It was the same British Government that was engaged in ‘rendering’ Libyan dissidents to the tender mercies of Ghadaffi’s torture regime on the orders of Jack Straw who denied all knowledge until MI6 waved under his nose the signed section 7 certificates granting immunity from criminal prosecution and civil liability to his subordinates who were only ‘obeying orders’! Funny how no one is seriously considering hauling Straw before the ‘beak’ but happy to jail an expendable little Lance Corporal from 1 QLR who deprived a father of his son and two little boys of their father!

Add to that the outsourcing of torture to the Somali authorities of a UK resident the evidence from which was passed back to the UK Security Services who used it to frame ‘questions’ to be put to the victim by the Border Agency on his deportation back to the Uk under Schedule 7 Terrorism Act 2000 and then used as the basis to place him under a control order – evidence derived from torture!

One can only imagine therefore how bemused the Jordanians must be following an assurance they gave to the British Government that no evidence secured by torture would be used against Qatada when faced with yet another approach from the British inviting the Kingdom to amend their criminal code to provide for the legal inadmissibility of such evidence.

You have to hand it to you average British Politician for his talent in the practiced art of hypocracy in taking a man like Qatada who has committed no criminal offence in this country, ‘banging him up’ for years, mobilising the vilification machinery of the national press to portray him as the personification of evil and then complain about the expense incurred in having to protect him against threats to his life when release on bail!

You certainly have to give the Home Secretary full marks for double standards for blaming the courts and the Human Rights Act for the inordinate delay in extraditing Abu Hamza to the USA who was merely suspected of an offence yet vilified for his views in the press while, at the same time, praying in aid of the Human Right Act and circumventing the court to prevent the extradition to the USA of Gary McKinnon who actually committed a serious crime of hacking into the computers of the Pentagon and NASA who was rather luckier than Hamza in having the press behind him allowing the government to abandon whatever principles it pretends to adhere to in order reap the benefit of a politically popular decision.

In short, whatever threat to this country Qatada represents, must pale into insignificance when set against the damage inflicted by those we choose to elect.

On then one hand, I see no reason to doubt that AQ is (or has been) a serious risk if he were free in the UK. The considered opinion of SIAC has to be accepted on this given that WE have not seen the totality of the evidence against him and probably never will.

On the other hand, Jordan “appears” to have cleaned up its act and does not torture detainees these days though it undoubtedly did in the past – (check out Human Rights Watch – Jordan).

The Jordanian case against AQ turns on two statements – (very likely extracted under torture) – which implicate him in terrorism in Jordan. Is this the ONLY evidence against him? If not, why cannot Jordan give an assurance that those statements will not be used against him in a future trial? IF the other evidence were strong enough then they would not need to rely on the statements.

The answer to that seems to lie in the (supposed) independence of the Jordanian judiciary. Here then is the nub of the problem regarding assurances. IF a nation’s judiciary are unable to give a commitment in advance of any trial that certain material will not be used at the trial of a person then the policy of “assurances” is utterly flawed. No judiciary – claiming to be independent – will give any assurance unless the case is actually before them.

Hence, the inescapable logic seems to be that assurances will usually be utterly worthless. I would be interested to hear argument against this since but, for my part, I have never been impressed by the idea of assurances received via diplomatic channels for States which have used torture.

The AQ case shows that our judiciary is truly independent of the executive and this is a matter to be very very proud of. Thomas Erskine referred to it as “the sacred independence of the judiciary.” At all costs, this must be guarded.

The fact then remains that we have a man in the Uk who is – according to government AND SIAC – a very serious risk to public safety. How is this to be dealt with? Perhaps a virtually permanent TPIM is the answer?