Ever since Rishi Sunak announced that a General Election would take place on July 4, some commentators have been suggesting that those of us who are implacably opposed to Israel’s ongoing genocide in Gaza — as all decent people should be — should boycott the Labour Party entirely, because of the unconditional support for Israel demonstrated by Keir Starmer and key members of his shadow cabinet.
Starmer, shamefully, told LBC on October 11 that Israel had “the right” to withhold power and water from Gaza, while claiming that, “Obviously, everything should be done within international law”, even though, as a former human rights lawyer, he must have known that international law prohibits withholding power and water from a civilian population, because it is collective punishment, and a war crime under Article 33 of the Fourth Geneva Convention relative to the Protection of Civilian Persons in Time of War, which entered into force in October 1950.
Emily Thornberry and David Lammy were also criticised for statements they made in the first week of Israel’s ultra-violent response to the deadly attacks by Hamas and other militants on October 7, and were all included in “a notice of intention to prosecute UK politicians for their role in aiding and abetting Israel’s perpetration of war crimes”, issued on October 16 by the International Centre of Justice for Palestinians (ICJP), “an independent organisation of lawyers, politicians and academics who support the rights of Palestinians and aim to protect their rights through the law.”
I wrote the following article for the “Close Guantánamo” website, which I established in January 2012, on the 10th anniversary of the opening of Guantánamo, with the US attorney Tom Wilner. Please join us — just an email address is required to be counted amongst those opposed to the ongoing existence of Guantánamo, and to receive updates of our activities by email.
For the 16th anniversary of the opening of the prison at Guantánamo Bay, and the first anniversary of Donald Trump’s inauguration, a cross-party group of British MPs have written to Donald Trump, and to Republican Senators John McCain and Bob Corker, the chairs of two influential Senate Committees (the Senate Armed Services Committee and the Senate Committee on Foreign Relations), to urge action on Guantánamo after a year in which no prisoner has been released, despite five of the 41 men still held being approved for release, between 2010 and 2016, by high-level government processes established under President Obama. Throughout 2017, Donald Trump also made it clear that he has no interest in closing the prison, and would like to expand its use.
Almost as soon as Trump took office last January, a leaked draft executive order revealed that he wanted to keep Guantánamo open, wanted to send new prisoners there, and wanted to “suspend any existing transfer efforts pending a new review as to whether any such transfers are in the national security interests of the United States.” He also wanted to reinstate torture and the use of CIA “black sites.”
Trump’s enthusiasm for torture was immediately rebuffed by a wide range of critics, including many in his own administration and his eagerness to send new prisoners to Guantánamo has also not led to any new arrivals at the prison, for sound reasons that we hope remain flagged up throughout the rest of his presidency. Set up to be beyond the reach of the US courts, Guantánamo was never about justice or due process, but about using torture and abuse and then hiding it, and as the troubled history of the military commissions reveals, once prisoners have been tortured, it is difficult, if not impossible to bring them to justice. Trump’s advisers have undoubtedly also told him that US courts have a strong track record of successfully prosecuting those accused of terrorism. Read the rest of this entry »
I’m in a hurry, so please see below for the press release for tomorrow’s launch, in London, of We Stand With Shaker‘s new initiative, Fast For Shaker. This morning, I was at a meeting of the All-Party Shaker Aamer Parliamentary Group with MPs David Davis, Andrew Mitchell, Andy Slaughter, Tania Mathias and others, plus lots of campaigners.
Then I was in Kensington for an interview on London Live, about the launch of Fast For Shaker, which I hope is online somewhere. More info later. For now, here’s the press release. if you’re in London, please come along! Otherwise, keep signing up for the fast, and send in photos!
MPs David Davis, John McDonnell, Caroline Lucas, Andy Slaughter, Tania Mathias, Tom Brake Attend, Plus Shaker’s Father-In-Law Saeed Siddique, representatives of Reprieve, Actor David Morrissey and Comedian Sara Pascoe Read the rest of this entry »
Today, following a meeting of the Shaker Aamer Parliamentary Group yesterday, which I attended, as the co-director of We Stand With Shaker, it was decided that an Early Day Motion would be submitted by Andrew Mitchell MP (Con., Sutton Coldfield), calling for the Obama administration to release Shaker Aamer, the last British resident in Guantánamo, from the prison, and to return him to the UK, to rejoin his family in London.
Andrew is one of four MPs from the All-Party Parliamentary Group who visited Washington D.C. in May to try to secure Shaker’s release. When the EDM was submitted, it was also signed by the other three MPs from the delegation — Jeremy Corbyn (Lab., Islington North), the frontrunner in the Labour leadership campaign, David Davis (Con., Haltemprice and Howden), the co-chair of the Shaker Aamer Parliamentary Group, and Andy Slaughter (Lab., Hammersmith).
Showing the breadth of cross-party support demonstrated by the campaign to get Shaker released, Andrew also secured the support of Tim Farron (Liberal Democrat, Westmorland and Lonsdale), the new leader of the Liberal Democrats, who spoke at the Parliamentary debate for Shaker in March, and Alex Salmond (Scottish National Party, Gordon), the former leader of the SNP, and early signatories to the EDM were John McDonnell (Lab., Hayes and Harlington), the co-chair of the Parliamentary Group, who established the group last November, Dominic Grieve (Con., Beaconsfield), the former Attorney General, and Caroline Lucas (Green, Brighton Pavilion), who has been a supporter from the beginning. Read the rest of this entry »
It’s eight months since the Labour MP John McDonnell MP, an indefatigable campaigner for justice, established the Shaker Aamer All-Party Parliamentary Group, to call for the release from Guantánamo of Shaker Aamer, the last British resident in the prison, who is still held, despite being approved for release by the US authorities twice — in 2007, under George W. Bush, and in 2009, under Barack Obama.
With support from the Save Shaker Aamer Campaign, which spent many years working to get the Parliamentary Group established, and also from We Stand With Shaker, the campaign group established by Andy Worthington and Joanne MacInnes, which was also launched eight months ago, the Parliamentary Group sent a delegation to Washington D.C. after the General Election in May. The four MPs involved — the Conservative MPs David Davis and Andrew Mitchell, and the Labour MPs Jeremy Corbyn and Andy Slaughter — met with Senators, including John McCain and Dianne Feinstein, and Obama administration officials, in the hope of securing a timeline for Shaker’s release, although no date has been given, despite repeated rumors that it would be this summer, and despite a hard-hitting op-ed in the New York Times by the MPs, who wrote, “There is simply no reason, domestic or international, for the United States to keep Mr. Aamer in custody,” and also stated, “It is difficult for us to shake off the depressing notion that the Obama administration is indifferent to the repeated requests of the British government,” adding that this is “a slap in the face for America’s staunchest friend.”
Prior to this, in March, the Parliamentary Group also secured a hugely important debate in the House of Commons, which led to the government supporting the motion “call[ing] on the US Government to release Shaker Aamer from his imprisonment in Guantánamo Bay and to allow him to return to his family in the UK.” Read the rest of this entry »
I’m delighted to report that, today, US Independence Day (July 4), the following open letter to President Obama, calling for the release from Guantánamo of Shaker Aamer, the last British resident in the prison, was published by the Guardian, on its website, which has seven million readers worldwide, and picked up on by the Daily Mail, Sky News and ITV News. Also see this Guardian article (a version of which was published in the newspaper), accompanying the publication of the letter.
I wrote the letter for the We Stand With Shaker campaign , which I founded, with the activist Joanne MacInnes, in November, and Jo has spent the last few weeks assiduously securing signatures. Celebrity supporters include Sir Patrick Stewart OBE, Ralph Fiennes, Russell Brand, Roger Waters, Peter Gabriel, Sting, Richard E. Grant, Mark Rylance, Juliet Stevenson, David Morrissey, Frankie Boyle, Ken Loach, Mike Leigh and Michael Brearley.
Late yesterday afternoon, we secured the support of Boris Johnson, the Mayor of London, who joined dozens of other MPs, including former Attorney General Dominic Grieve, the former Director of Public Prosecutions and the Head of the Crown Prosecution Service, Keir Starmer, and the six MPs who lead the cross-party Shaker Aamer Parliamentary Group: the co-chairs, John McDonnell (Lab.) and David Davis (Con.), and the four officers of the group: Andrew Mitchell (Con.), Jeremy Corbyn (Lab.), Caroline Lucas (Green) and Andy Slaughter (Lab.). Read the rest of this entry »
I wrote the following article for the “Close Guantánamo” website, which I established in January 2012 with US attorney Tom Wilner. Please join us — just an email address is required to be counted amongst those opposed to the ongoing existence of Guantánamo, and to receive updates of our activities by email.
Regular readers of “Close Guantánamo” will be aware of the case of Shaker Aamer, the last British resident still held in the prison at Guantánamo Bay. Shaker, a Saudi national who was given indefinite leave to remain in the UK, has a British wife and four British children, and is still held despite being approved for release under President Bush in 2007 and under President Obama in 2010.
I wrote about Shaker’s case soon after the “Close Guantánamo” campaign and website was established, on the 10th anniversary of the opening of Guantánamo in January 2012. To mark the 10th anniversary of Shaker’s arrival at Guantánamo, on February 14, 2012, I wrote an article entitled, 10 Years in Guantánamo: British Resident Shaker Aamer, Cleared for Release But Still Held.
One of his lawyers, Ramzi Kassem, then made available notes of his meetings with Shaker, which we published as two articles in April 2012, and again in October 2012, at Shaker’s request. In October 2013, we published an exclusive article about Shaker’s request for an independent medical evaluation, and also published Ramzi Kassem’s supporting statement, and in April 2014, after that medical evaluation had been allowed, we followed up with an article about Shaker’s ultimately unsuccessful request for a judge to order his release because of the findings by the expert, Dr. Emily Keram, that Shaker was suffering from a host of physical and psychological problems. Read the rest of this entry »
On Tuesday, in an open letter to President Obama and defense secretary Ashton Carter that I drafted, 13 rights groups, including Close Guantánamo and We Stand With Shaker, as well as Amnesty international USA, the Center for Constitutional Rights, Reprieve and others, called for the release of 57 men from Guantánamo (out of the 122 men still in the prison), who are still held despite being approved for release, the majority for over five years.
One of the 57 is Shaker Aamer, the last British resident in Guantánamo, and one of the reasons I initiated the letter was to coincide with a visit to Washington, D.C. by a delegation of British MPs, from the Shaker Aamer Parliamentary Group, which was established last November, and, in March, secured the support of the government for the following motion — “That this House calls on the US Government to release Shaker Aamer from his imprisonment in Guantánamo Bay and to allow him to return to his family in the UK.”
The MPs who flew to the US for meetings to try to secure Shaker’s release are the Labour MPs Jeremy Corbyn (a longtime colleague of the Shaker Aamer Parliamentary Group’s chair, John McDonnell) and Shadow Justice Minister Andy Slaughter, and the Conservative MPs David Davis (a former Shadow Home Secretary) and Andrew Mitchell (a former Chief Whip and former International Development Secretary). Read the rest of this entry »
On March 17, as regular readers will know, a long-awaited — and long fought for — Parliamentary debate took place in the main chamber of the House of Commons, with MPs debating the motion, “That this House calls on the US Government to release Shaker Aamer from his imprisonment in Guantánamo Bay and to allow him to return to his family in the UK.”
I wrote a detailed article about the debate here, noting that Tobias Ellwood, a Tory MP and a junior minister in the Foreign Office, who was speaking for the British government, supported the motion, and stated, “I hope I have made it clear that the UK Government are absolutely committed to securing the release of Mr Aamer. Today I would like to underline that commitment and join the House in calling for the US Government to approve the release of Shaker Aamer to the UK.”
Below I’m cross-posting the transcript of the debate from Hansard. I’ve divided it into two parts, as it’s quite long, so the first part is below and the second will follow tomorrow.
As I noted in my article yesterday, the transcript contains some stirring speeches about the importance of the law and the perpetually shocking injustice of Shaker’s continued imprisonment from a variety of speakers, including John McDonnell, David Davis, Andrew Mitchell, Sir Gerald Kaufman, Andy Slaughter, Tim Farron, Jeremy Corbyn, Caroline Lucas and Gareth Thomas (the Shadow Minister for Foreign Affairs), with other comments by Kate Hoey, Jim Cunningham, Neil Carmichael, Stephen Timms, Alistair Burt, Ian Murray, David Ward and Dennis Skinner. Others were present, but did not make comments, including Jane Ellison, Shaker’s constituency MP, who is a minister and therefore unable to comment. Read the rest of this entry »
Yesterday’s news was expected, but it still hit hard. Last June, the Joint Committee of North West London Primary Care Trusts proposed the closure of four of the nine A&E Departments at hospitals in north west London, and on Tuesday, despite vigorous campaigns throughout the area against the proposals, the committee confirmed that, as the Evening Standard put it, “Hammersmith and Central Middlesex hospitals will lose their A&Es permanently while Charing Cross and Ealing will be left with a downgraded urgent care centres which will not accept emergency patients.”
This really is an alarming development, as it will leave three of the eight boroughs in north west London — containing about three-quarters of a million people — without a major hospital, out of the 1.9 million people in the whole of north west London. In addition, removing hospitals’ ability to deal with emergencies essentially sounds the death knell for those hospitals, as a huge range of hospital services rely upon emergency admissions and the ability to deal with emergencies. In Lewisham, for example, where similar cuts have been approved, at least 90 percent of the mothers in the entire borough (4,400 a year) will no longer be able to give birth in Lewisham itself, despite it having the same population as Brighton, Hull or Newcastle.
Following the announcement about the north west London hospitals, Andy Slaughter, the MP for Hammersmith and the secretary of Save Our Hospitals Hammersmith and Fulham, said, “This is the biggest hospital closure programme in the history of the NHS. It will put lives at risk across West London and will give a second class health service to 2 million people.” He also stated, “There will be no A&E in the London boroughs of Hammersmith, Ealing or Brent, which together have a population the size of Leeds.” Read the rest of this entry »
Investigative journalist, author, campaigner, commentator and public speaker. Recognized as an authority on Guantánamo and the “war on terror.” Co-founder, Close Guantánamo and We Stand With Shaker. Also, photo-journalist (The State of London), and singer and songwriter (The Four Fathers).
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