For the many Muslims incarcerated in legal limbo in the UK and their terrified families and friends, darkness began to fall almost as soon as the first news about the events of September 11th and World Trade Centre broke, initiating America's latest incarnation of its 'War on Terror'. The shadow hasn't lifted since.
The most elementary requirement of legal certainty demands that you know the
case against you. And yet considerable numbers of young men, and some women,
are being held in our prisons without any idea of why they are there. They
are detained under yet more provisions, for the present deemed lawful, which
either forbid or demand no meaningful explanation being given to the
accused. The concept of secret evidence and accusations so vague and
undefined as to be meaningless has now bedded down in our system of justice.
Gareth Peirce, human rights lawyer, December 2007 [1]
[1-camp x-ray US run concentration camp.jpg] Mention the words 'Guantanamo
Bay' to anyone, and it is virtually guaranteed that they won't be picturing a
coastal town located in the Guantanamo province of Cuba in the far south
east corner of the Island which, among other things, is home to one of
Cuba's national parks. Originally valued by the United States Government as
a point of strategic value to its Navy in protecting the Panama Canal, the
US took control of Camp X-Ray, the naval base at Guantanamo Bay in 1903;
control which it has retained ever since. However, since the 1990s, the US
has utilised the naval base as a 'holding camp' [2] ; first for Cuban
refugees and from January 2002, as a detention camp for Muslim prisoners,
judged by the US to be "illegal enemy combatants" [3] , which enables it to
employ practices that would be illegal were the prisoners detained in the
USA. This is the image that will come to mind for most, upon hearing the
words "Guantanamo Bay".
The United Kingdom government has often murmured [4] that it would like to
see the detention camps at Guantanamo Bay closed down. In a letter
responding to the concerns of a J7 researcher, Home Office Minister Tony
McNulty said:
We have made it clear that we think Guantanamo Bay should be closed;
President Bush said that he would like to close Guantanamo Bay as soon as
practicable......the UK has played an active role in this process and we
secured the release and return of all British nationals held at the
detention facility in 2004 and 2005; last year we secured the release and
return of four detainees who were previously legally resident in the UK.
Source: J7 People's Investigation Forum [5]
What is not apparent from this statement is that in 2006 the UK government,
in response to the US government's offer to return nearly all remaining UK
residents, refused to accept them, with ministers stating that they had no
legal right to return to the UK. Additionally, according to this report:
Documents obtained by the Guardian show US authorities are demanding that
the detainees be kept under 24-hour surveillance if set free - restrictions
that are dismissed by the British as unnecessary and unworkable.
Although all are accused of terrorist involvement, Britain says there is no
intelligence to warrant the measures Washington wants, and it lacks the
resources to implement them. "They do not pose a sufficient threat," said
the head of counter-terrorism at the Home Office.
Source: The Guardian [6]
It was only in August 2007, after Gordon Brown was handed Tony Blair's prime
ministerial position, that the government performed a volte-face [7] and
formally requested the return of the remaining men held at the detention
facility.
For the purposes of this article it is important to note that the Home
Office did not consider the Guantanamo detainees a "sufficient threat". It
is also interesting to note that the Home Office refused to issue passports
[8] to four former Guantanamo detainees, namely Martin Mubanga [9] , Feroz
Abbasi [10] , Richard Belmar [11] and Moazzam Begg [12] . The decisions to
revoke the passports of these men was taken under the Royal Prerogative [13]
power which enables decisions to be taken without any parliamentary
consultation [14] or scrutiny. The Royal Prerogative power was also used to
revoke the passport of Canadian Abdurahman Khadr [15] .
Furthermore, the Home Office regularly, and with impunity, impounds innocent
Muslims in UK prisons pending deportation to countries where they face
almost certain torture - and in some cases death - on the vague basis of an
alleged 'threat to national security [16] '. The Home Office does this in
the total absence of any evidence that could actually convict them in a UK
court. In addition, innocent Muslims are regularly impounded and interned in
UK prisons, not because the government considers them to be a 'threat to
national security' but because another country might consider them to be a
threat to theirs [17] . In Long Lartin prison in Worcestershire alone, just
one of many prisons in the UK holding innocent Muslim detainees, against
many of whom the State has not a jot of evidence, there are at least six men
facing deportation, and at least five appealing against extradition orders
to the United States. In each situation, captives face a very different
process with the same potential outcome.
One only has to consider the soaring rate of attacks against Muslims [18] -
and indeed anyone of Asian appearance [19] - in the wake of the explosions
in London on July 7th 2005 to imagine what life is like in prison for a
Muslim [20] . Prisoner abuses at HMP Frankland include Eesa 'Dhiren' Barot
[21] suffering horrifically painful injuries from having boiling oil poured
over him by another inmate (he later requested that the charges against the
perpetrator be dropped [22] ), whose solicitor wrote of terrible examples of
Islamophobia and racism [23] facing Muslim inmates and detainees. Muslims in
other prisons [24] suffer the same kind of treatment. Whereas it seems to be
a policy in the UK prison service to move prisoners who come under attack
from other inmates [25] , when Omar Khyam, a Muslim inmate at Frankland who
had been involved in an extremely high profile trial [26] came under attack,
he was simply kept in isolation [27] at the same prison. Later, the Daily
Mail would twist the situation completely, claiming that these particular
prisoners demanded to be moved because their fellow inmates were "too white
[28] ", rather than citing the genuine reason; that they were living in fear
of their own safety and had merely asked to be treated in the same manner as
other prisoners at risk of attack. Mr. Barot's solicitor made the point [29]
at the time he was attacked, "We are not asking for preferential treatment
for Muslim prisoners - what we are requesting is that Muslim prisoners
should be afforded the same protection as other prisoners".
Incredibly, other media coverage turns the worrying situation of Muslim
prisoners coming under attack into one where prisons are under threat from
'al-Qaeda' [30] .
[2-long lartin prison.jpg] [31] In Long Lartin prison, the Muslim detainees are
kept in a separate wing from other prisoners. The wing has come in for
bitter criticism by convicts elsewhere in the prison who feel that the
detainees have a "good deal". However, the detainees face the same
restrictions as Category A prisoners [32] , despite the fact that they have
never been convicted of any crime in the UK, terrorism-related or otherwise.
They are not allowed to receive magazines or books from 'outside', for
instance and in Belmarsh, it is prohibited to send just about any item to a
detainee other than a letter - which cannot include a stamped addressed
envelope for return, as detainees are not allowed to receive items of
stationary. Faraj Hassan, a former prison detainee now living under a
control order, has told of the human rights violations and abuse which he
regularly experienced [33] in Belmarsh and Brixton prisons. Shockingly, on
one occasion, he was shown a fatwa at Belmarsh, signed by the Muslim Council
of Britain, giving permission for staff to perform humiliating and
unnecessary strip searches on Muslim detainees.
In August 2005, solicitors Birnberg Peirce & Partners stated of Full Sutton
that the so-called secure unit was covered in cobwebs and that it remained
unfit for humans. Ten years previously the Special Secure Unit at Full
Sutton had been closed down [34] on the basis that it was unfit for human
habitation. A Council of Europe investigation team who visited Long Lartin
and Full Sutton prisons warned that the restrictive, isolated conditions
under which prisoners were held placed their mental and physical health in
danger, even cautioning that a mass suicide would not be a surprising
outcome.
'SPECIAL' COURTS , 'SPECIAL ADVOCATES' AND SECRET EVIDENCE
Anyone with a social conscience would agree that detaining people without
giving them a specific reason and giving them no opportunity to prove their
innocence goes against all the principles of democracy and freedom that this
government proudly tells its citizens they will not let `the terrorists [35]
' destroy. No evidence to support the allegations is required to be shown,
in the cases of both those facing deportation and those facing extradition -
either to the accused themselves or their legal representatives. In the case
of the detainees threatened with deportation to face torture, this luxury is
only afforded to appointed `special advocates' in an extraordinary secret
court procedure known as the Special Immigration Appeals Commission [36]
(SIAC), who are not permitted to have contact with the appellant or his [37]
lawyers [37] . In essence, the defence has no possibility of presenting any
sort of argument because the State simply refuses to allow them to know the
charges they face. How, exactly, can any kind of defence argument be formed
when the person concerned has no right to know what evidence the precise
case against them rests on? It can't.
The men in question came to the UK in desperation, many having already
suffered torture in their countries of origin. One Algerian detainee,
Mustapha Taleb - also known as Detainee Y [38] , arrived in the UK in March
2000 to claim political asylum. After being exonerated of all charges
relating to the now infamous `Ricin case' along with his co-defendants, he
had a mere five months to recover from the trauma of being imprisoned for 28
months for a crime he did not commit (indeed, a `crime' which appears to
have existed solely for the convenient purpose of making the case for the
illegal invasion of Iraq [39] ) before finding himself manhandled back into
jail for allegedly being a threat to UK security. He discovered during a
SIAC hearing that the very same 'evidence' that was used in an attempt to
convict him [32] of involvement in the Ricin case was being used to justify
his imprisonment and deportation, despite the fact that this absurd case had
collapsed in a UK criminal court. Two of the jurors in the Ricin case were
so horrified [40] to discover what had happened to a man that they had
cleared in a court of law that they now campaign on his behalf, along with
organisations such as Amnesty International and Cageprisoners. Mr. Taleb
remains incarcerated in the UK, despite one of his co-defendants in the same
case escaping deportation [41] .
Even a short visit to the Cageprisoners [42] website will discover many
other similar cases, all of which are a gross affront to human rights. One
case is that of Hussain Al-Samamra [43] , who faces deportation to Jordan,
where he will almost certainly face the torture that he escaped from in
desperation in 2001, the very reason he claimed asylum in the first place.
Mr. Al-Samamra had no access to the evidence used to form the case against
him and therefore had no opportunity to construct a defence. It is evident
from a number of other similarly outrageous cases on the SIAC website [36]
that the SIAC process is heavily weighted in favour of the State. It is this
legislative framework that facilitates the State acting out whatever its
pre-determined political will might be, against whomever it so chooses.
The British government is no stranger [44] to deporting asylum seekers under
inhumane circumstances, [45] but those arrested on suspicion of involvement
in terrorism and jailed immediately, are treated exceptionally harshly.
Hussain Al-Samamra was not permitted to see his wife and child for a year;
many friends and family members 'fail' the vetting process to obtain
clearance for visits during their incarceration so not only is liberty lost,
there is no opportunity to have contact with loved ones. Wives and families
are often left to struggle alone, too fearful of the stigma of their
circumstances to allow themselves to be helped. Some detainees have wished
for death as a release from the purgatory of living in perpetual, imprisoned
limbo.
Detainee H, an Algerian granted refugee status by the UK authorities [46] in
1993, who had been arrested in 2002 and detained in Belmarsh without trial
until March 2005, had only five short months in which to enjoy his 'freedom'
under control orders. In the immediate aftermath of the July 7th 2005
attacks, he - along with the eight other men also released from Belmarsh in
March 2005 - was dragged from his bed in the early hours and taken away by
police and Immigration Officials with no word to their families regarding
where they were being taken and why. When supporters of the detainees acting
on the behalf of their distraught families were finally able to access the
relevant Home Office department, they were first told that the solicitors
for the men would know where they were - even though they did not. When this
was communicated to the Immigration Department the response was that the
captives would be taken care of - with the spectacularly unreassuring and
these days quite sinister qualification, "This is Britain, you know." The
Home Office finally responded.....naming captives and advising the families
to contact the Salvation Army's missing person's service [47] in order to
find out where they had been taken.
Detainee H finally left Britain for Algeria in January 2007, despite
attempts by Amnesty International to prevent this [48] , leaving his wife
and baby daughter behind. Upon arrival in Algeria Detainee H was detained
almost immediately despite assurances from the UK and Algeria that this
would not happen. He is now serving a three year sentence in an Algerian
prison, with the UK and Algerian authorities denying he was ever given
amnesty - a SIAC judge putting this down to "a muddle rather than deceit
[49] ". His wife has been refused a visa to visit him. When Detainee H gave
a statement detailing his treatment upon returning to Algeria, as part of
defence case for another detainee facing the same process, it was dismissed
in a SIAC ruling [49] .
[3-harry maurice roberts - daily mirror.jpg] Given the use of the Special Advocate
process against foreign nationals, British nationals might think they need
not worry about such a thing, However, the government also has other uses
for 'special advocates [37] ', Special Advocates were primarily created to
represent foreign nationals appealing against immigration and later, after
the introduction of the Anti-terrorism, Crime and Security Act 2001 [50] ,
foreign terror suspects detained without charge or trial. Harry Roberts [51]
, who was convicted in 1966 for the murders of three policemen and sentenced
to thirty years imprisonment, is still behind bars twelve years after his
tariff expired [52] on the basis of 'secret evidence'. Neither Mr. Roberts
nor his solicitors have been allowed access. The parole board employed the
use of a special advocate to examine this secret evidence. Of course, the
special advocate is not allowed to speak to either Mr. Roberts nor his legal
representatives about 'the evidence' that is keeping Mr Roberts in jail.
In February 2008, news broke of conversations between Tooting MP Sadiq Khan
and Babar Ahmad [53] being bugged whilst Mr. Ahmad was detained at Woodhill
Prison. Ahmad and Khan were being covertly recorded by anti-terror
operatives [54] , allegedly without government knowledge. [55] At the time,
much was made of how terrible it was that anyone might dare to bug an MP,
thereby contravening the Wilson Doctrine [56] which dictates that MPs and
peers not be bugged. At least, not without the express permission from the
Prime Minister. Mr Khan was not pleased [57] and threatened to take his
evidence of bugged meetings, phone taps, and being followed, to the European
Court of Human Rights. Levels of left, right, liberal and libertarian
outrage were raised by the idea that an MP might be treated as a common
criminal, or a 'terrorist' by association, yet barely a murmur was heard
about the other focus of the story, prisoner Babar Ahmad. As if further
evidence were required to suggest that, while the bugging of an MP might be
a rare exception, the bugging of prisoners is a rather more routine function
of the State, Harry Roberts' solicitor, Simon Creighton, said that a
government lawyer had inadvertently sent [58] two transcripts of covertly
recorded telephone conversations between he and his client. This was in
addition to revelations that hundreds of lawyers and prison visitors had
been secretly recorded [59] , cases which didn't feature MPs and therefore
didn't warrant similar levels of outrage.
The same day that 56 people lost their lives in London, Harry Roberts
suffered his own personal catastrophe. On 7th July 2005 [51] his appeal
against the use of secret evidence to block his long overdue release was
rejected and he remains imprisoned to this day, still prohibited from
knowing why he remains to this day deprived of his freedom. Roberts, a
British citizen who served his country as a Lance Corporal during the
Malayan 'Emergency [60] ', continues to be detained long after his sentence
ended through the use of the same loaded methods created for use against
foreign nationals [61] . Roberts' extended detention on the basis of
"national security" was used to set, and continues to set, a legal precedent
that paves the way for routine use of the special advocate process in cases
brought against British citizens. Mr. Roberts himself is certainly aware of
the dangers of extending secret hearings and the hypocrisy of the UK
government's use of such procedures, observing, "Surely this is 'double
standards' - to castigate the Americans for something we are doing in
England [62] ". And therein lies the rub - or rather, one of the rubs.
HYPOCRISY, SECRECY & STEALTH
It is somewhat ironic that the Government's reasoning for originally
refusing the return of Guantanamo detainees under the conditions demanded by
the US was that the captives did not pose a "sufficient threat" to warrant
surveillance [63] - or apparently even a common judicial process [64] .
However, they must have been considered "sufficient threat" for the UK to
deem it acceptable for them to moulder away in a prison camp with no access
to legal representation that would enable them to find out and defend
against the crimes of which they stood accused. What meets the criteria for
a "sufficient" threat is anybody's guess in a country where men are
manhandled away from their families to be spirited off by the Home Office
and where five men had their convictions under the Terrorism Act 2000
quashed [65] for the exact same non-offence for which only a month later
another man was jailed. [66] That the UK won't consider individuals
'suspected' of terrorism involvement a "sufficient" enough threat to
actually warrant an open, legal trial, but will certainly consider them a
"sufficient" enough threat to act as judge, jury and executioner on their
suspicions is doubly ironic.
[4-terrorism act 2000/2006.jpg] Tony Blair used the concept of "sufficiency" in
a slightly different context in an article written for The Times in May 2007,
where he primarily defended control orders as a "much milder remedy" than
detention in jail, describing them as "imposing some limits on the
individual's freedom". Control orders, for those not familiar, came about
after the Law Lords' ruling in December 2004 that the detention of the nine
men - of which Detainee H, mentioned earlier in this article was one - at
Belmarsh prison without trial, breached fundamental human rights. Mr. Blair
bitterly recalled the judgement made at the time, that there was "a greater
risk to Britain through the abrogation of the foreign suspect's civil
liberties than through terrorism."
Control Orders do not merely impose "some" limits on an individual's
freedom; the individual is effectively imprisoned in his own home, which
makes family life extremely difficult, and for single men, a supportive
social life impossible. At any given time, with no notice, they are to
expect (among other things) to allow "officials" to search their homes [67]
, have their phone, internet access and contact with other people in general
restricted, their own home restricted, a 24 hour ban on all movements and
requirements to be at specified places or in a particular area at certain
times on certain days. In the light of this, it is virtually
incomprehensible that Mr. Blair then says that control orders were "much
weaker than we wanted, perpetually diluted by opposition amendments,
constantly attacked on civil liberty grounds."
Mr. Blair goes on to give away the rules of the game that he had changed,
stating:
After September 11, 2001, in common with many other nations, we passed new
antiterror laws. In the aftermath of such an outrage it was relatively easy
to do. We gave ourselves the ability, in exceptional circumstances, to
detain foreign nationals who we believed were plotting terrorism but against
whom there was insufficient evidence to prosecute. It was an important
power. They were, of course, free to leave Britain. But we wouldn't let them
be free here. The ability to detain foreign nationals gave our services the
ability to focus even more resources on the surveillance of British
nationals who were a threat. It also sent out a strong signal of intent.
Source: The Times [68]
Where there is "insufficient evidence" to prosecute, or there is not enough
of a "sufficient threat" posed, then in the eyes of the law, detainees are
innocent and should be protected by habeus corpus [69] . However, despite
the grave concerns raised in 2005 by the Director of Public Prosecutions
[70] that secret courts would pave the way for miscarriages of justice,
ingrained traditions of 'British Justice' continue to be turned on their
heads. Judicial processes have become ever more covert, including the
existence of secret family courts [71] along with recent proposals to hold
criminal trials without juries [72] and to hold secret inquests [73] - the
latter of which has caused concern to the bereaved families of those killed
on July 7th 2005 [74] but also to UK Parliamentary Joint Committee on Human
Rights [73] .
Such processes are, of course, in addition to the Inquiries Act 2005 [75] ;
legislation which was rushed through parliament exactly one month before the
July 7th atrocities, effectively ending the concept of independent and/or
public inquiries. In times when the public most require answers about
matters of great import, the State instead affects less transparency and
plumbs greater depths of secrecy, allowing the public to know as little as
possible about its actions and operations. All on the catch-all basis of
"national security" [76] .
Recent legislative proposals pushed by the State also have the inquest
process in their sights and the State is seeking to legislate itself
ultimate control over inquests and coroners. Once again, the sole reason
given is 'national security'. Already it has been suggested that the 7/7
inquests -- an event from which much political capital has been made by all
parties -- and the extra-judicial execution by the State of Jean Charles de
Menezes will be held in secret.
EXTRADITIONS, RENDITIONS AND LIES
Another piece of legislation which gives rise to justifiable concerns is the
Extradition Act 2003; [77] in particular Part 2 of the Act, which covers
extradition to Category 2 territories [78] . As the wording of the Act
states, this part deals with extradition from the United Kingdom to the
territories designated for the purposes of this Part by order made by the
Secretary of State. As the Crown Prosecution Service guidelines [79] state
in bold text, the district judge in a given case must be satisfied that the
request contains admissible evidence of the offence sufficient to establish
a prima facie case against the person. This requirement does not apply in
respect of extradition requests from the USA, Canada, Australia and New
Zealand.
Here is the crux of the matter, and the reasoning behind the controversy
that this Act has engendered. In the first place, these four named nations,
only three of which are part of the Commonwealth, are not obliged or
required to submit prima facie evidence when requesting the extradition of
British citizens or foreign nationals residing in Britain. In other words,
at present, the United States is able to request any amount of British
individuals to be sent over and don't even need to say why. Even worse,
there is no reciprocal arrangement between the two countries; if Britain
wishes to extradite a US citizen or resident, the government is required by
the US to provide evidence justifying the request.
[5-haroon rashid aswat.jpg] In the case of Haroon Aswat, the US Justice
Department blocked attempts by Seattle prosecutors [80] to charge him in
relation to suspected 'terrorist activity' in Oregon in 2002. Yet, in the aftermath
of the July 7th 2005 attacks in London, amid a flurry of hysterical [81] and
groundless [82] media coverage of his alleged and unproven connection to the
July 7th suspects [83] , he was arrested in late July 2005, in Zambia,
having previously resided in South Africa [84] . It was reported that the US
wanted to render Mr. Aswat to a third, undisclosed country [85] , as opposed
to directly to the US from Africa, several weeks before he was arrested, but
were unable to do so due to his British citizenship and possession of UK
papers. It was allegedly [86] whilst this diplomatic argument occurred that
Mr. Aswat left South Africa for Zambia, where he was then arrested under
Zambian immigration laws [87] . He was deported, rather than extradited to
Britain, and the UK authorities have never arrested or charged Mr. Aswat
either in connection with the events of July 7th 2005 or any other suspected
terrorist activity. A 'source' at Scotland Yard said rather dismissively,
"He may be of interest to us in the future but he is not our priority at the
moment [88] ".
It is completely unclear therefore, at which point Mr. Aswat was supposed to
have been arrested in Pakistan [89] - the Pakistani authorities denied that
this had happened and according to one report, men with identical names may
have been detained [90] . A point extremely worthy of note, especially as it
was also reported that the man detained in Pakistan was in fact a ceramics
salesman from London with a "similar" name [91] .
At present, Mr. Aswat is detained in a UK prison appealing against his
extradition order to the United States. His solicitor, Gareth Pierce, stated
on the same day as the original extradition ruling that the US had provided
no evidence of Mr. Aswat's involvement in terrorist activity:
She said: "The only witness against him in the United States was threatened
that if he didn't plead guilty and co-operate he would be put under military
detention.
"It shows the extent to which the United States is manipulating evidence and
pressuring witnesses. All that is said about Haroon Aswat is that in 1999 he
travelled to a farm in the US which was considering setting up a Muslim
community and, after a few days, left. That's it -- that's the evidence."
Source: The Times [92]
In an earlier hearing, a lawyer for the US had stated that the accusations
made against Mr. Aswat by the US meant that he faces up to fifteen years in
jail, but also that "the charges could change [87] and he could face a
longer term of imprisonment."
[6-babar ahmad.jpg] Other cases not involving the US, but where equally flimsy
allegations are all that is required by the UK to approve extraditions are
just as concerning; such as that of Farid Hilali, extradited to Spain in
February 2008 to face charges of being a member of a terrorist group -
despite the fact that the UK courts expressly said that it would be illegal
[93] for Spain to extradite him on those grounds. Mr. Hilali's so-called
co-conspirator had previously had his conviction quashed [94] for
involvement in the same case, the Spanish Supreme court had ruled telephone
intercept evidence as inadmissable because not only had it been obtained
unlawfully but did not, in any case, support the inference that the two had
been conspiring together and the Spanish Prosecutor attempted to mislead the
UK courts by alleging Mr. Hilali's involvement in the 'Hamburg Cell [95] ',
which had already been refuted by German courts [96] . Yet off to Spain Mr.
Hilali has gone, making a mockery of the "trust" accorded to European
countries in such cases.
Other men facing extradition to the United States along with Haroon Aswat
include Babar Ahmad [97] , the victim of bugging in Woodhill prison
mentioned above and human rights campaigner Syed Talha Ahsan [98] , both of
whom face charges of providing 'material' to terrorists [99] . The charges
have been brought by the US purely on the basis of alleged Internet
activity; neither man has ever set foot on US soil. In 2004, a US attorney
made the quite mind boggling statement [100] in relation to Mr. Ahmad's
case, "If you're supporting the Taleban and the Taleban is killing American
soldiers, we're alleging you're conspiring to kill American citizens
abroad." Perhaps one day the Iraqi people might apply this type of logic to
UK taxpayers; it would certainly be interesting to see the outcome of such a
case.
QUIS CUSTODIET IPSOS CUSTODES?
Given the appalling human rights record of the United States of America, of
which prison camps such as Camp X-Ray and Abu Ghraib [101] are only a part,
this is unsurprisingly a terrifying prospect for captives facing
extradition. As with deportations, diplomatic notes are often used as
assurance of human rights, but there are no guarantees that these will be
adhered to. For instance, there is nothing to stop the CIA advising the U.S
government to change its position and designate a given individual as an
enemy combatant, where he would, of course, face the kind of treatment that
the Home Office condemns at detention camps, where incidences of
maltreatment and torture of the detainees are well documented [102] .
[7-abu ghraib.jpg] The recent admittance by the US authorities [103] that it had
employed the use of torture to interrogate terrorism suspects and the news
that the US president has vetoed a [104] Congressional Bill that would have
prohibited the employment of torture [104] during the interrogation of
terrorism suspects, shows that it is clear that there is no guarantee
whatsoever that detainees will be treated objectively and humanely. The CIA
director Michael Hayden's supposedly `reassuring' statement that the CIA
will "continue to operate [105] within the law [105] " carries very little
weight when the 'law' states that torture and inhumane methods are
acceptable. No one should forget that it isn't so long ago that the
practices employed by the US against terror suspects; hypothermia, long
periods of standing, sleep deprivation and multiple sessions of
waterboarding -- cleverly renamed, with its former nomenclature of 'water
torture' all but forgotten -- among others, were classified by the [106] US
as war crimes when perpetuated by the Nazis [106] . The United States has a
history of convicting others of torture in cases where the practice of water
torture was used. After World War II, the US organised and participated in
the International Military Tribunal where senior members of the Japanese
government and military were charged and convicted largely upon the basis
that they practised water torture [107] . In 1983, the county sheriff of San
Jacinto, Texas, was convicted of civil rights violations for using water
torture on suspects. Upon sentencing, the District Judge told the former
sheriff, "The operation down there would embarrass the dictator of a country
[108] ."
Adopting as your own the characteristics of the very thing you profess to
despise in no way confers any kind of moral superiority. This applies to
both the UK and US governments' hypocrisy in their imperialistic actions of
warfare for peace and democracy by death in the Middle East. It includes the
hypocrisy of the UK government, media and senior legal figures for
'attacking' George Bush's detention camps when the liberty, safety and
fundamental rights of UK residents are breached in the same unacceptable
manner - sanctioned and imposed by the State itself. The UK government has
demonstrated a breathtaking lack of regard for human life and liberty with
its 'anti-terror' measures. In November 2004, a Special Advocate before SIAC
publicly resigned, making his reasons for doing so abundantly clear:
The detainees have not been targeted simply as a group of foreigners
suspected of involvement in international terrorism. The overwhelming focus
has been on the fact that they are Muslim.....this is how the war against
terrorism is often portrayed. It produces hatred and attacks not just on
Muslims, but on the whole Asian community. It has already eroded the
confidence of British Muslims and must, in the longer term, affect social
cohesion. More importantly this kind of law alienates Britain in the
international arena. The solution to the perceived threat of international
terrorism is not, in my view, to pass new laws, which apply arbitrary arrest
and indefinite detention without trial to every terrorist suspect, British
and foreign alike.The point was trenchantly made by Lord Hoffman in his
speech:
"I said that the power of detention is at present confined to foreigners and
I would not like to give the impression that all that was necessary was to
extend the power to UK citizens as well. The real threat to the life of the
nation, in the sense of people living in accordance with its traditional
laws and political values comes not from terrorism but from laws like
these."
Thursday's judgement in the House of Lords supports and vindicates my view.
I now feel that whatever difference I might make as a special advocate on
the inside is outweighed by the operation of a law, fundamentally flawed and
contrary to our deepest notions of justice. My role has been altered to
provide a false legitimacy to indefinite detention without knowledge of the
accusations being made and without any kind of criminal charge or trial. For
me this is untenable. No other country in Europe has felt it necessary to
follow this course and derogate from Article 5 of the European Convention.
Britain should not stand apart from the rest of Europe on this issue.
Such a law is an odious blot on our legal landscape and for reasons of
conscience I feel that I must resign.
Source: Ian Macdonald QC via Garden Court Chambers [109]
The Law Lords' decision in December 2005 that 'evidence' extracted under
torture was inadmissable in SIAC courts [110] - countermanding a previous
ruling that such evidence could be used provided that Britain itself was not
involved in the torture process [111] - should have saved the Belmarsh
detainees from being sent back to countries which employed the use of
torture. It didn't.
No `terror threat' to this country justifies detention without trial and
condemnation to torture abroad - the government is clearly correct to assert
that it won't let `the terrorists' destroy `our way of life [112] '. It's
far too busy doing the destroying itself with the added propaganda coup
value of fostering fear and suspicion of Muslims.
Daniel Guedella, a legal representative for some of the individuals
mentioned in this article makes the stark observation,
This government cannot parade itself on the international stage with its
claimed commitments to democracy and the rule of law whilst at home its
contempt for such principles has never been more evident than in its
treatment of these men and their families. The Prime Minister is wrong. The
rules of the game have not changed. The rules cannot be changed for the
purposes of political grandstanding at the expense of the most vulnerable
and innocent amongst us.
Daniel Guedella, Birnberg Peirce and Partners
Imagine a day in your life - of no particular value purely due to its sheer
availability and mass quantity. Then imagine it was the last day you knew
freedom. Imagine being Detainee H, who went to bed on a summer's evening and
didn't wake up in his own home again. Imagine being Hussain Al-Samamra who
spent an entire year waiting to see his daughter who'd been only three days
old the last time he'd held her in his arms; the realisation of nine months
of future plans, who now can only mourn all the precious days he assumed
he'd spend caring for her with his wife. Imagine your own home being not a
place of safety and sanctuary, but your own personal prison, where you
couldn't even arrange something as simple as meeting a friend for a coffee
or doing the shopping when you wanted. Imagine optimistically applying and
being accepted onto a college course, then having to give it up when you
realised that everyone on the course would have to know you were a 'terror
suspect'. Imagine how it feels to stumble blindly through a closed 'court'
process, unable to speak to the person who has the luxury of knowing what
you don't; the grounds on which you've been taken away from everything that
you knew, whilst the judge sits sighing, having the privilege of knowing
exactly what the outcome will be. Imagine being arrested and thrown into
jail in one country because another country has demanded your presence,
conferring 'suspect' status upon you immediately. Imagine how it would feel
to sit alone in a small cell day after day and year after year, knowing that
you don't even have the option or means to prove your innocence beyond doubt
because there is "insufficient evidence" to charge you with a crime - and
because of this, knowing that the general assumption is likely to be that
'there's no smoke without fire'. Especially when there's a 'war on terror'
to win.
In September 2006, Tony Blair described the "global struggle against
terrorism" as being "without mercy or limit [113] ".
Without limit....what's happening to Harry Roberts, and the incalculable
amount of people in the UK who have anti-terrrorism legislation used against
them every day for actions as terrifying and criminal as wearing a T-shirt
[114] and peacefully protesting [115] against the legislation itself,
illustrates that we all need to consider that as a warning. Many still have
no idea exactly how deleterious the situation is. As one supporter of the
Muslim detainees in Britain puts it,
Many British Muslims only woke up when Babar Ahmad was taken - even Babar
himself has said since that he did not take any notice when the men were
detained indefinitely in 2001. He just assumed they were all terrorists.
Source: Cageprisoners Via Algeria Watch [47]
For the majority of UK citizens, it's not dark yet, but it's getting there
[116] ; for the many Muslims incarcerated in legal limbo in the UK and their
terrified families and friends, darkness began to fall almost as soon as the
first news about the events of September 11th and World Trade Centre broke,
initiating America's latest incarnation of its 'War on Terror [117] '. The
shadow hasn't lifted since.
[1]
http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2007/dec/21/humanrights.uksecurity
[2] http://www.kwintessential.co.uk/articles/article/Cuba/US-Base-in-Guantanamo-Bay/282
[3] http://www.andyworthington.co.uk/?p=246
[4] http://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/politics/close-guantanamo-says-peter-hain-466866.html
[5] http://z13.invisionfree.com/julyseventh/index.php?showtopic=568&st=7
[6] http://www.guardian.co.uk/uk/2006/oct/03/politics.guantanamo
[7] http://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/crime/ministers-ask-for-british-residents-held-at-guantanamo-to-be-released-460670.html
[8] http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk/4272171.stm
[9] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Martin_Mubanga
[10] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Feroz_Abbasi
[11] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Richard_Belmar
[12] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Moazzam_Begg
[13] http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk/4267761.stm
[14] http://www.theyworkforyou.com/wrans/?id=2005-04-07a.217978.h
[15] http://www.reference.com/browse/wiki/Abdurahman_Khadr
[16] http://www.guardian.co.uk/uk/2005/aug/11/politics.terrorism1
[17] http://www.theregister.co.uk/2008/03/06/abu_jihaad_verdict/
[18] http://www.caabu.org/press/briefings/Anti-Muslim-backlash.pdf
[19] http://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/crime/britains-muslim-scapegoats-501389.html
[20] http://www.mirror.co.uk/news/topstories/2005/09/20/muslims-abused-in-prison-89520-16150723/
[21] http://www.dailymail.co.uk/pages/live/articles/news/news.html?in_article_id=487347&in_page_id=1770
[22] http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/england/wear/7196205.stm
[23] http://cageprisoners.com/articles.php?id=23177
[24] http://www.captivesupport.org/?p=48
[25] http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/england/northamptonshire/5135424.stm
[26] http://www.julyseventh.co.uk/crevice/index.html
[27] http://www.cageprisoners.com/download.php?download=673
[28] http://www.dailymail.co.uk/pages/live/articles/news/news.html?in_article_id=541109&in_page_id=1770
[29] http://uk.reuters.com/article/domesticNews/idUKL169035020070716?pageNumber=1
[30] http://www.guardian.co.uk/uk/2008/feb/10/uksecurity.alqaida
[31] http://www.cageprisoners.com/articles.php?id=21472
[32] http://www.cageprisoners.com/articles.php?id=23748
[33] http://www.cageprisoners.com/articles.php?id=21612
[34] http://www.publications.parliament.uk/pa/jt200506/jtselect/jtrights/185/185we19.htm
[35] http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk_politics/4659933.stm
[36] http://www.siac.tribunals.gov.uk/
[37] http://www.guardian.co.uk/politics/2005/apr/04/uk.september11
[38] http://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/crime/jurors-attack-deportation-of-cleared-ricin-plot-suspect-413286.html
[39] http://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/politics/the-politics-of-fear-or-how-tony-blair-misled-us-over-the-war-on-terror-466623.html
[40] http://www.amnestyusa.org/document.php?lang=e&id=ENGEUR450132007
[41] http://www.guardian.co.uk/uk/2007/may/14/terrorism.world
[42] http://www.cageprisoners.com/
[43] http://www.cageprisoners.com/articles.php?id=23689
[44] http://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/politics/britains-refugee-shame-796606.html
[45] http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/wales/7306345.stm
[46] http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk/4101751.stm
[47] http://www.algeria-watch.org/en/hr/extradition_gb/interview_ann.htm
[48] http://www.amnesty.org/en/library/asset/EUR45/056/2005/en/ee49e1d8-a307-11dc-8d74-6f45f39984e5/eur450562005en.html
[49] http://www.siac.tribunals.gov.uk/Documents/sc_32_2005.pdf
[50] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anti-terrorism,_Crime_and_Security_Act_2001#Part_4
[51] http://www.publications.parliament.uk/pa/ld200506/ldjudgmt/jd050707/robert-1.htm
[52] http://www.guardian.co.uk/uk/2005/apr/21/2
[53] http://www.freebabarahmad.com/
[54] http://scotlandonsunday.scotsman.com/uk/Antiterror-police-bug-Muslim-Labour.3739224.jp
[55] http://www.guardian.co.uk/uk/2008/feb/05/terrorism.freedomofinformation
[56] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wilson_Doctrine
[57] http://www.guardian.co.uk/politics/2001/dec/18/uk.september11
[58] http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk/7227918.stm
[59] http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/main.jhtml?xml=/news/2008/02/09/nbug109.xml
[60] http://markcurtis.wordpress.com/2007/02/13/the-war-in-malaya-1948-60/
[61] http://antagonise.blogspot.com/2005/10/european-court-of-human-rights-rules.html
[62] http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/main.jhtml?xml=/news/2004/07/15/nlaw15.xml&sSheet=%20/news/2004/07/15/ixhome.html
[63] http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk_politics/7230476.stm
[64] http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/england/dorset/7343445.stm
[65] http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk/7242724.stm
[66] http://www.julyseventh.co.uk/july-7-article-the-7-7-investigation-7-arrests-part-2.html#update
[67] http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk_politics/4343081.stm
[68] http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/comment/columnists/guest_contributors/article1845229.ece
[69] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Habeus_corpus
[70] http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk_politics/4206999.stm
[71] http://women.timesonline.co.uk/tol/life_and_style/women/families/article3021139.ece
[72] http://business.timesonline.co.uk/tol/business/law/article3346769.ece
[73] http://www.publications.parliament.uk/pa/jt200708/jtselect/jtrights/50/50.pdf
[74] http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk/7305460.stm
[75] http://www.julyseventh.co.uk/july-7-peoples-inquiry.html
[76] http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/main.jhtml?xml=/news/2008/03/20/ninquest120.xml
[77] http://www.opsi.gov.uk/acts/acts2003/ukpga_20030041_en_1
[78] http://www.opsi.gov.uk/acts/acts2003/ukpga_20030041_en_6#pt2
[79] http://www.cps.gov.uk/news/factsheets/fs-extraditionpart2.html#07
[80] http://seattletimes.nwsource.com/html/nationworld/2002399039_aswat24m.html
[81] http://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/crime/briton-wanted-for-questioning-over-london-bombs-is-held-in-pakistan-499616.html
[82] http://iafrica.com/news/us_terror/london/463152.htm
[83] http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/uk/article549996.ece
[84] http://www.rediff.com/news/2005/aug/02ukblast1.htm
[85] http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/main.jhtml?xml=/news/2005/07/31/nbomb331.xml
[86] http://www.cnn.com/2005/LAW/07/28/aswat/index.html
[87] http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/uk/article553004.ece
[88] http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/uk/article549328.ece
[89] http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2005/jul/21/pakistan.july7
[90] http://www.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,1086106-2,00.html
[91] http://findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_qn4156/is_20050731/ai_n14827406
[92] http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/uk/article785640.ece
[93] http://www.dailymail.co.uk/pages/live/articles/news/news.html?in_article_id=515152&in_page_id=1770
[94] http://business.timesonline.co.uk/tol/business/law/reports/article3285298.ece
[95] http://www.sacc.org.uk/index.php?option=content&task=view&id=456&catid=45
[96] http://p10.hostingprod.com/@spyblog.org.uk/blog/european_arrest_warrant/
[97] http://www.cageprisoners.com/prisoners.php?id=1268
[98] http://www.afterdowningstreet.org/node/13263
[99] http://newhaven.fbi.gov/dojpressrel/2006/nh071906.htm
[100] http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk/4441680.stm
[101] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Abu_Ghraib_prisoner_abuse
[102] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Guantanamo_Bay_detention_camp
[103] http://www.reuters.com/article/latestCrisis/idUSN06286822
[104] http://www.nytimes.com/2008/03/09/washington/09policy.html?scp=5&sq=bush+torture&st=nyt
[105] http://ap.google.com/article/ALeqM5h2R4depUphqfFC_KstDmMrl0XMwgD8V9FNSO0
[106] http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/world/us_and_americas/article3086937.ece
[107] http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/11/02/AR2007110201170.html
[108] http://www.sptimes.com/2006/10/22/Columns/We_sentenced_Japanese.shtml
[109] http://www.gardencourtchambers.co.uk/news/news_detail.cfm?iNewsID=268
[110] http://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/crime/law-lords-ban-evidence-gained-under-torture-518719.html
[111] http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk_politics/4509530.stm
[112] http://www.number-10.gov.uk/output/Page8302.asp
[113] http://www.guardian.co.uk/politics/2006/sep/27/uk.society
[114] http://www.newstatesman.com/200601090004
[115] http://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/crime/helen-and-sylvia-the-new-face-of-terrorism-472993.html
[116] http://www.julyseventh.co.uk/july-7-article-capitalising-on-terror.html
[117] http://query.nytimes.com/mem/archive-free/pdf?res=9400EFDE133CEE3ABC4A53DFB266838A699FDE
case against you. And yet considerable numbers of young men, and some women,
are being held in our prisons without any idea of why they are there. They
are detained under yet more provisions, for the present deemed lawful, which
either forbid or demand no meaningful explanation being given to the
accused. The concept of secret evidence and accusations so vague and
undefined as to be meaningless has now bedded down in our system of justice.
Gareth Peirce, human rights lawyer, December 2007 [1]
[1-camp x-ray US run concentration camp.jpg] Mention the words 'Guantanamo
Bay' to anyone, and it is virtually guaranteed that they won't be picturing a
coastal town located in the Guantanamo province of Cuba in the far south
east corner of the Island which, among other things, is home to one of
Cuba's national parks. Originally valued by the United States Government as
a point of strategic value to its Navy in protecting the Panama Canal, the
US took control of Camp X-Ray, the naval base at Guantanamo Bay in 1903;
control which it has retained ever since. However, since the 1990s, the US
has utilised the naval base as a 'holding camp' [2] ; first for Cuban
refugees and from January 2002, as a detention camp for Muslim prisoners,
judged by the US to be "illegal enemy combatants" [3] , which enables it to
employ practices that would be illegal were the prisoners detained in the
USA. This is the image that will come to mind for most, upon hearing the
words "Guantanamo Bay".
The United Kingdom government has often murmured [4] that it would like to
see the detention camps at Guantanamo Bay closed down. In a letter
responding to the concerns of a J7 researcher, Home Office Minister Tony
McNulty said:
We have made it clear that we think Guantanamo Bay should be closed;
President Bush said that he would like to close Guantanamo Bay as soon as
practicable......the UK has played an active role in this process and we
secured the release and return of all British nationals held at the
detention facility in 2004 and 2005; last year we secured the release and
return of four detainees who were previously legally resident in the UK.
Source: J7 People's Investigation Forum [5]
What is not apparent from this statement is that in 2006 the UK government,
in response to the US government's offer to return nearly all remaining UK
residents, refused to accept them, with ministers stating that they had no
legal right to return to the UK. Additionally, according to this report:
Documents obtained by the Guardian show US authorities are demanding that
the detainees be kept under 24-hour surveillance if set free - restrictions
that are dismissed by the British as unnecessary and unworkable.
Although all are accused of terrorist involvement, Britain says there is no
intelligence to warrant the measures Washington wants, and it lacks the
resources to implement them. "They do not pose a sufficient threat," said
the head of counter-terrorism at the Home Office.
Source: The Guardian [6]
It was only in August 2007, after Gordon Brown was handed Tony Blair's prime
ministerial position, that the government performed a volte-face [7] and
formally requested the return of the remaining men held at the detention
facility.
For the purposes of this article it is important to note that the Home
Office did not consider the Guantanamo detainees a "sufficient threat". It
is also interesting to note that the Home Office refused to issue passports
[8] to four former Guantanamo detainees, namely Martin Mubanga [9] , Feroz
Abbasi [10] , Richard Belmar [11] and Moazzam Begg [12] . The decisions to
revoke the passports of these men was taken under the Royal Prerogative [13]
power which enables decisions to be taken without any parliamentary
consultation [14] or scrutiny. The Royal Prerogative power was also used to
revoke the passport of Canadian Abdurahman Khadr [15] .
Furthermore, the Home Office regularly, and with impunity, impounds innocent
Muslims in UK prisons pending deportation to countries where they face
almost certain torture - and in some cases death - on the vague basis of an
alleged 'threat to national security [16] '. The Home Office does this in
the total absence of any evidence that could actually convict them in a UK
court. In addition, innocent Muslims are regularly impounded and interned in
UK prisons, not because the government considers them to be a 'threat to
national security' but because another country might consider them to be a
threat to theirs [17] . In Long Lartin prison in Worcestershire alone, just
one of many prisons in the UK holding innocent Muslim detainees, against
many of whom the State has not a jot of evidence, there are at least six men
facing deportation, and at least five appealing against extradition orders
to the United States. In each situation, captives face a very different
process with the same potential outcome.
One only has to consider the soaring rate of attacks against Muslims [18] -
and indeed anyone of Asian appearance [19] - in the wake of the explosions
in London on July 7th 2005 to imagine what life is like in prison for a
Muslim [20] . Prisoner abuses at HMP Frankland include Eesa 'Dhiren' Barot
[21] suffering horrifically painful injuries from having boiling oil poured
over him by another inmate (he later requested that the charges against the
perpetrator be dropped [22] ), whose solicitor wrote of terrible examples of
Islamophobia and racism [23] facing Muslim inmates and detainees. Muslims in
other prisons [24] suffer the same kind of treatment. Whereas it seems to be
a policy in the UK prison service to move prisoners who come under attack
from other inmates [25] , when Omar Khyam, a Muslim inmate at Frankland who
had been involved in an extremely high profile trial [26] came under attack,
he was simply kept in isolation [27] at the same prison. Later, the Daily
Mail would twist the situation completely, claiming that these particular
prisoners demanded to be moved because their fellow inmates were "too white
[28] ", rather than citing the genuine reason; that they were living in fear
of their own safety and had merely asked to be treated in the same manner as
other prisoners at risk of attack. Mr. Barot's solicitor made the point [29]
at the time he was attacked, "We are not asking for preferential treatment
for Muslim prisoners - what we are requesting is that Muslim prisoners
should be afforded the same protection as other prisoners".
Incredibly, other media coverage turns the worrying situation of Muslim
prisoners coming under attack into one where prisons are under threat from
'al-Qaeda' [30] .
[2-long lartin prison.jpg] [31] In Long Lartin prison, the Muslim detainees are
kept in a separate wing from other prisoners. The wing has come in for
bitter criticism by convicts elsewhere in the prison who feel that the
detainees have a "good deal". However, the detainees face the same
restrictions as Category A prisoners [32] , despite the fact that they have
never been convicted of any crime in the UK, terrorism-related or otherwise.
They are not allowed to receive magazines or books from 'outside', for
instance and in Belmarsh, it is prohibited to send just about any item to a
detainee other than a letter - which cannot include a stamped addressed
envelope for return, as detainees are not allowed to receive items of
stationary. Faraj Hassan, a former prison detainee now living under a
control order, has told of the human rights violations and abuse which he
regularly experienced [33] in Belmarsh and Brixton prisons. Shockingly, on
one occasion, he was shown a fatwa at Belmarsh, signed by the Muslim Council
of Britain, giving permission for staff to perform humiliating and
unnecessary strip searches on Muslim detainees.
In August 2005, solicitors Birnberg Peirce & Partners stated of Full Sutton
that the so-called secure unit was covered in cobwebs and that it remained
unfit for humans. Ten years previously the Special Secure Unit at Full
Sutton had been closed down [34] on the basis that it was unfit for human
habitation. A Council of Europe investigation team who visited Long Lartin
and Full Sutton prisons warned that the restrictive, isolated conditions
under which prisoners were held placed their mental and physical health in
danger, even cautioning that a mass suicide would not be a surprising
outcome.
'SPECIAL' COURTS , 'SPECIAL ADVOCATES' AND SECRET EVIDENCE
Anyone with a social conscience would agree that detaining people without
giving them a specific reason and giving them no opportunity to prove their
innocence goes against all the principles of democracy and freedom that this
government proudly tells its citizens they will not let `the terrorists [35]
' destroy. No evidence to support the allegations is required to be shown,
in the cases of both those facing deportation and those facing extradition -
either to the accused themselves or their legal representatives. In the case
of the detainees threatened with deportation to face torture, this luxury is
only afforded to appointed `special advocates' in an extraordinary secret
court procedure known as the Special Immigration Appeals Commission [36]
(SIAC), who are not permitted to have contact with the appellant or his [37]
lawyers [37] . In essence, the defence has no possibility of presenting any
sort of argument because the State simply refuses to allow them to know the
charges they face. How, exactly, can any kind of defence argument be formed
when the person concerned has no right to know what evidence the precise
case against them rests on? It can't.
The men in question came to the UK in desperation, many having already
suffered torture in their countries of origin. One Algerian detainee,
Mustapha Taleb - also known as Detainee Y [38] , arrived in the UK in March
2000 to claim political asylum. After being exonerated of all charges
relating to the now infamous `Ricin case' along with his co-defendants, he
had a mere five months to recover from the trauma of being imprisoned for 28
months for a crime he did not commit (indeed, a `crime' which appears to
have existed solely for the convenient purpose of making the case for the
illegal invasion of Iraq [39] ) before finding himself manhandled back into
jail for allegedly being a threat to UK security. He discovered during a
SIAC hearing that the very same 'evidence' that was used in an attempt to
convict him [32] of involvement in the Ricin case was being used to justify
his imprisonment and deportation, despite the fact that this absurd case had
collapsed in a UK criminal court. Two of the jurors in the Ricin case were
so horrified [40] to discover what had happened to a man that they had
cleared in a court of law that they now campaign on his behalf, along with
organisations such as Amnesty International and Cageprisoners. Mr. Taleb
remains incarcerated in the UK, despite one of his co-defendants in the same
case escaping deportation [41] .
Even a short visit to the Cageprisoners [42] website will discover many
other similar cases, all of which are a gross affront to human rights. One
case is that of Hussain Al-Samamra [43] , who faces deportation to Jordan,
where he will almost certainly face the torture that he escaped from in
desperation in 2001, the very reason he claimed asylum in the first place.
Mr. Al-Samamra had no access to the evidence used to form the case against
him and therefore had no opportunity to construct a defence. It is evident
from a number of other similarly outrageous cases on the SIAC website [36]
that the SIAC process is heavily weighted in favour of the State. It is this
legislative framework that facilitates the State acting out whatever its
pre-determined political will might be, against whomever it so chooses.
The British government is no stranger [44] to deporting asylum seekers under
inhumane circumstances, [45] but those arrested on suspicion of involvement
in terrorism and jailed immediately, are treated exceptionally harshly.
Hussain Al-Samamra was not permitted to see his wife and child for a year;
many friends and family members 'fail' the vetting process to obtain
clearance for visits during their incarceration so not only is liberty lost,
there is no opportunity to have contact with loved ones. Wives and families
are often left to struggle alone, too fearful of the stigma of their
circumstances to allow themselves to be helped. Some detainees have wished
for death as a release from the purgatory of living in perpetual, imprisoned
limbo.
Detainee H, an Algerian granted refugee status by the UK authorities [46] in
1993, who had been arrested in 2002 and detained in Belmarsh without trial
until March 2005, had only five short months in which to enjoy his 'freedom'
under control orders. In the immediate aftermath of the July 7th 2005
attacks, he - along with the eight other men also released from Belmarsh in
March 2005 - was dragged from his bed in the early hours and taken away by
police and Immigration Officials with no word to their families regarding
where they were being taken and why. When supporters of the detainees acting
on the behalf of their distraught families were finally able to access the
relevant Home Office department, they were first told that the solicitors
for the men would know where they were - even though they did not. When this
was communicated to the Immigration Department the response was that the
captives would be taken care of - with the spectacularly unreassuring and
these days quite sinister qualification, "This is Britain, you know." The
Home Office finally responded.....naming captives and advising the families
to contact the Salvation Army's missing person's service [47] in order to
find out where they had been taken.
Detainee H finally left Britain for Algeria in January 2007, despite
attempts by Amnesty International to prevent this [48] , leaving his wife
and baby daughter behind. Upon arrival in Algeria Detainee H was detained
almost immediately despite assurances from the UK and Algeria that this
would not happen. He is now serving a three year sentence in an Algerian
prison, with the UK and Algerian authorities denying he was ever given
amnesty - a SIAC judge putting this down to "a muddle rather than deceit
[49] ". His wife has been refused a visa to visit him. When Detainee H gave
a statement detailing his treatment upon returning to Algeria, as part of
defence case for another detainee facing the same process, it was dismissed
in a SIAC ruling [49] .
[3-harry maurice roberts - daily mirror.jpg] Given the use of the Special Advocate
process against foreign nationals, British nationals might think they need
not worry about such a thing, However, the government also has other uses
for 'special advocates [37] ', Special Advocates were primarily created to
represent foreign nationals appealing against immigration and later, after
the introduction of the Anti-terrorism, Crime and Security Act 2001 [50] ,
foreign terror suspects detained without charge or trial. Harry Roberts [51]
, who was convicted in 1966 for the murders of three policemen and sentenced
to thirty years imprisonment, is still behind bars twelve years after his
tariff expired [52] on the basis of 'secret evidence'. Neither Mr. Roberts
nor his solicitors have been allowed access. The parole board employed the
use of a special advocate to examine this secret evidence. Of course, the
special advocate is not allowed to speak to either Mr. Roberts nor his legal
representatives about 'the evidence' that is keeping Mr Roberts in jail.
In February 2008, news broke of conversations between Tooting MP Sadiq Khan
and Babar Ahmad [53] being bugged whilst Mr. Ahmad was detained at Woodhill
Prison. Ahmad and Khan were being covertly recorded by anti-terror
operatives [54] , allegedly without government knowledge. [55] At the time,
much was made of how terrible it was that anyone might dare to bug an MP,
thereby contravening the Wilson Doctrine [56] which dictates that MPs and
peers not be bugged. At least, not without the express permission from the
Prime Minister. Mr Khan was not pleased [57] and threatened to take his
evidence of bugged meetings, phone taps, and being followed, to the European
Court of Human Rights. Levels of left, right, liberal and libertarian
outrage were raised by the idea that an MP might be treated as a common
criminal, or a 'terrorist' by association, yet barely a murmur was heard
about the other focus of the story, prisoner Babar Ahmad. As if further
evidence were required to suggest that, while the bugging of an MP might be
a rare exception, the bugging of prisoners is a rather more routine function
of the State, Harry Roberts' solicitor, Simon Creighton, said that a
government lawyer had inadvertently sent [58] two transcripts of covertly
recorded telephone conversations between he and his client. This was in
addition to revelations that hundreds of lawyers and prison visitors had
been secretly recorded [59] , cases which didn't feature MPs and therefore
didn't warrant similar levels of outrage.
The same day that 56 people lost their lives in London, Harry Roberts
suffered his own personal catastrophe. On 7th July 2005 [51] his appeal
against the use of secret evidence to block his long overdue release was
rejected and he remains imprisoned to this day, still prohibited from
knowing why he remains to this day deprived of his freedom. Roberts, a
British citizen who served his country as a Lance Corporal during the
Malayan 'Emergency [60] ', continues to be detained long after his sentence
ended through the use of the same loaded methods created for use against
foreign nationals [61] . Roberts' extended detention on the basis of
"national security" was used to set, and continues to set, a legal precedent
that paves the way for routine use of the special advocate process in cases
brought against British citizens. Mr. Roberts himself is certainly aware of
the dangers of extending secret hearings and the hypocrisy of the UK
government's use of such procedures, observing, "Surely this is 'double
standards' - to castigate the Americans for something we are doing in
England [62] ". And therein lies the rub - or rather, one of the rubs.
HYPOCRISY, SECRECY & STEALTH
It is somewhat ironic that the Government's reasoning for originally
refusing the return of Guantanamo detainees under the conditions demanded by
the US was that the captives did not pose a "sufficient threat" to warrant
surveillance [63] - or apparently even a common judicial process [64] .
However, they must have been considered "sufficient threat" for the UK to
deem it acceptable for them to moulder away in a prison camp with no access
to legal representation that would enable them to find out and defend
against the crimes of which they stood accused. What meets the criteria for
a "sufficient" threat is anybody's guess in a country where men are
manhandled away from their families to be spirited off by the Home Office
and where five men had their convictions under the Terrorism Act 2000
quashed [65] for the exact same non-offence for which only a month later
another man was jailed. [66] That the UK won't consider individuals
'suspected' of terrorism involvement a "sufficient" enough threat to
actually warrant an open, legal trial, but will certainly consider them a
"sufficient" enough threat to act as judge, jury and executioner on their
suspicions is doubly ironic.
[4-terrorism act 2000/2006.jpg] Tony Blair used the concept of "sufficiency" in
a slightly different context in an article written for The Times in May 2007,
where he primarily defended control orders as a "much milder remedy" than
detention in jail, describing them as "imposing some limits on the
individual's freedom". Control orders, for those not familiar, came about
after the Law Lords' ruling in December 2004 that the detention of the nine
men - of which Detainee H, mentioned earlier in this article was one - at
Belmarsh prison without trial, breached fundamental human rights. Mr. Blair
bitterly recalled the judgement made at the time, that there was "a greater
risk to Britain through the abrogation of the foreign suspect's civil
liberties than through terrorism."
Control Orders do not merely impose "some" limits on an individual's
freedom; the individual is effectively imprisoned in his own home, which
makes family life extremely difficult, and for single men, a supportive
social life impossible. At any given time, with no notice, they are to
expect (among other things) to allow "officials" to search their homes [67]
, have their phone, internet access and contact with other people in general
restricted, their own home restricted, a 24 hour ban on all movements and
requirements to be at specified places or in a particular area at certain
times on certain days. In the light of this, it is virtually
incomprehensible that Mr. Blair then says that control orders were "much
weaker than we wanted, perpetually diluted by opposition amendments,
constantly attacked on civil liberty grounds."
Mr. Blair goes on to give away the rules of the game that he had changed,
stating:
After September 11, 2001, in common with many other nations, we passed new
antiterror laws. In the aftermath of such an outrage it was relatively easy
to do. We gave ourselves the ability, in exceptional circumstances, to
detain foreign nationals who we believed were plotting terrorism but against
whom there was insufficient evidence to prosecute. It was an important
power. They were, of course, free to leave Britain. But we wouldn't let them
be free here. The ability to detain foreign nationals gave our services the
ability to focus even more resources on the surveillance of British
nationals who were a threat. It also sent out a strong signal of intent.
Source: The Times [68]
Where there is "insufficient evidence" to prosecute, or there is not enough
of a "sufficient threat" posed, then in the eyes of the law, detainees are
innocent and should be protected by habeus corpus [69] . However, despite
the grave concerns raised in 2005 by the Director of Public Prosecutions
[70] that secret courts would pave the way for miscarriages of justice,
ingrained traditions of 'British Justice' continue to be turned on their
heads. Judicial processes have become ever more covert, including the
existence of secret family courts [71] along with recent proposals to hold
criminal trials without juries [72] and to hold secret inquests [73] - the
latter of which has caused concern to the bereaved families of those killed
on July 7th 2005 [74] but also to UK Parliamentary Joint Committee on Human
Rights [73] .
Such processes are, of course, in addition to the Inquiries Act 2005 [75] ;
legislation which was rushed through parliament exactly one month before the
July 7th atrocities, effectively ending the concept of independent and/or
public inquiries. In times when the public most require answers about
matters of great import, the State instead affects less transparency and
plumbs greater depths of secrecy, allowing the public to know as little as
possible about its actions and operations. All on the catch-all basis of
"national security" [76] .
Recent legislative proposals pushed by the State also have the inquest
process in their sights and the State is seeking to legislate itself
ultimate control over inquests and coroners. Once again, the sole reason
given is 'national security'. Already it has been suggested that the 7/7
inquests -- an event from which much political capital has been made by all
parties -- and the extra-judicial execution by the State of Jean Charles de
Menezes will be held in secret.
EXTRADITIONS, RENDITIONS AND LIES
Another piece of legislation which gives rise to justifiable concerns is the
Extradition Act 2003; [77] in particular Part 2 of the Act, which covers
extradition to Category 2 territories [78] . As the wording of the Act
states, this part deals with extradition from the United Kingdom to the
territories designated for the purposes of this Part by order made by the
Secretary of State. As the Crown Prosecution Service guidelines [79] state
in bold text, the district judge in a given case must be satisfied that the
request contains admissible evidence of the offence sufficient to establish
a prima facie case against the person. This requirement does not apply in
respect of extradition requests from the USA, Canada, Australia and New
Zealand.
Here is the crux of the matter, and the reasoning behind the controversy
that this Act has engendered. In the first place, these four named nations,
only three of which are part of the Commonwealth, are not obliged or
required to submit prima facie evidence when requesting the extradition of
British citizens or foreign nationals residing in Britain. In other words,
at present, the United States is able to request any amount of British
individuals to be sent over and don't even need to say why. Even worse,
there is no reciprocal arrangement between the two countries; if Britain
wishes to extradite a US citizen or resident, the government is required by
the US to provide evidence justifying the request.
[5-haroon rashid aswat.jpg] In the case of Haroon Aswat, the US Justice
Department blocked attempts by Seattle prosecutors [80] to charge him in
relation to suspected 'terrorist activity' in Oregon in 2002. Yet, in the aftermath
of the July 7th 2005 attacks in London, amid a flurry of hysterical [81] and
groundless [82] media coverage of his alleged and unproven connection to the
July 7th suspects [83] , he was arrested in late July 2005, in Zambia,
having previously resided in South Africa [84] . It was reported that the US
wanted to render Mr. Aswat to a third, undisclosed country [85] , as opposed
to directly to the US from Africa, several weeks before he was arrested, but
were unable to do so due to his British citizenship and possession of UK
papers. It was allegedly [86] whilst this diplomatic argument occurred that
Mr. Aswat left South Africa for Zambia, where he was then arrested under
Zambian immigration laws [87] . He was deported, rather than extradited to
Britain, and the UK authorities have never arrested or charged Mr. Aswat
either in connection with the events of July 7th 2005 or any other suspected
terrorist activity. A 'source' at Scotland Yard said rather dismissively,
"He may be of interest to us in the future but he is not our priority at the
moment [88] ".
It is completely unclear therefore, at which point Mr. Aswat was supposed to
have been arrested in Pakistan [89] - the Pakistani authorities denied that
this had happened and according to one report, men with identical names may
have been detained [90] . A point extremely worthy of note, especially as it
was also reported that the man detained in Pakistan was in fact a ceramics
salesman from London with a "similar" name [91] .
At present, Mr. Aswat is detained in a UK prison appealing against his
extradition order to the United States. His solicitor, Gareth Pierce, stated
on the same day as the original extradition ruling that the US had provided
no evidence of Mr. Aswat's involvement in terrorist activity:
She said: "The only witness against him in the United States was threatened
that if he didn't plead guilty and co-operate he would be put under military
detention.
"It shows the extent to which the United States is manipulating evidence and
pressuring witnesses. All that is said about Haroon Aswat is that in 1999 he
travelled to a farm in the US which was considering setting up a Muslim
community and, after a few days, left. That's it -- that's the evidence."
Source: The Times [92]
In an earlier hearing, a lawyer for the US had stated that the accusations
made against Mr. Aswat by the US meant that he faces up to fifteen years in
jail, but also that "the charges could change [87] and he could face a
longer term of imprisonment."
[6-babar ahmad.jpg] Other cases not involving the US, but where equally flimsy
allegations are all that is required by the UK to approve extraditions are
just as concerning; such as that of Farid Hilali, extradited to Spain in
February 2008 to face charges of being a member of a terrorist group -
despite the fact that the UK courts expressly said that it would be illegal
[93] for Spain to extradite him on those grounds. Mr. Hilali's so-called
co-conspirator had previously had his conviction quashed [94] for
involvement in the same case, the Spanish Supreme court had ruled telephone
intercept evidence as inadmissable because not only had it been obtained
unlawfully but did not, in any case, support the inference that the two had
been conspiring together and the Spanish Prosecutor attempted to mislead the
UK courts by alleging Mr. Hilali's involvement in the 'Hamburg Cell [95] ',
which had already been refuted by German courts [96] . Yet off to Spain Mr.
Hilali has gone, making a mockery of the "trust" accorded to European
countries in such cases.
Other men facing extradition to the United States along with Haroon Aswat
include Babar Ahmad [97] , the victim of bugging in Woodhill prison
mentioned above and human rights campaigner Syed Talha Ahsan [98] , both of
whom face charges of providing 'material' to terrorists [99] . The charges
have been brought by the US purely on the basis of alleged Internet
activity; neither man has ever set foot on US soil. In 2004, a US attorney
made the quite mind boggling statement [100] in relation to Mr. Ahmad's
case, "If you're supporting the Taleban and the Taleban is killing American
soldiers, we're alleging you're conspiring to kill American citizens
abroad." Perhaps one day the Iraqi people might apply this type of logic to
UK taxpayers; it would certainly be interesting to see the outcome of such a
case.
QUIS CUSTODIET IPSOS CUSTODES?
Given the appalling human rights record of the United States of America, of
which prison camps such as Camp X-Ray and Abu Ghraib [101] are only a part,
this is unsurprisingly a terrifying prospect for captives facing
extradition. As with deportations, diplomatic notes are often used as
assurance of human rights, but there are no guarantees that these will be
adhered to. For instance, there is nothing to stop the CIA advising the U.S
government to change its position and designate a given individual as an
enemy combatant, where he would, of course, face the kind of treatment that
the Home Office condemns at detention camps, where incidences of
maltreatment and torture of the detainees are well documented [102] .
[7-abu ghraib.jpg] The recent admittance by the US authorities [103] that it had
employed the use of torture to interrogate terrorism suspects and the news
that the US president has vetoed a [104] Congressional Bill that would have
prohibited the employment of torture [104] during the interrogation of
terrorism suspects, shows that it is clear that there is no guarantee
whatsoever that detainees will be treated objectively and humanely. The CIA
director Michael Hayden's supposedly `reassuring' statement that the CIA
will "continue to operate [105] within the law [105] " carries very little
weight when the 'law' states that torture and inhumane methods are
acceptable. No one should forget that it isn't so long ago that the
practices employed by the US against terror suspects; hypothermia, long
periods of standing, sleep deprivation and multiple sessions of
waterboarding -- cleverly renamed, with its former nomenclature of 'water
torture' all but forgotten -- among others, were classified by the [106] US
as war crimes when perpetuated by the Nazis [106] . The United States has a
history of convicting others of torture in cases where the practice of water
torture was used. After World War II, the US organised and participated in
the International Military Tribunal where senior members of the Japanese
government and military were charged and convicted largely upon the basis
that they practised water torture [107] . In 1983, the county sheriff of San
Jacinto, Texas, was convicted of civil rights violations for using water
torture on suspects. Upon sentencing, the District Judge told the former
sheriff, "The operation down there would embarrass the dictator of a country
[108] ."
Adopting as your own the characteristics of the very thing you profess to
despise in no way confers any kind of moral superiority. This applies to
both the UK and US governments' hypocrisy in their imperialistic actions of
warfare for peace and democracy by death in the Middle East. It includes the
hypocrisy of the UK government, media and senior legal figures for
'attacking' George Bush's detention camps when the liberty, safety and
fundamental rights of UK residents are breached in the same unacceptable
manner - sanctioned and imposed by the State itself. The UK government has
demonstrated a breathtaking lack of regard for human life and liberty with
its 'anti-terror' measures. In November 2004, a Special Advocate before SIAC
publicly resigned, making his reasons for doing so abundantly clear:
The detainees have not been targeted simply as a group of foreigners
suspected of involvement in international terrorism. The overwhelming focus
has been on the fact that they are Muslim.....this is how the war against
terrorism is often portrayed. It produces hatred and attacks not just on
Muslims, but on the whole Asian community. It has already eroded the
confidence of British Muslims and must, in the longer term, affect social
cohesion. More importantly this kind of law alienates Britain in the
international arena. The solution to the perceived threat of international
terrorism is not, in my view, to pass new laws, which apply arbitrary arrest
and indefinite detention without trial to every terrorist suspect, British
and foreign alike.The point was trenchantly made by Lord Hoffman in his
speech:
"I said that the power of detention is at present confined to foreigners and
I would not like to give the impression that all that was necessary was to
extend the power to UK citizens as well. The real threat to the life of the
nation, in the sense of people living in accordance with its traditional
laws and political values comes not from terrorism but from laws like
these."
Thursday's judgement in the House of Lords supports and vindicates my view.
I now feel that whatever difference I might make as a special advocate on
the inside is outweighed by the operation of a law, fundamentally flawed and
contrary to our deepest notions of justice. My role has been altered to
provide a false legitimacy to indefinite detention without knowledge of the
accusations being made and without any kind of criminal charge or trial. For
me this is untenable. No other country in Europe has felt it necessary to
follow this course and derogate from Article 5 of the European Convention.
Britain should not stand apart from the rest of Europe on this issue.
Such a law is an odious blot on our legal landscape and for reasons of
conscience I feel that I must resign.
Source: Ian Macdonald QC via Garden Court Chambers [109]
The Law Lords' decision in December 2005 that 'evidence' extracted under
torture was inadmissable in SIAC courts [110] - countermanding a previous
ruling that such evidence could be used provided that Britain itself was not
involved in the torture process [111] - should have saved the Belmarsh
detainees from being sent back to countries which employed the use of
torture. It didn't.
No `terror threat' to this country justifies detention without trial and
condemnation to torture abroad - the government is clearly correct to assert
that it won't let `the terrorists' destroy `our way of life [112] '. It's
far too busy doing the destroying itself with the added propaganda coup
value of fostering fear and suspicion of Muslims.
Daniel Guedella, a legal representative for some of the individuals
mentioned in this article makes the stark observation,
This government cannot parade itself on the international stage with its
claimed commitments to democracy and the rule of law whilst at home its
contempt for such principles has never been more evident than in its
treatment of these men and their families. The Prime Minister is wrong. The
rules of the game have not changed. The rules cannot be changed for the
purposes of political grandstanding at the expense of the most vulnerable
and innocent amongst us.
Daniel Guedella, Birnberg Peirce and Partners
Imagine a day in your life - of no particular value purely due to its sheer
availability and mass quantity. Then imagine it was the last day you knew
freedom. Imagine being Detainee H, who went to bed on a summer's evening and
didn't wake up in his own home again. Imagine being Hussain Al-Samamra who
spent an entire year waiting to see his daughter who'd been only three days
old the last time he'd held her in his arms; the realisation of nine months
of future plans, who now can only mourn all the precious days he assumed
he'd spend caring for her with his wife. Imagine your own home being not a
place of safety and sanctuary, but your own personal prison, where you
couldn't even arrange something as simple as meeting a friend for a coffee
or doing the shopping when you wanted. Imagine optimistically applying and
being accepted onto a college course, then having to give it up when you
realised that everyone on the course would have to know you were a 'terror
suspect'. Imagine how it feels to stumble blindly through a closed 'court'
process, unable to speak to the person who has the luxury of knowing what
you don't; the grounds on which you've been taken away from everything that
you knew, whilst the judge sits sighing, having the privilege of knowing
exactly what the outcome will be. Imagine being arrested and thrown into
jail in one country because another country has demanded your presence,
conferring 'suspect' status upon you immediately. Imagine how it would feel
to sit alone in a small cell day after day and year after year, knowing that
you don't even have the option or means to prove your innocence beyond doubt
because there is "insufficient evidence" to charge you with a crime - and
because of this, knowing that the general assumption is likely to be that
'there's no smoke without fire'. Especially when there's a 'war on terror'
to win.
In September 2006, Tony Blair described the "global struggle against
terrorism" as being "without mercy or limit [113] ".
Without limit....what's happening to Harry Roberts, and the incalculable
amount of people in the UK who have anti-terrrorism legislation used against
them every day for actions as terrifying and criminal as wearing a T-shirt
[114] and peacefully protesting [115] against the legislation itself,
illustrates that we all need to consider that as a warning. Many still have
no idea exactly how deleterious the situation is. As one supporter of the
Muslim detainees in Britain puts it,
Many British Muslims only woke up when Babar Ahmad was taken - even Babar
himself has said since that he did not take any notice when the men were
detained indefinitely in 2001. He just assumed they were all terrorists.
Source: Cageprisoners Via Algeria Watch [47]
For the majority of UK citizens, it's not dark yet, but it's getting there
[116] ; for the many Muslims incarcerated in legal limbo in the UK and their
terrified families and friends, darkness began to fall almost as soon as the
first news about the events of September 11th and World Trade Centre broke,
initiating America's latest incarnation of its 'War on Terror [117] '. The
shadow hasn't lifted since.
[1]
http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2007/dec/21/humanrights.uksecurity [2]
http://www.kwintessential.co.uk/articles/article/Cuba/US-Base-in-Guantanamo-Bay/282 [3]
http://www.andyworthington.co.uk/?p=246 [4]
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http://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/crime/ministers-ask-for-british-residents-held-at-guantanamo-to-be-released-460670.html [8]
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk/4272171.stm [9]
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Martin_Mubanga [10]
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Feroz_Abbasi [11]
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Richard_Belmar [12]
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Moazzam_Begg [13]
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk/4267761.stm [14]
http://www.theyworkforyou.com/wrans/?id=2005-04-07a.217978.h [15]
http://www.reference.com/browse/wiki/Abdurahman_Khadr [16]
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http://www.theregister.co.uk/2008/03/06/abu_jihaad_verdict/ [18]
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http://www.cageprisoners.com/articles.php?id=21472 [32]
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http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk_politics/4659933.stm [36]
http://www.siac.tribunals.gov.uk/ [37]
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http://www.guardian.co.uk/uk/2007/may/14/terrorism.world [42]
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