Terrorism
21 December 2011 by Guest Contributor
Freezing
One could be forgiven, amidst the furore over the European Court of Human Rights’ Al-Khawaja judgment last Thursday, for missing the first report of the Independent Reviewer of Terrorism Legislation on the operation of the Terrorist Asset-Freezing etc Act 2010. The Report runs to over 100 pages and is the most comprehensive account of UK terrorist asset freezing in print.
It is the third report of the current Independent Reviewer, David Anderson Q.C., since he took up the post in February. Asset freezing is something of a speciality of his, as he has appeared in litigation in both EU and UK courts on the matter. It is therefore unsurprising that the Report exhibits the same attention to detail that made the Anderson’s previous two efforts essential reading.
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6 November 2011 by Matthew Flinn
Raed Mahajna v Secretary of State for the Home Department IA/21/21631/2011 – Read Judgment
1 Crown Office Row’s Neil Sheldon appeared for the Secretary of State in this case. He is not the writer of this post.
The First-Tier Tribunal (Asylum and Immigration Chamber), has upheld the decision of the Home Secretary to deport Raed Mahajna, who had come to the UK to attend a number of meetings and speaking engagements.
Mr. Mahajna (also known as Raed Saleh) was born in Israel in 1968. He is however of Palestinian origin and has been a vocal critic of the Government of Israel. Aware of his intention to travel to the UK, the Home Secretary issued an exclusion order against him on the basis that he had publicly expressed views that fostered hatred which might lead to inter-community violence in the UK. However, this order was never served upon him, and he entered the UK on 25th June 2011. He was subsequently arrested on 27th June and detained until released on bail on 18th July.
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4 September 2011 by Adam Wagner
Updated | Next week will mark the 10th anniversary of the 11 September 2001 terrorist attacks. Despite the intervening decade, the states threatened by terrorism are still puzzling out the right balance between the powers of security services and the rights of suspected terrorists to due process.
Although terrorism is now mercifully low on the public agenda, the effects of 9/11 are still being felt across the legal system. The United Kingdom is soon to open an independent inquiry into the improper treatment of detainees by security services following the terrorist attacks. As things stand, the UK’s major human rights groups are boycotting the inquiry for fear that the government will be able to suppress evidence.
The intelligence services have now tightened up their policy towards interviewing detainees overseas, but one policy which is still in flux is the control order regime, soon to be succeeded by Terrorism Prevention and Investigation Measures (TPIMs).
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1 June 2011 by Isabel McArdle
CD v Secretary of State for the Home Department [2011] EWHC 1273 (Admin) Read judgment
As readers of this blog will know, control orders have often been successfully challenged in the courts on human rights grounds. But in this case, an order forcing a person to relocate to a different part of the country was found to be lawful.
The Prevention of Terrorism Act 2005 gives the Home Secretary the power create to control orders, which impose obligations on persons “for purposes connected with protecting members of the public from a risk of terrorism”. One of the obligations permitted is a restriction on an individual’s place of residence.
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3 May 2011 by Adam Wagner
The New York Times reports that after years of promising leads gone cold, the final piece of evidence which led to Osama Bin Laden was found by interrogating detainees in Guantanamo Bay, Cuba. Given the rough interrogation techniques which were in use at the prison camp, the killing has reopened the debate over torture, and whether it is ever justified.
Blogger David Allen Green, amongst others, asks whether the Bin Laden scenario may amount to an exception to the “otherwise absolute rule” that torture is wrong. I would like to pose a slightly different question: on the basis of current UK law, would it have been lawful for UK authorities to use information obtained under torture to capture or kill a known terrorist?
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2 May 2011 by Adam Wagner
I argued last summer that rights campaigners were approaching the end of the age of terrorism, with economic concerns taking centre stage. The death of Bin Laden, just under a decade since the September 11 terrorist attacks, may ultimately be a historical marker of that shift in focus.
It is coincidental that Bin Laden’s death was announced on the British May Day bank holiday, traditionally a period of economic protests and celebration of the labour movement. But that coincidence does serve to highlight two different aspects of universal rights protections: to put it crudely, the protection of people we do and people we don’t like.
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8 February 2011 by Adam Wagner
Mustafa Kamal MUSTAFA (ABU HAMZA) (No. 1) v the United Kingdom – 31411/07 [2011] ECHR 211 (18 January 2011) – Read judgment
The European Court of Human Rights has rejected radical preacher Abu Hamza’s claim that his 2005-6 trial, at which he was convicted of soliciting to murder, inciting racial hatred and terrorism charges, was unfair. He claimed that a virulent media campaign against him and the events of 9/11 made it impossible for the jury to be impartial.
Abu Hamza has lived in the UK since 1979. from 1997-2003 was Imam at the Finsbury Park Mosque, London. Between 1996 and 2000 he delivered a number of sermons and speeches which later formed the basis for charges of soliciting to murder, using threatening, abusive or insulting words or behaviour with intent to stir up racial hatred, possessing a document or recording with the same intent.
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26 January 2011 by Adam Wagner
The Home Office has published its long-awaited review of counter-terrorism and security powers. The review findings and recommendations are here.
Other key documents can be found via the following links:
The Home Office’s summary of the key recommendations is reproduced below:
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17 November 2010 by Alasdair Henderson
As we reported recently, the Special Immigration Appeals Commission has ruled that Abu Hamza, the extremist Muslim cleric, cannot be stripped of his British citizenship since this would have the effect of making him stateless.
This is the latest in a string of decisions by various courts in a long-running legal saga surrounding the British government’s attempts to remove Abu Hamza from the UK. Hamza is also facing extradition to the United States, but this has been stayed pending the substantive decision of the European Court of Human Rights as to whether the prospect of serving a life sentence in a ‘supermax’ US prison would breach his Article 3 rights (our analysis of the admissibility decision can be found here).
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3 November 2010 by Richard Mumford
On 1 November 2010 the Terrorist Asset-Freezing etc. Bill received its third reading in the House of Lords. The bill, which started in the Lords, must now be passed by the Commons before receiving Royal Assent.
The Bill represents the coalition government’s response to the Supreme Court’s decision in HM Treasury v Ahmed (incidentally, the first appeal to have been heard in the Supreme Court) concerning the lawfulness of measures enabling the Treasury to freeze the assets of, amongst others, a person whom it has reasonable grounds for suspecting is or may be a person who facilitates the commission of acts of terrorism.
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10 September 2010 by Adam Wagner
Tomorrow is the 9th anniversary of the 11 September 2001 terrorist attacks, and it is worth considering some of the after effects which are still being felt in the UK courts.
Our posts on the human rights law relating to terrorism can be found here. The fact that it is the blog’s largest legal category is a reflection on the difficulties which the court have found in approaching anti-terrorism law. This relates to the previous government’s often controversial anti-terrorism policies, many of which have been successfully challenged in the courts, as well as the effects of the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan. Particular posts of interest are:
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13 July 2010 by Adam Wagner
The criminalisation of support for terrorist organisations has arisen in various domestic and international contexts recently, and it is likely that the issue will continue to attract controversy as states attempt to trace the boundaries of what can fairly be considered “support” for terrorism, and risk criminal legislation unjustifiably infringing on human rights.
The Human Rights in Ireland blog has posted the first in a series addressing the issue (update – the second post in the series is now available, see below). In the post, Dr. Cian Murphy suggests that “One of the most corrosive effects on political freedom during the “war on terrorism” has been that caused by material support legislation.” He goes on to refer to three recent decisions, including the 2008 Kadi case on EU implementation of UN sanctions against individuals linked to the Taleban, al-Qaeda and bin Laden (see ASIL case comment).
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9 July 2010 by Adam Wagner
Babar Ahmad, Haroon Rashid Aswat, Syed Tahla Ahsan and Mustafa Kamal Mustafa (Abu Hamza) v United Kingdom – 24027/07 [2010] ECHR 1067 (6 July 2010) – Read judgment
The European Court of Human Rights has delayed the extradition of four men, including the notorious Mustafa Kamal Mustafa (Abu Hamza), from the United Kingdom to the United States due to concerns that long prison sentences and harsh conditions in a “supermax” prison could violate their human rights.
In this admissibility application, the four men mounted a wide-ranging attack on the US Justice system to the Strasbourg court, in terms usually reserved for lawless rogue states. The men claimed their extradition would put them at risk of harsh treatment, extraordinary rendition and the death penalty, amongst other draconian penalties. They said that the trial of non-US citizens on terrorism charges would lead to a “flagrant denial of justice”.
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6 July 2010 by Adam Wagner
Binyam Mohamed
The details of the forthcoming wide-ranging public inquiry into British complicity with “rendition” and torture abroad have been announced by the Prime Minister.
He also announced the public release of guidance, formerly secret, on the questioning of suspects overseas, and that a new committee is to review the use of secret evidence in court proceedings.
The statement can be read in full here. Contrary to some reports, the new inquiry is to be judge-led. It will be headed by Sir Peter Gibson, a retired Court of Appeal Judge, who amongst other things headed up the Omagh bombing intelligence review in 2008, and currently is serving as the Intelligence Services Commissioner, a post which involves reviewing actions taken by the Secretary of State under the Intelligence Services Act 1994 and the activities of British intelligence.
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22 June 2010 by Adam Wagner
Holder v. Humanitarian Law Project, United States Supreme Court – Read judgment
The US Supreme Court has ruled that it does not violate the US Constitution for the government to block speech and other forms of advocacy supporting a foreign organization that has been officially labeled as terrorist, even if the aim is to support such a group’s peaceful or humanitarian actions.
The judgment does not, of course, have any direct effect on the UK. But UK anti-terrorism legislation already provides the police with broad powers to prosecute those who support terrorist groups. The UK Government is likely to be keeping a close eye on the United States in order to guide future policy, in terms of what is and what is not beyond the pale in restriction freedom of expression.
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