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Tuesday 22 May 2012

Abu Qatada Should Stay in Britain

Tuesday, 14th February 2012

I am sure Dan Hodges is correct: Abu Qatada is not a great poster boy for civil liberties. He is not a British citizen and seems to have abused the privileges afforded him when he was granted asylum in this country. Deporting him to Jordan, where he is wanted on terrorism charges, must be a popular move. Nevertheless, the European Court of Human Rights has a strong case: sending Qatada to a country in which the evidence against him may well depend upon torture compromises Qatada's hopes of a fair trial.

Even if this were not the case you might think the fact he would be put on trial in Jordan is enough to compromise his prospects for a decent trial. Jordan may not be Saudi Arabia or Iran but it is not Canada or Finland either. Freedom House are quite clear on this: Jordan is in the "Not Free" camp. Is this the kind of country to which we should be deporting anyone, even those of whom we may have good reason to disapprove?

And there is this: either the UK government disapproves of torture or it is happy to disapprove of it in some countries while tolerating and perhaps even tacitly encouraging it in others. Though deporting Qatada to Jordon would dispose of the problem of what to do with him it also makes the British government an accomplice to the activities of the Jordanian security apparatus. It encourages the use of torture in other cases for the Jordanian authorities - or those in other countries where comparable cases may arise - will discover that though western governments deplore their brutality publicly they are happy to take advantage of it when it proves convenient to do so. (Of course this is also true of intelligence sharing but that's a different matter.)

Besides, given Qatada's record it seems remarkable that there is nothing in the great list of British criminal offences for which he can be put on trial in this country. Perhaps he really is a danger to public safety. If so then let this be tested in a British court. There appears to be a widespread assumption that he "must" be guilty of "something". Perhaps that is a reasonable belief. Where, then, is the charge?

Fretting about these matters is not, actually, the preserve of liberals self-imprisoned in their ivory towers; it is, rather, something sometimes reckoned, at least when it proves convenient to do so, as one of the defining virtues of what used to be called the British way of life. Douglas Murray offers a muscular response to this, arguing that the court can go hang and Britain should deport Qatada anyway. It is, you see, what the French or Italians would do. Perhaps it is; it's also the srt of thing - respect for the rule of law - that once made Britons think themselves superior to the French or Italians. Chauvinism? Certainly but a kind of chauvinism based (notionally at least) on something positive.

Peter Oborne's Telegraph column last week made much of the European Court of Human Rights' British origins. Rightly so, even if summoning the spirit of Winston Churchill required him to ignore Churchill's own enthusiasm for internment, the suspension of habeas corpus and much else besides (including, incidentally, the use of chemical weapons). Nevertheless: the Second World War was a different kettle of fish entirely: a conflict that demanded the almost total mobilisation of state and society. The struggle against crackpot Islamic extremism is a different, more limited, thing and so, plainly, is the nature of the threat the country faces.

If this means we must tolerate unpleasant, even awful, people bcause we lack the laws to imprison them simply because we suspect they hold unpleasant, even awful opinions then so be it. There will always be those who argue "but if it saves just one life" and those who prefer to be "safe than sorry" but where does this end? Few people are really willing to push those arguments to their grim, illiberal end. So, as Mr Hodges says, lines must be drawn even by those with little appetite for liberalism.

On the whole, I'd think better of a country that refused to send suspects to countries with a proven fondness for torture. Doing so is another signal to those regimes that they can stamp on their own people's rights and, when this proves useful to us, we will not make a fuss. It puts us on their side, not that of the brave liberals and dissidents who oppose regimes that, in normal circumstaces, we consider utterly deplorable. The affairs of state may be an organised hypocrisy but that does not mean we must champion that hypocrisy.

If Qatada is such a menace, put him on trial in the United Kingdom. He does not seem a pleasant man possessing pleasant opinions but the case is not, whatever Mr Hodges says, about our evaluation of Mr Qatada but is, rather, a question of how we see ourselves. That's why it is important and why liberals from all parties have reason to despair at the decisions made by successive governments of different parties.

Filed under: Abu Qatada (12 more articles) , Britain (738 more articles) , Civil liberties (52 more articles) , Liberalism (38 more articles) , Middle East (272 more articles) , Torture (57 more articles)

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Peter From Maidstone

February 14th, 2012 1:17pm Report this comment

Alex, why not invite him to come and live with you? Jordan is passing legislation to prohibit the use of evidence obtained by torture, there is therefore no reason for us to be prevented from deporting him. It is common sense justice. There are lots of places where justice is not of the same quality as found in the UK. In some countries dangerous Islamic extremists are locked up, while in the UK we fund the lifestyles of their growing families.

www.coffeehousewall.co.uk

Doug Daniel

February 14th, 2012 1:40pm Report this comment

I would like to think he must have committed some sort of offence in the UK, before we would have reason to want to deport him. If this is so, then let's try him in a court over here. If he hasn't, then why are we even looking to deport him?

It's as simple as that really. Either he's done something wrong, or he hasn't. Otherwise, the British state is shown up to be every bit as illiberal as China, Cuba and every other state that we claim has a "poor human rights record" on the basis of locking people up for having certain views.

C Powell

February 14th, 2012 2:14pm Report this comment

Jordan has not signed the ECHR. By what right does the Court or the UK tell Jordan, a sovereign government how to conduct its trials?

There are two points you miss:-

1. There is a balance between the duty of the state - and it is the most important duty the state has - to protect its citizens from harm and such rights as we owe a foreigner who is a threat to those citizens. The ECHR has judged that balance wrongly and the UK government should say so.

2. We are not complicit in whatever the Jordanian government does anymore than we are complicit in the policies of any other state to whom our citizens get deported.

It is an absurd situation where the human rights of foreigners who are a threat to us are given greater weight than the rights of UK citizens who are not criminals. The ECHR has no state and no citizens to protect and so, regrettably, if its decisions result in the UK's citizens being put at risk, then the only proper thing for the UK government to do is to ignore the ruling.

That we should have reached such a stage is further evidence of how "human rights" have been twisted and perverted in such a way that it becomes hard - if not impossible - for anyone of any sense to support the ECHR's absolutist and absurdist interpretation of the Convention.

Louis

February 14th, 2012 2:22pm Report this comment

Why not hand him over to the French or the Belgians who both want to put him on trial for various offences. That would save us all a lot of hassle.

Titus Salt

February 14th, 2012 2:42pm Report this comment

@1:40pm "I would like to think he must have committed some sort of offence in the UK, before we would have reason to want to deport him."

He has committed an offence - he is an illegal immigrant.

Kittler

February 14th, 2012 2:49pm Report this comment

Alex, enjoy poking a stick through the bars to stir up the inhabitants?

Dan Grover

February 14th, 2012 3:11pm Report this comment

I agree with Alex. What we now think of as free market economics and individual responsibility originated with liberalism, not conservatism. There's nothing paternal or historical about them. They existed before liberalism was codified, of course, though mutual cooperatives existed before Marxism too, so that's not saying much.

The point is that Liberalism has changed since then. It's taken on the US meaning of the word, where the so-called 'Guardianistas" are reviled as liberals for their support of huge welfare states and promotion of equality. None of these things are liberal.

But what *is* liberal is support of human rights. When did it become OK for those on the right to support the ruminations of the state instead of the individual? Why should we advocate and support ruinous, ill-disciplined court systems purely because the person to be tried isn't a British citizen? Rights are universal, surely, else they're not "rights", they're merely "things you can do in Britain".

I think the problem is that, having had the word "liberal" hi-jacked, people on the right are hesitant to support *anything* that puts them on the same side of the hymn sheet as the left. Another problem is the over-egging of human rights - the idea that, if you apply the label of "human right" to something, it becomes indellible, like the restoration of a muslim woman's Hymen et al. But that doesn't reduce the importance of *actual* human rights, and it's hard to deny that the right to a fair trial is, indeed, a human right. Protecting someone's human rights isn't the same as exonerating them - it's that, and nothing more. Like Alex said, if this person's a danger to the UK, then let's charge him with something.

*Actual* human rights are something that, I think, everyone can get behind, right or left, liberal or "liberal".

Mac

February 14th, 2012 4:12pm Report this comment

Abu Qatada Should Stay in Britain............and Scotland should leave.

Scots never supported the so-called war on terror.

Peter From Maidstone

February 14th, 2012 4:41pm Report this comment

And so the almost complete subversion of the Spectator by the left-liberal agenda continues and is almost complete.

www.coffeehousewall.co.uk

AndyinBrum

February 14th, 2012 5:15pm Report this comment

Oh grow the fuck up Peter. If they think he's guilty of a crime, charge him & put him on trail, if not your just as bad as the communists/socialists/EUSSR you profess to hate so much.

Hexhamgeezer

February 14th, 2012 5:58pm Report this comment

Unfortunately the Spectator software restricts long posts opposing output such as this.

Qatada does not have the right to reside with, and be funded by, people whom he wishes to see murdered and enslaved.

Anything else is just hard left sophistry, camouflage, deceptiom and evasion.

Fergus Pickering

February 14th, 2012 6:15pm Report this comment

Why do you say Peter professes? Do you not believe him? And why does deporting this horrible man (not putting a bullet in the back of his neck) make us as bad as Stalin. I don't see it myself. I think human rights are something you can lose if you are sufficiently evil. I've never been a great supporter of, say, Goering's human rights.

Mr L

February 14th, 2012 8:31pm Report this comment

He should never have been allowed to stay in this country for so long. We owe him no favours whatsoever. C Powell is right. It angers anyone not of the left-liberal tendency that we should have to spend so much money and effort on this dreadful man. Get shot of him, and please everybody but the bleeding hearts. What about the human rights of the people he wants to threaten?

Slim Jim

February 14th, 2012 8:40pm Report this comment

Apart from the human rights conundrum, i.e. the foreign criminal's rights v. the governments duty to protect the people and their rights; why was he granted asylum (as I understand he was) in the first place? If he wasn't, then he is an illegal alien. Why is it that every effort is made NOT to deport a person of this calibre? An urgent review of the law and its practitioners is overdue.

In2minds

February 14th, 2012 10:06pm Report this comment

@Peter From Maidstone - February 14th, 2012 1:17pm -

"why not invite him to come and live with you"?

No! Abu Qatada must not go to Scotland just in case the SNP seeking a small political advantage hand him back, as they did with Abdelbaset al-Megrahi.

Ron Todd

February 15th, 2012 6:12am Report this comment

Few would disagree that our government should do nothing to support or encourage torture in the more unpleasant parts of the world. We can see that many of the people produced by unpleasant countries turn out to be unpleasant people.

But if we have information that we suspect was obtained by torture and could use that information to prevent an atrocity would it be moral to ignore that information?

Richard Thomas

February 15th, 2012 8:54am Report this comment

I rather suspect that the failure to prosecute him follows authority's (special branch and co) tolerance of him when he first arrived and their fear that this would be used in any trial. There is of course an easy solution to the case - suspend the bail conditions and let him go wherever he wishes although any form of state benefit he might claim should be withheld. Should the British public wish to show their dislike of him and his ways by, say, throwing rotten vegetables and eggs at him, then the customary dilatoriness of the Met might come into play. Of course it would be wholly unacceptable should there be any leakage about how helpful he has been to the authorities during his time in custody.

Ron Todd

February 15th, 2012 9:24am Report this comment

I suspect that if a MNuslim ethnic minority immigrant was the subject of any sort of attack by members of the British public the Mets response and the judges, would be swiftand forcible.

R.G. Bargie

February 15th, 2012 12:27pm Report this comment

"I've never been a great supporter of, say, Goering's human rights."

Then you're no better than him.

R.G. Bargie

February 15th, 2012 12:29pm Report this comment

"We are not complicit in whatever the Jordanian government does anymore than we are complicit in the policies of any other state to whom our citizens get deported."

Of course we are. It's the exact same principle as the Spanish Inquisition, who executed no-one themselves but handed them over to the "mercy" of the state, knowing exactly what that meant.

Is the Spanish Inquisition what you aspire to?

Barry Byrne

February 15th, 2012 1:29pm Report this comment

"Perhaps he really is a danger to public safety. If so then let this be tested in a British court"

It was. In 2004. From wiki:
"Mr. Justice Collins, then chairman of the Special Immigration Appeals Commission that rejected his appeal against detention in 2004, said that Abu Qatada was "heavily involved, indeed was at the centre in the United Kingdom of terrorist activities associated with al-Qaeda. He is a truly dangerous individual"

Slim Jim

February 15th, 2012 2:25pm Report this comment

R. G. Bargie - 'Is the Spanish Inquisition what you aspire to?'

I would say that is exactly what radical Islamists like Qatada would have in store for us if they had their way. I'm afraid that appeasers like you are the problem not the solution. To equate this matter with the Spanish Inquisition is ridiculous. Putting principle before practicality is dangerous when you're under threat. You ought to change your name to Chamberlain.

R.G. Bargie

February 15th, 2012 5:13pm Report this comment

"I would say that is exactly what radical Islamists like Qatada would have in store for us if they had their way."

Indeed they would. And if we're not better than them, what are we fighting for? If he's committed a crime, charge him and punish him accordingly. If he hasn't, leave him be. Because if people aren't allowed to express opinions you don't like, you know what YOU should change your name to.

Slim Jim

February 15th, 2012 9:07pm Report this comment

R.G. Bargie - You know that his crimes do not include expressing his opinion. Perhaps you would be so kind as to remind us exactly why you think he should stay in this country? What possible benefit could that give, and what message would that send to other 'dangerous individuals?' This is less to do with grand principles, and more to do with the (possibly) unforeseen consequences and interpretation of badly thought-out legislation, exacerbated by the fact it is now beyond democratic control and accountability.

Baron

February 15th, 2012 10:44pm Report this comment

C Powell @2.14:

spot on, sir, Baron seconds every word.

Baron

February 15th, 2012 10:58pm Report this comment

R.G.Bargie @ 5.13, my blogging friend, don’t get your boxers in the twist, of course, the guy should be free to express any opinion he likes, one would back him to the hilt on that score, the thing is the man’s an illegal immigrant, he has no right to stay here with us, it’s that simple, sir.

and will you please explain to Baron your equating this case to those of the Spanish inquisition, you what, insane?