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February 23, 2006

How to win friends and influence people

Amnesty International - UK government’s "war on terror" policies put people at risk of torture

Moreover, the UK government is trying to undermine the absolute prohibition of torture by seeking to deport people it has labelled "suspected international terrorists" and a "national security threat" to places where they face a real risk of torture or other ill-treatment. It is doing so by negotiating "diplomatic assurances" – in bi-lateral agreements known as Memorandums of Understanding (MoU) – with governments in countries where torture and other ill-treatment are a persistent problem.

Not only is the Government effectively washing its hands of these people, but it is also tacitly encouraging the use of torture in other countries.

All in all, a pretty indefensible situation for a supposedly civilised country, but that hasn't stopped Charlie Falconer from trying to belittle both the report and Amnesty International:

BBC - UK terrorism laws 'cause abuses'

Responding on BBC Radio 4's Today programme, Lord Falconer, the lord chancellor, said: "What Amnesty are doing is in practice disagreeing with us on whether or not the laws are too tough.

"But they should not suggest we are breaking human rights principles because we are complying always with human rights principles."

So presumably the US rendition flights using British airspace are compliant with human rights obligations? Or perhaps it isn't a violation if investigations are "too slow" or only carried out after the government has been put under pressure.

BBC - MPs urge 'terror flights' probe

The UK Government was too slow to start investigating claims that the US has secretly flown terror suspects through the UK, says a powerful group of MPs.

Interestingly enough, in response to the issue, Blair appeared to put himself in a potential Catch-22 situation:

Prime Minister Tony Blair said he knew of no evidence the US had been flying suspects through UK territory.

He said people should not assume the US was doing so without asking permission.

Presumably then, if evidence does come to light of such flights, then the flights had the permission of the British government. Or alternatively senior ministers were kept in complete ignorance. Either way our government has displayed chronic dereliction of duty.

Posted by Clive at 1:41 PM | Comments (0) | TrackBack

February 20, 2006

The Road to Guantanamo - Redux

Following up on last week's post regarding the detention of the Tipton Three and the actors portraying them on returning from the Berlin Film Festical, an interview with one of the actors can be found at The LIP Magazine.

One has to wonder why the mainstream media have given this story zero coverage, especially when it so ably illustrates the dangers inherent in the misguided anti-terror legislation.

Posted by Clive at 4:07 PM | Comments (0) | TrackBack

Falling out of love with Labour

27 years ago the Conservatives came to power under Margaret Thatcher. The Thatcher years constituted, I felt at the time, one of the worst periods in modern British history. Indeed I firmly believed that Thatcher would remain unchallenged as one of Britain's most disliked leaders.

But not any more. I have finally reached the point where inspite of remaining a member of the Labour Party, I find myself unable to vote for a Labour candidate either locally or nationally.

There have been many issues that have built towards this point, but the final straw was the second reading in Parliament of potentially the most dangerous piece of legislation brought before parliament, the Legislative and Regulatory Reform Bill

According to the Government,

The Legislative & Regulatory Reform Bill aims to make it quicker and easier to tackle unnecessary or over-complicated regulation and help bring about a risk-based approach to regulation.

The Bill will help deliver a number of the wide-scale reforms announced in the Better Regulation Action Plan in May 2005.

It will do this primarily by creating a wider law reform power than that in the Regulatory Reform Act 2001. This will allow the Government to deliver reform of outdated or over-complicated legislation more quickly, and enable the mergers of those regulators not currently covered by separate legislation.

A laudable sentiment you might think, enabling the Government to simplify legislation for the benefit of the public and business alike.

Except that it isn't that simple, as this briefing paper from London solicitors Clifford Chance shows.

If this Bill is passed onto the Statute Book then the Government will have enacted a profound and fundamental change in the constitutional nature of this country. The Bill would grant the executive the power to abolish trial by jury, reform or remove what remains of Magna Carta; sack judges, all without recourse to Parliament.

After the pensions raid where prudent Gordon Brown knowingly gambled with our future financial security, after Iraq and WMD, after the burying of the Jenkins Report on Electoral Reform (a referendum on which was a 1997 manifesto commitment), after all this enough is enough.

Along with many others, I won't be voting Labour and beyond that, will be pushing for true constitutional reform.

Not Little England - Getting New Labour out of office

Chicken Yoghurt - Chain of command

Talk Politics - Where liberty is, there is my country

BlairWatch - The Tipping Point

Nick Barlow - And if we don't do it, who else will?

Perfect.co.uk - The tipping point?

Posted by Clive at 10:59 AM | Comments (8) | TrackBack

February 18, 2006

The Road to Guantanamo

Received this from Craig Murray this morning:

Acclaimed film director Michael Winterbottom ("A Cock and Bull Story", "24 Hour Party People", "Welcome to Sarajevo") was showing his new film, "The Road to Guantanamo", at the Berlin Film Festival, where it has won a number of top awards.

The film traces the true story of three Muslim friends from Birmingham who were picked up as aliens in Afghanistan by US forces and ended up in Guantanamo for three years, where they suffered brutal and humiliating treatment.

Extensive interrogation established that they had no connection with al-Qaida, and despite their plight being ignored by British authorities, eventually they were returned home. The UK media covered live the return of these "Suspected terrorists" and the massive police convoy that brought them in to Ventral London for questioning. Their release after the UK police also found they had no connection with terrorism was, naturally, hardly mentioned.

Last week the three travelled to the Berlin Festival with the Winterbottom party, and were arrested yesterday under the Prevention of Terrorism Act as they returned with the Winterbottom Party. They were held by Special Branch and questioned for several hours about where they had been and who they had met. They were also questioned on Michael Winterbottom's politics.

Even more worrying, the three actors who portrayed them in the film were also arrested and questioned. The actors have no particular political or religious affiliation and were also arrested apparently purely on the basis that they were Asian. None of the white members of the group were arrested.

Following legal intervention by Gareth Peirce, the group were eventually released. Special Branch claimed they had not been arrested, merely detained under the Prevention of Terrorism Act.

On Saturday the party will be returning to Berlin again to accept the film's awards. We wait to see what will happen when they come home this time.

"The Road to Guantanamo" will premiere on Channel 4 on 9 March.

Craig Murray

Posted by Clive at 11:45 AM | Comments (3) | TrackBack

February 3, 2006

Bring me the head of Methuselah

So far Hillary Armstrong has survived the fiasco in which the Government's Religeous Hatred bill was defeated, but someone somewhere is going to hvae to pay for Blair's humiliation.

And who better than Bob Marshall Andrews, habitual rebel and persistant thorn in Blair's side regarding Iraq.

The Independent - Rebel ringleader faces Labour plot to oust him from seat

Senior ministers are seeking to punish a leading rebel backbencher following two embarrassing defeats in the Commons this week over the Racial and Religious Hatred Bill.

"We don't mind him voting against the Government, but colluding with the Tories is beyond the pale," one Labour insider said.

Colluding with the Tories? Looks like a classic case of finding a scapegoat to cover up Armstrong's incompetance, Blair's blundering and - for a change - a slick move by the LibDems.

But if collusion with the Tories is such a no-no, then maybe the Blair government should call for its deselection if it only manages to get its education reforms passed with the support of the Conservatives?

Rather than calling for the removal of one of the more in-touch MPs, it would make more sense for the Government to take a reality check, appreciate that it now needs the support of Parliament and start to behave like a democratic body. It is all very well Blair wringing his hands over defeat, but he had 8 years of massive majorities in which to implement key legislation. It is no one's fault but Blair's that his timidity led him to squander his first 2 terms as Prime Minister.

And no one's fault but Armstrong's that the Government was defeated again. If a head must roll, it must be Hillary's neck, not Bob's, that is placed across the block.

UPDATE

Over at Bloggerheads, Tim is ironically calling for Bob's arrest for an unathorised protest against the Government with the Whitehall exclusion zone.

Posted by Clive at 1:27 PM | Comments (0) | TrackBack

February 1, 2006

Hidden motives

Less than a week has passed since Defence Minister Dr John Reid announce the deployment of a further 3,300 British troops to Afghanistan, and at a conference in London, it appears to have been agreed that they will be there until at least 2010.

The Guardian - British troops to stay in Afghanistan until at least 2010

But the document agreed in London yesterday, the Afghan Compact, says that the international force will promote security and stability in all regions of Afghanistan "through [to] end-2010". It says that by then, the Afghan government is aiming to have established a force of its own of about 70,000.

One can only hope that the international force makes a better job of promoting security and stability over the next four years than it has done since the original invasion.

The Guardian - Blair's latest expedition is a Lawrence of Arabia fantasy

The talk in London yesterday was of punishing Afghans for growing so successfully what Britons consume so eagerly. When the Taliban were in charge things were different. The regime stopped virtually all poppy cultivation in 2001, a fact verified by UN monitors. Output that year was negligible. The Taliban's Mullah Amir Mohammed Haqqani pleaded at the time for western aid for distressed farmers, whose income from substituted wheat and vegetables was a quarter that from poppies. But he declared that "whether we get assistance or not, poppy growing will never be allowed again in our country." There is no evidence that this ascetic policy was not sincere.

Meanwhile, rumours are being heard of the possibility of an early exit from Iraq for British forces:

BBC - Straw hinting at Iraq withdrawal

Foreign Secretary Jack Straw has said he expects "good news" in the next 12 months about withdrawing British troops from Iraq.

He said a timescale was not yet available, but "active discussions" about withdrawal were being held.

And all this comes at the same time as British forces mourn their 100th death since the invasion of Iraq.

One thing is clear, any early exit from Iraq is likely to create just as unholy mess in that country as the over-eager move from Afghanistan to Iraq did in the former. Whether or not you approve of the invasion of Iraq, it is incumbent upon us as an occupying power to ensure an orderly and safe transition. For those conditions to arise within the next 12 months seems wholly unrealistic.

So why is Jack Straw dropping hints of a British withdrawal from Iraq? Possibly in an effort to promote a feel-good factor amongst rebel MPs at home, at a time when some of Blair's key legislation is in danger of being sunk? Or maybe because they might just, eventually, be needed somewhere else?

Posted by Clive at 1:03 PM | Comments (0) | TrackBack