Terrorism

Mark Littlewood is Director General of the Institute of Economic Affairs and contributed an article to the recent collection Big Brother Watch: The state of civil liberties in Britain. He summarises his argument here. It’s not fanciful to argue that the formation of a Liberal-Conservative coalition government last May was helped by the fact that Lib Dem and Tory parliamentarians had worked closely together in the previous Parliament to thwart or temper some of the Labour administration’s more aggressive assaults on civil liberties. The two parties – then in opposition, now in government – seemed to find common ground in defending the rights of the individual against the increasingly shrill

It is fashionable to ridicule David Miliband’s search for a post-political career. But in yesterday’s Daily Telegraph the former Foreign Secretary showed that – for all his mistakes in office – his intellect, and judgement on a number of key issues, including how to bring the Afghanistan War to an end, was, and remains, razor-sharp: “Afghanistan’s battles are not just between the Afghan and foreign forces and the Taliban insurgency, but between (and within) Afghanistan’s often warring tribes. When Nato trains the Afghan National Army, it’s good – but not if you are a Pashtun who sees the predominantly Tajik army as the enemy.” The South Shields MP goes on

Coalition is a tricky business, full of compromise and connivance. Emblazoned across the front page of the Sunday Times (£) is the news that Control Orders are to be scrapped. A victory for Nick Clegg, we are told, won to nurture wounded Liberal Democrats and preserve the coalition. The Liberal Democrat 2010 manifesto maintained that Control Orders would be abolished and many senior Liberal Democrats have been volubly opposed to Lord Carlisle’s report into Control Orders, which was understood to propose their retention. Certainly, Nick Clegg needs an outright victory on policy. The Oldham East by-election draws near, whilst the tuition fees debacle remains clear in the memory, harsh austerity

Downing Street may  have dismissed as “complete nonsense” a newspaper report that the coalition was considering inviting David Miliband to become British ambassador to Washington. But the former foreign secretary is one of a few younger British politicians with international standing and while it would be odd to appoint him to a government job – and stranger still for him to accept — the coalition should consider putting him forward for a number of international assignments. Potential jobs include the international community’s “high representative” in Bosnia; as a UN envoy to Yemen; or as the representative of the Friends of Democratic Pakistan. In future, these three posts need to be

Today’s Wikileaks will make uncomfortable reading for all parts of the British defence establishment – ministers, both old and new, and the senior military leadership. As a senior military officer told me, “this isn’t going to be good.” The diplomatic cables reveal that US officials and President Hamid Karzai at some point thought that British forces had bitten of more in Helmand than they could chew. The US NATO commander, General Dan McNeill, is quoted as saying three years ago that British forces have made a mess of Helmand. This is backed up by a comment, more than a year later, suggesting that President Karzai also agreed that British forces

It is a day for about turns. First, the Pope has taken a historic decision to approve the use of condoms to fight AIDS; second, Labour has vowed to change its position on terror legislation and law and order. The party feels its record in government has damaged its reputation as a guarantor of liberty. Generation Ed wants to make another break from the past. Ed Balls has masterminded a cunning sleight of hand. The proposal is nowhere near as dramatic as headlines suggest. Labour will support the government’s proposed reduction of detention periods from 28 days to 14, provided the police and security services are not impeded by the change. Balls

As NATO leaders gather for a key summit in Lisbon, expect the newspapers to be full of the usual “why bother” commentary. NATO, they will argue, was founded for a different age and is not relevant for dealing with today’s threats – from cyber-attacks to nuclear non-proliferation. It is even struggling to deal with older threats, such as the Taliban insurgency. Most Europeans do not seem to mind. They feel safer than at any time before and worry predominantly about post-material threats, not conventional attack, as a think tank report showed recently. As a result, Europeans are set to spend less on defence. Germany expert Hans Kundnani has an excellent