Tag Archives: David Davis

Britain, Government, Legal, Politics

An inquiry is needed into torture

RENDITION & TORTURE

Former cabinet minister David Davis is pressing the Prime Minister to order a judge-led inquiry into Britain’s involvement in the mistreatment of terror suspects – or face the prospect of a legal challenge.

In a major intervention, the former Brexit Secretary calls on Theresa May to set up an independent probe to investigate UK complicity in “wicked” torture and rendition during the so-called “war on terror”.

Failing to fulfil the Tory party’s pledge to hold an inquiry, chaired by a senior judge, into the abuse of captives will mean never discovering the truth about some of Britain’s “darkest days”, he says.

Mr Davis has backed a hard-hitting letter to Downing Street on torture signed by senior MPs.

It comes just weeks after he quit the Cabinet in disgust at Mrs May’s Chequers blueprint for leaving the EU.

He claims that Government inaction following confirmation that Tony Blair’s New Labour and the security services colluded with the US’s torture programme after 9/11 also contributed to his decision to walk out.

Mr Davis condemns Mrs May for hindering the search for the truth by preventing British agents from giving crucial evidence to Parliament’s Intelligence and Security Committee (ISC).

He says: “If the Government rejects the cross-party calls then they will open themselves up to being challenged in the courts. That is an outcome none of us wants to see. We have to hope common sense prevails.”

He also says it was “amazing” that Mr Blair and his ministers appeared not to have questioned spy chiefs about their actions, which raised the prospect that they were “deliberately avoiding asking them to maintain deniability”.

The letter, written by the All-Party Parliamentary Group on Rendition, argues that a judge-led inquiry is the “only way to get to the bottom of this shameful episode in our recent history and draw a line under it”.

A damning ISC report in June said British spy chiefs tolerated “inexcusable” mistreatment of terror suspects in the years after 9/11. The 152-page dossier, which took three years to compile, laid bare in unprecedented detail the UK’s complicity in torture and “extraordinary rendition”, where suspects are flown to another country for imprisonment and interrogation.

Mrs May said the security and intelligence agencies “regretted” not recognising sooner the “unacceptable practices”. But the Government said only that it would give “careful consideration” to holding a judge-led inquiry and make a decision within 60 days – around August 27.

Former prime minister David Cameron supported such an inquiry and appointed judge Sir Peter Gibson in 2010 but the probe was scrapped in 2012 before completing his work.

A spokesperson for the human rights charity Reprieve said: “The Prime Minister should listen to her colleagues and call an independent judge-led inquiry, to ensure Britain learns from its mistakes.”

MR Davis says any government that permits UK involvement in torture should be held to firmly account. Unfortunately, he declared, this has not happened in cases where UK ministers and officials got mixed up in “war on terror”- era torture.

That is why Theresa May should deliver on the Government’s long-standing commitment to launch an independent judge-led inquiry into these matters. That is the only way we can ensure we don’t become complicit ever again.

The reports revealed Tony Blair’s ministers planned and bankrolled score of illegal kidnap operations and allowed the UK to become involved in hundreds of cases where officials knew of or suspected abuse.

In one incident cited an MI6 officer took part in the questioning of a detainee alongside US personnel before witnessing the man being driven in a “6ft sealed box” to be illegally rendered on an American plane.

The report also details the account of one British agent describing an American “Torture Centre” in Iraq, to which the UK military were no longer allowed to send detainees as a result of what went on there.

In what the ISC report condemns as an unacceptable “workaround”, MI6 simply took detainees held there to an adjacent cabin, where they could be interviewed, before being sent back to their abuse.

In another incident, an MI6 officer was assisting with a US interrogation – until being asked to leave the room, so that the US official could “rough up” the detainee without any witnesses present. When the UK officer returned, the ISC report describes the detainee as visibly hurt.

These revelations, Mr Davis says, represent only the tip of the iceberg, as the Parliamentary committee investigating UK involvement in torture was barred by Downing Street from following critical leads.

Roadblocks thrown up by No 10 meant the ISC was able to question 13 times fewer witnesses than it sought. This led to its chairman, in his own words, to “draw a line” under the committee’s efforts.

This interference by government means that despite the reports’ damning findings there are too many gaps and unanswered questions. The need for a full, independent, judge-led inquiry is clear.

When the Conservatives entered government in 2010, the party rightly promised that it would get to the bottom of Britain’s involvement in these practices, and make whatever changes were needed to stop them happening again. The job has been started, but it remains incomplete. Mr Davis says this is not about blaming individuals who were undoubtedly operating under extreme and highly pressured conditions, but that we will never be able to understand what those on the ground understood their orders to be unless they can be asked.

What were they being told? What information were they feeding back? And what questions were they raising with their supporters?

 

ALSO central to understand is what ministers at the time knew about the operations they were signing off on. Amazingly, it seems that they were not asking questions of the agencies about what was being sanctioned.

Did they fail to do this because they wrongly assumed everything was in order? Or were they deliberately avoiding asking them to maintain deniability?

An inquiry into these issues must be led by someone untainted by a connection to the intelligence services. It is also clear that the chair must have full legal powers to compel the production of evidence.

Measures will, of course, need to put in place to protect genuinely sensitive material, but it is perfectly possible for this to be done while ensuring that relevant testimony is publicly heard.

If the Government rejects the cross-party calls then they will open themselves up to being challenged in the courts.

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Britain, European Parliament, European Union, Government, Politics

UK Government threatens to get tough if Brussels bars trade deal

BREXIT

BRITAIN has threatened to impose customs duties and VAT on all goods coming from Europe if the EU blocks a trade deal.

Brexit Secretary David Davis warned Brussels it would suffer if trade is disrupted as EU countries sell 60billion euros more in goods and services to us than we do to them.

Ministers set out post-Brexit plans that would allow lorries to clear customs checks at Channel ports within seconds thanks to an online border system and number-plate recognition technology.

However, they said MPs and peers will legislate to impose new customs duties and VAT tariffs on trade with the EU, in case no Brexit deal can be agreed by March 2019.

In the first of 12 documents setting out its negotiating position, the Government said that if there is no deal, ‘the UK would treat trade with the EU as it currently treats trade with non-EU countries’.

‘Customs duty and import VAT would be due on EU imports,’ it said. ‘Traders would need to be registered. Traders exporting to the EU would have to submit an exploration declaration, and certain goods may require an export licence.’

But the document said it hoped for a deal with the EU and set out two customs options – a streamlined customs arrangement or a new customs partnership.

Under the first proposal, Britain and the EU would use technology to help goods pass speedily through ports.

Mr Davis said they would replicate techniques used for products coming from outside the EU, which ‘get 90 per cent of containers through in a matter of seconds’.

Companies would fill out customs declarations using an online system in advance, with number-plate recognition allowing vehicles to be waved straight through. Spot checks would affect only a small proportion of lorries. The second proposal, for a new customs partnership, would see the EU’s customs rules mirrored by the UK so that ‘all goods entering the EU via the UK have paid the correct EU duties’.

‘This would remove the need for the UK and the EU to introduce customs processes between us, so that goods moving between the UK and the EU would be treated as they are now for customs purposes,’ the document said.

Holidaymakers would face no extra checks under either option, the Government said, and people on so-called ‘booze cruises’ to France would not be affected.

Brussels said it would not begin discussing the UK’s proposals for customs until more progress is made in negotiations on the Brexit divorce bill.

However, Mr Davis reminded EU countries it was in their interest to reach a mutually beneficial arrangement.

‘We sell about 230billion euros of goods and services to the EU each year, they sell 290billion to us. I was in Bavaria only two or three weeks ago. They sell BMWs, they sell agricultural produce, they sell electronic goods.

‘They have got an incredibly strong interest in something like this, so there is an interest on both sides of not doing each other harm.’

Michel Barnier, The EU’s chief Brexit negotiator, tweeted: ‘The quicker the UK and EU27 agree on citizens, settling accounts and Ireland, the quicker we can discuss customs and the future relationship.’

A European Commission spokesman said: ‘We take note of the UK’s request for an implementing period and its preferences as regards the future relationship, but we will only address them once we have made sufficient progress on the terms of the orderly withdrawal.

‘An agreement on a future relationship between the EU and the UK can only be finalised once the UK has become a third country … frictionless trade is not possible outside the single market and customs union.’

Guy Verhofstadt, the European Parliament’s chief Brexit co-ordinator, also took to Twitter and wrote: ‘To be in and out of the customs union and [have] “invisible borders” is a fantasy. First need to secure citizens’ rights and a financial settlement.’

Mr Davis said he did not expect the Brexit divorce bill to be agreed this year.

. Britain to demand no barriers at Irish border

The British Government has said that no check points or CCTV cameras should be put on the border between Northern Ireland and the Republic after Brexit.

Ministers have said their top priority is keeping the frontier free of border posts and have made clear there will be ‘no return to the hard borders of the past’.

In a paper, the Government said that Brussels could agree to there being no checks on goods crossing the border.

Under one proposal put forward, small businesses that make up 80 per cent of cross-border trade would be exempted from customs rules.

Larger companies would be trusted to declare what goods they are carrying between the two countries, with spot checks taking place away from the border.

Another option would see the Government work with Brussels on a special customs agreement that would eliminate checks on goods moving between any EU country and the UK.

The Government paper dismisses any suggestion a customs border could be shifted to the Irish Sea with checks and tariffs only at entry and exit points between the island and Great Britain.

Creating such a barrier between Northern Ireland and the rest of the UK is ‘not constitutionally or economically viable’, it says.

It also makes clear that the UK plans to protect the Common Travel Area – the open borders agreement predating our EU membership – that allows British and Irish citizens to move freely around the two countries. A Government source said: ‘Both sides need to show flexibility and imagination when it comes to the border issue in Northern Ireland and that is exactly what our latest position paper will do.

‘As [the EU’s chief Brexit negotiator] Michel Barnier himself has said, the solution cannot be based on a precedent so we’re looking forward to seeing the EU’s position paper on Ireland.

‘But it’s right that as we shape the unprecedented models, we have some very clear principles.

‘Top of our list is to agree upfront no physical border infrastructure – that would mean a return to the border posts of the past and is completely unacceptable.

‘Our paper sets out some creative options on customs … Protecting trade is vital for the UK and Ireland … so we’re prioritising finding a solution that protects businesses’ ability to access these important markets.’

The Irish government has welcomed the UK’s position paper. A spokesperson said: ‘Protecting the peace process is crucial and it must not become a bargaining chip in the negotiations.

The spokesperson added that the publication of the position paper was ‘timely and helpful’ as it offers more clarity.

. Ancillary: 

Brexit Timeline

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Britain, European Union, Government, Politics, Society

UK Government announces plans for Brexit negotiations

UNITED KINGDOM

David Davis MP, the Brexit Secretary, has set out the UK Government’s negotiating strategy in a Government White Paper.

David Davis MP, the Brexit Secretary, has set out the UK Government’s negotiating strategy in a Government White Paper.

BREXIT SECRETARY David Davis has set out the Government’s negotiating strategy for the UK’s withdrawal from the EU in a keenly-awaited white paper.

Launching the 77-page document in a statement to the House of Commons, Mr Davis said the paper confirmed Prime Minister Theresa May’s vision of ‘an independent and truly global United Kingdom’.

Confirming the UK’s strategy would be guided by the 12 principles set out by Mrs May in her Lancaster House speech last month (see article), Mr Davis said the Government was aiming for ‘a new, positive and constructive partnership between Britain and the European Union that works in our mutual interest’.

The white paper, entitled The United Kingdom’s Exit From And New Partnership With The European Union, was published a day after MPs voted overwhelmingly to permit Mrs May to press ahead with starting withdrawal negotiations under Article 50 of the EU treaties.

Mrs May’s foreword to the white paper was made up of extracts from her Lancaster House speech, in which she said that forging a new partnership with Europe and a ‘stronger, fairer, more global’ Britain would be ‘the legacy of our time, the prize towards which we work, the destination at which we arrive once the negotiation is done’.

In a preface to the document, Mr Davis said that Britain entered the negotiations which the Government intends to trigger by the end of March in ‘a position of strength’.

Stressing that the UK ‘wants the EU to succeed’, he urged the remaining 27 member states and European institutions to be guided in the upcoming negotiations by ‘the principles set out in the EU Treaties concerning a high degree of international co-operation and good neighbourliness’.

Mr Davis said the Government would not publish details of its plans that would undermine Britain’s negotiating position, but promised ‘extensive engagement with Parliament’ and a ‘high degree of public engagement’ as the process went forward.

‘This document sets out our plan for the strong new partnership we want to build with the EU,’ he said.

‘Whatever the outcome of our negotiations, we will seek a more open, outward-looking, confident and fairer UK, which works for all.’

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