Newsy-ness: Leaked reports - my view
Oct. 3rd, 2006 10:10 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
sparkindarknessIt would appear that reports have been leaked indicating that the US offered to send British resident inmates (but not British citizens) to the UK from Guantanamo (or possibly a secret gulag of choice) if Britain agreed to put them under 24 hour surveillance. Britain refused.
I have met a couple of people already today huffing about Blair not accepting the offer. Now, while I am more than happy to slap Blair with a full selection of wet fish, in this case I cannot agree.
We have human rights law and appropriate habeus corpus (or due process) law - and it's human rights law that applies to everyone here, not just citizens. If these people were sent back to the UK they would expect to have the full protection of the law (rightly so).
That law would certainly frown on us putting someone under indefinite 24 hour surveillance without damn good reason. "Because America said so" is not a good reason (though it seems America believes it is). I can see it now - they are returtned to Britain, we start surveillance, the High Court/Court of Appeal/House of Lords/European Court of Justice gives the government a good slapping, surveillance stops - and the promise to the Americans is broken.
Yes, that promise is unreasonable and yes they shouldn't be demanding that proviso and yes the whole Guantanamo mess stinks to high heaven and certainly makes the "Land of the Free" a bad joke; but we don't break those provisos because that would make things messy.
I have met a couple of people already today huffing about Blair not accepting the offer. Now, while I am more than happy to slap Blair with a full selection of wet fish, in this case I cannot agree.
We have human rights law and appropriate habeus corpus (or due process) law - and it's human rights law that applies to everyone here, not just citizens. If these people were sent back to the UK they would expect to have the full protection of the law (rightly so).
That law would certainly frown on us putting someone under indefinite 24 hour surveillance without damn good reason. "Because America said so" is not a good reason (though it seems America believes it is). I can see it now - they are returtned to Britain, we start surveillance, the High Court/Court of Appeal/House of Lords/European Court of Justice gives the government a good slapping, surveillance stops - and the promise to the Americans is broken.
Yes, that promise is unreasonable and yes they shouldn't be demanding that proviso and yes the whole Guantanamo mess stinks to high heaven and certainly makes the "Land of the Free" a bad joke; but we don't break those provisos because that would make things messy.