be demanding blood. If I, or I think any person other than a dessicated calculating machine, were the victim of crime, they would immediately become biased to such a point that they could not make a neutral decision; they are partial.

xD.