Human Rights For Human Wrongs
Ten foreign nationals who pose a threat to national security have been detained today pending deportation to their country of origin.
Under the Human Rights Act the UK cannot deport anyone to a country known for human rights abuses. Jordan, Lebanon and Algeria, all of whom have been criticised for their human rights records, are among the countries that these foreign nationals will be returned to.
Supposedly the UK has come to an agreement with Jordan that the Jordan national will not be persecuted but instead will have access to a lawyer and proper recourse to the justice system. No such agreement has been reached with Algeria and Lebanon.
These are individuals that have been granted assylum in the UK because of fear of persecution in their own countries. A persecution they faced because they were known to be linked to terrorist activities. Having been given a haven in the UK, they then proceeded to take full advantage of the generosity afforded them, some for well over ten years, while shamelessly gnawing away at the hand that fed them; inciting hate, violence and disloyalty towards the very society that gave them shelter.
What I'm finding difficult to get my head around is who cares if they get persecuted in the country they get sent back to? If I take a destitute person into my house out of pity and they then decide to plot against and murder my family, I'm hardly likely to feel compunction when I show them the door. And if they get torn to shreds by wolves as a result of being thrown out, it's frankly no longer my problem.
One thing I will add though is that it's important that the authorities don't get frenzied into a witch hunt state of mind in the current climate of paranoia, and start deporting people left right and centre without proper evidence or investigation.
posted by turtlebrain @ 7:12 pm
12 comments
12 Comments:
It's really quite simple. The second you start thinking of terrorists as sub-human, strip them of access to due process, and deprive them of basic human rights, you start heading down a very slippery slope.
Initially you might not care whether the people responsible for the London bombings or 9/11 be allowed legal recourse. You might even want them to be tortured to death. But the very thing that makes terrorists wrong and us right is the fact that we know the difference between a soldier and a civilian. We know the difference between punishment and revenge. We can claim moral superiority for the simple reason that we are in fact morally superior. The USA PATRIOT Act, Abu Ghraib, Guantanamo and 'extraordinary rendition' - where the US government does the exact opposite of the UK Human Rights Act, by secretly 'extraditing' people to countries that sanction torture - all hurt the credibility of the 'war on terror'.
The bottom line is that if you do to them what they would do to you, it makes you just as bad as them, if not worse.
it's not about thinking of them as sub-human. it's about not giving assylum to people who wish to blow you up. and contrary to what you say i don't want them to be tortured and i don't agree with abu ghraib, guantanamo, etc; but i have no compunction about sending them back to their country where they may be tortured. these are not british citizens. if they were i would say yes, try them and sentence them here. these are foreign nationals who have abused the hospitality given to them so in my mind it's quite reasonable to rescind that hospitality
i agree with some points sam has raised(he's only 19 shock horror..) but i do still question the fact that IF* you are plotting against the country you live in, why then should that country have a duty to protect you?
* im talking about hardcore evidence/proof here.
There's a difference between protecting someone and sending them to the dogs with nothing to defend themselves with.
If you feel these people are a threat, than deal with them as you would any native threat. You wouldn't send your british citizen brother or sister to Jordan to be tried; why would you anyone else?
>>Legally, I have no idea how it would play out in the UK. Here in the US if DHS considers you a threat, you will either be deported back to your own country (regardless of torture practices), or if you are a known terrorist then you will be 'renditioned' by CIA operatives to a country that uses torture during interrogation
it's a contentius issue at the moment in the UK. till now the UK couldn't deport a person to a country with a poor human rights record. however new laws are being considered where national security and the suspect's human rights will be given equal importance. the law itself if passed is still several months down the line so after that each case may still take years to go through the courts. so it's not as if we're looking at immediate deportations. however in light of the recent bombings blair made it evry clear which direction we're heading.
the british are never quite as openly barbaric as the americans though so for the sake of form we'regetting agreements from the countries in question that they won't persecute the nationals on their return. agreements which aren't worth the paper they're written on.
oops sorry i stand corrected. the jordan national abu qatada is expected to be deported next week having acquired an agreement from jordan that he will not be persecuted.
In my opinion, if someone is guilty of conspiring to commit terrorism and if his home country is a known violator of human rights, then he shouldn't be extradited. It's not about offering asylum to or protecting the guilty party, but making sure that their basic human rights aren't compromised.
Think about it - you could convict and imprison a known terrorist on British soil, or you could have him sent to Uzbekistan where you know for a fact that he will be tortured. The end result in terms of national security would be the same.
the judicial process is expensive and could well run into hundreds of thousands of pounds for each individual. in addition the cost of keeping a person in prison is approximately £40k per year. don't you think this money would be better spent on assylum seekers who aren't trying to blow us up or on the famine in niger or any other worthy cause.
obviously it doesn't quite work like this but hypothetically speaking would you be willing to protect the human rights of one terrorist at the expense of hundreds of thousands of starving people in famine ridden countries in africa, for the sake of a principal which you feel morally obliged to uphold?
>>would you be willing to protect the human rights of one terrorist at the expense of hundreds of thousands of starving people in famine ridden countries in africa, for the sake of a principal which you feel morally obliged to uphold?
see, although its hypothetical, i completely disagree with the phrasing of the question. whether the person is a terrorist or not shouldnt be the deciding factor in whether his life has more or less meaning/value to anyone else's. going further..i would say this is the one main reason why i feel we have so much bloodshed going on in the world right now.
So are you effectively willing to sell out your moral principles for the right price? Would you deny terrorists the judicial process simply because it is too expensive? Is the real problem here the terrorist or the bureaucracy of the justice system?
I would say that the cost is irrelevant, and miniscule when compared to the size of a nation's total budget, and needs to be borne.
There are any number of ways to redirect money to help asylum seekers and starving nations in Africa, if you really do care. So when you say...
>>obviously it doesn't quite work like this but hypothetically speaking would you be willing to protect the human rights of one terrorist at the expense of hundreds of thousands of starving people in famine ridden countries in africa, for the sake of a principal which you feel morally obliged to uphold?
...there is a total logical disconnect. Yes, it doesn't work like this at all.
i'm going to give up on defending a blog i had problems with myself. what you're saying is absolutely right and i'm really quite ashamed of what i wrote
hi spinny :)
(rolls out red carpet)
thanks you so much for joining. i feel honoured and unspeakably humbled.
;-)
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