Biofuels

From The Times

March 7, 2008

Rush for biofuels threatens starvation on a global scaleBy 2030 the world population will have increased to such an extent that a 50 per cent increase in food production will be needed, it is claimedLewis Smith and Francis Elliott The rush towards biofuels is theatening world food production and the lives of billions of people, the Government’s Chief Scientific Adviser said yesterday. Professor John Beddington put himself at odds with ministers who have committed Britain to large increases in the use of biofuels over the coming decades. In his first important public speech since he was appointed, he described the potential impacts of food shortages as the “elephant in the room” and a problem which rivalled that of climate change. “It’s very hard to imagine how we can see the world growing enough crops to produce renewable energy and at the same time meet the enormous demand for food,” he told a conference on sustainability in London yesterday. “The supply of food really isn’t keeping up.” Related LinksBiofuels cannot save the planet By 2030, he said, the world population would have increased to such an extent that a 50 per cent increase in food production would be needed. By 2080 it would need to double. But the rush to biofuels – allegedly environmentally friendly – meant that increasing amount of arable land had been given over to fuel rather than food. The world’s population is forecast to increase from the six billion at the start of the millennium to nine billion by 2050. Already biofuels have contributed to the rapid rise in international wheat prices and Professor Beddington cautioned that it was likely to be only a matter of time before shoppers in the United Kingdom faced big price rises because of the soaring cost of feeding livestock. His comments come just a month after the Government welcomed a European Commission target requiring 10 per cent of all fuel sold in British service stations to be derived from plants within 12 years. Already biofuels attract a 20p per litre reduction in duty to encourage their uptake. Hilary Benn, the Environment Secretary, recently announced additional funding for biofuel research and farmers can claim subsidies to grow crops for energy. Last year President Bush called for a massive increase in the use of ethanol in America over the next decade. The US now devotes more acreage to growing corn than at any time since 1944. Farmers planted 90.5 million acres in 2007, 15 per cent more than a year before. If White House efforts to double ethanol production this year are achieved, and in due course 40 per cent of that corn ends up in petrol tanks, the world will face a harder and costlier time feeding itself. A spokesman for Ruth Kelly, the Transport Secretary, insisted that the Government was well aware of the possible negative effects of biofuels. “We take this issue very seriously and we are not prepared to go beyond current target levels for biofuels until we are satisfied it can be done sustainably.” Professor Beddington said that the prospect of food shortages over the next 20 years was so acute that politicians, scientists and farmers must begin to tackle it immediately. “Climate change is a real issue and is rightly being dealt with by major global investment,” he said afterwards. “However, I am concerned there is another major issue along a similar time-scale, an elephant in the room – that of food and energy security. This is giving me and many of my scientific colleagues much concern.” Population levels are growing so fast already that an extra six million people are born every month. Growing enough food for everyone was further challenged, he said, because of climate change, which was likely to lead to a shortage of water. Scientists say that intense dry spells will become more frequent over the next century. The supply of water will be put under further pressure because of the increased number of people who need it, not only to drink but to keep their crops alive. The production of a tonne of wheat, for example, requires 50 tonnes of water. Because it was almost impossible to control the population increase in the short term, Professor Beddington told the conference, other measures would need to be taken. “Agriculture has been doing pretty well against the population size but things are changing now and they are changing quite dramatically,” he said. “Don’t we need to do something about food? Demand has grown enormously, particularly in China and India, where much of the driving force is increased demand. By 2030 energy demand is going to be up by 50 per cent and demand for food is going to be up by 50 per cent.” The increase in demand has been reflected by the rapid rise in the prices of basic commodities, including wheat, over the past two years. Biofuels have been put forward as a means of reducing the greenhouse gas emissions pumped out by fossil fuels but recent studies have questioned their impact when all factors, such as the use of fertilisers on the crops, are taken into account. Critics have been angered by the loss of tropical rainforests, which have been cleared to allow farmers to grow biofuel crops. Deforestation has been calculated to account for about 18 per cent of world greenhouse gas emissions and Professor Beddington said that to destroy rainforests in order to grow biofuel crops was “insane”. He added: “Some of the biofuels are hopeless, in the sense that the idea that you cut down rainforest to actually grow biofuels seems profoundly stupid.” He said that human ingenuity was extraordinary and he was confident that food production could be boosted, including by growing genetically modified crops. Josette Sheeran, executive director of the World Food Programme, told the European Parliament in Brussels yesterday: “The shift to biofuels production has diverted lands out of the food chain. Food prices such as palm oil in Africa are now set at fuel prices. It may be a bonanza for farmers – I hope it is true – but in the short term, the world’s poorest are hit hard.” Have your say

The Moral Responsibility of Lawyers

The next HRLA lecture entitled "The Moral Responsibility of Lawyers" will be taking place on Tuesday 1st April at 6.00pm at Freshfields Bruckaus Deringer. The event is free to members of the HRLA and £5.00 for non members. CPD 1.5 hours.

Boycott Chinese goods...

The Chinese authorities must allow independent UN investigation into the events of the last week in Tibet and lift the long-term restrictions on human rights monitoring in the area.After a week of unrest, the region has been sealed off. Amnesty International has called on the Chinese authorities to show restraint in responding to continuing protests in Lhasa and elsewhere in Tibet. International law requires that governments handle such crises in ways that uphold fundamental human rights and the principles of necessity and proportionality in the use of force.The authorities must also fully account for all detainees and release those detained solely for peacefully expressing their views." The Chinese authorities also need to address the underlying grievances of the Tibetan people and the long-term policies that have generated such resentment," said Catherine Baber, Director of the Asia-Pacific Programme at Amnesty International. "The situation also demands attention by the UN Human Rights Council at its current session."Tibetans' long-term grievances include perceived exclusion from the benefits of economic development, restrictions on religious practice, and government policies weakening their culture and ethnic identity.On Friday, protests in Lhasa turned violent, with protestors setting fire to Chinese-owned businesses, police stations and attacking Han Chinese. As a result, thirteen persons died according to official Chinese sources, largely Han Chinese businesspeople in Lhasa. Police and military forces were reported to have fired teargas and live ammunition into crowds and beaten protestors in an attempt to disperse them. According to spokespersons for the Tibetan Government in Exile this has resulted in around 80 deaths.A curfew is reported to have been imposed throughout Lhasa and all shops are closed. Entry into the city has been blocked off through check-points. Armoured vehicles and contingents from the People’s Armed Police are present throughout the city. Reports suggest that scattered protests continued in parts of the city over the weekend.

Police and military forces have surrounded three major monasteries in the Lhasa area, confining monks inside and beating those who have attempted to leave. Monks from Sera monastery are reported to have started a hunger strike demanding the withdrawal of military forces from their monastery.

Tibetans Hold Demonstration In London

Protesters have gathered outside the Chinese Embassy in London in support of anti-Chinese demonstrations in Tibet. 'Free Tibet' protest in London The group waved red, blue, white and yellow flags in the build-up to a 4pm deadline (midnight in Tibet) set by the Chinese government for protests in Tibet to end.The protesters shouted "free Tibet, stop the killing in Tibet" and "Chinese out", "long live the Dalai Llama" and "China, China, China, out, out, out".Some of the demonstrators threw banners and sticks at the front door of the embassy and at police officers standing outside. They were eventually pushed back on to the central reservation but continued to shout and wave their flags and banners About eight police vans and 15 officers lined up in front of the group to keep them on the opposite side of the road from the embassy. One protester, Tashi Gyaltsen, lives in London but his parents fled Tibet as children. The 31-year-old said: "We are here to show our support for Tibetans who are risking everything to protest."As free Tibetans living in the UK we are very lucky to be able to protest without any danger to our lives. "It is so sad - Tibetans in Tibet are in the worst situation. Everything they do is under restrictions."We don't care what the response is in the embassy but we have to voice our concern." Six protesters, who are Tibetan students at British universities, are to stage a 24-hour hunger strike on the pavement opposite the embassy.

Israel's Jewish critics

Anti-Zionism is part of a larger opposition to racism, an expression of solidarity with the Palestinians as victims of injustice
As long as there has been Zionism, there have been anti-Zionist Jews. Indeed, decades before it even came to the notice of non-Jews, anti-Zionism was a well-established Jewish ideology, and until the second world war commanded wide support in the diaspora. Today, as cracks show in the presumed monolith of Jewish backing for Israel, increasing numbers of Jews are interrogating and rejecting Zionism. Nonetheless, the existence of anti-Zionist Jews strikes many people - Jews and non-Jews - as an anomaly, a perversity, a violation of the first clause in Hillel's ethical aphorism: "If I am not for myself, who will be for me?"
Zionism is an ideology and a political movement. As such, it is open to rational dispute, and on a variety of grounds. Jews, like others, might well view the Jewish claim to Palestine as irrational, anachronistic, and intrinsically unjust to other inhabitants. They might consider the Jewish state to be discriminatory or racist in theory and in practice or might object, on political, philosophical, or even specifically Jewish grounds, to any state based on the supremacy of a particular religious or ethnic group. As Jews, they might reject the idea that Jewish people constitute a "nation", or at least a "nation" of the type that can or should become a territorial nation-state. Or they might have concluded on the basis of an examination of Israel's treatment of the Palestinians that the underlying cause of the conflict was the ideology of the Israeli state.
Any or all of the above should be sufficient to explain why some Jews would become anti-Zionists. But that doesn't stop critics from placing us firmly in the realm of the irredeemably neurotic. In their eyes, we remain walking self-contradictions, a menace to our fellow Jews.
Whenever Jews speak out against Israel, they are met with ad hominem criticism. Their motives, their representativeness, their authenticity as Jews are questioned. For only a psychological aberration, a neurotic malaise, could account for our defection from Israel's cause, which is presumed to be - whether we like it or not - our own cause. We are pathologised. So we are either bad Jews or Jews in bad faith.
Of course, being an anti-Zionist Jew is a negative identity. It's a disavowal of a politics commonly ascribed to Jews. And if one's anti-Zionism is made up exclusively of a rejection of Zionism, then it's not worth much. But for myself and for the anti-Zionist Jews I know, anti-Zionism is part of a larger opposition to racism and inequality, an expression of a positive solidarity with the Palestinians as victims of injustice and specifically of colonialism.
It should go without saying, but unfortunately cannot, that being an anti-Zionist by no means implies a desire to destroy the Jews who live in Palestine. On the contrary, anti-Zionism is founded on a refusal to countenance discrimination on racial or religious grounds. The Jews of Israel have every right to live safely, to follow (or not) their religious faith, to adhere (or not) to their cultural heritage, to speak Hebrew. What they do not have is the right to continue to dispossess and oppress another people.
An edited extract from Mike Marqusee's new book, If I Am Not for Myself, appears in today's G2. Click here to read it.
Colonial realities
Timid calls for a ceasefire between Israel and Palestine mask the root cause of the conflict: the problem is the occupation, not the resistance
Once again Israel defies an impotent international community which offers nothing but timid calls for ceasefire on "both sides". And once again Palestinian suffering and death tolls continue to break records in the territories occupied by Israel since 1967.
Perhaps it is easy to dismiss this suffering by blaming the victims and resorting to ready cliches. Indeed, Israeli propagandists go out of their way to repeat the soundbite: we withdrew from Gaza in 2005 and since then the Palestinians have been firing rockets on our southern towns. This soundbite might fly in the western media; after all it resonates with a simplistic world view that ignites stereotypes which have been in the making for centuries, producing demonic and degrading representations of Muslims and Arabs. It becomes easy to describe the Palestinians in this context as the carriers of incomprehensible and irrational rage. This kind of representation has intensified since September 2001 with the "rediscovery" of Israel, and its supreme court, as a western lighthouse amid the darkness of the Middle East.
When examined closely, however, reality rules out crude explanations of "violence without reason" and "terrorism without context". It becomes apparent that one cannot seriously discuss a legitimate resistance to a prolonged and horrendous military occupation within the context of the "war on terrorism". Moreover, even if one finds a place to critique some practices of the oppressed one should keep in mind the root of the problem: it is the occupation, not the resistance. No rhetorical device can conceal the reality of colonialism by transforming it either to a mere "conflict" between equally culpable sides or to portray the occupier as the retaliating victim. In his most recent report (pdf) of January 2008, the UN rapporteur on the situation of human rights in the occupied territories has recounted Israel's actions in Gaza, calling them "war crimes" and demonstrating how these have been relentlessly producing a humanitarian crisis. Indeed, more than 80% of Gaza's Palestinians are living below the poverty line and depend on the food aid supplied by the UNRWA. In recent years Israel has destroyed power plants and other civilian facilities, reduced the fuel and electricity supply, and closed the borders. Palestinians' basic human needs, such as movement, food and medical treatment, became totally dependent on the whims of Israeli security technocrats and political demagogues. It was unsurprising then to witness on January 23 the overflow of tens of thousands of Palestinians to Egypt following the destruction of a part of the Gaza-Egypt border.
By the so-called disengagement plan Israel has aimed to escape its responsibility for Gaza's fate while effectively remaining the occupier. It has also sought to impede Palestinian self-determination by separating the West Bank from Gaza and intensifying the colonisation of the West Bank and East Jerusalem along with the vehement denial of the right of the Palestinian refugees to return to their homeland. One cannot expect the Palestinians to sit quietly while Israel is creating facts on the ground to transform and fragment the ever-shrinking Palestinian homeland making their aspirations as remote as they have ever been. One cannot expect the Palestinians to submit to their reduction from humans to mere beings concerned only with survival.
Israel should not be allowed to escape its responsibility. The tens of thousands of Palestinians who have been killed, wounded, imprisoned, or handicapped only in recent years, and the thousands of houses that have been demolished can testify to the cruelty of one of the longest military occupations in recent modern history.
Unfortunately, parts of the international community have tolerated Israel's atrocities and continue to turn a blind eye on Israel's long list of war crimes and crimes against humanity. It is hard to escape the irony and hypocrisy when we compare the international strong condemnation of the capture of Israeli soldiers by resistance groups and the timid calls for Israel "to restrain" herself in massacring the Palestinians or in destroying Lebanon. These Israeli soldiers have names and families that broadcasters around the world learn to spell, while the Palestinians remain nameless and faceless numbers. This hypocrisy conveys a dichotomy between the powerful who by definition cannot commit terrorism no matter how reprehensible the actions are, and the underprivileged who by definition cannot commit but terrorism no matter how marginal and pitiful the actions are.
It is about time that Israel be held accountable. There is a need for an international protection for the Palestinians. Under the current conditions of gross power asymmetry it is unlikely that Israel will comply with the demands of international law and just peace without a pressure from the international community. The sooner this pressure comes and the sooner the international community assumes its responsibility, the less suffering we will witness in the region.
The Palestinians, however, cannot wait till the international community self-awakes into action. They will have to continue to resist in order to assert and restore their humanity. And for that purpose they will have to overcome their own internal differences and unite. Indeed, the long walk toward Palestinian freedom is overwhelming and becoming even more demanding of Palestinian blood. Yet, history informs us that the Palestinians will eventually have their freedom like the South Africans, Algerians, Egyptians, Indians and others.
Not only will the Palestinians overthrow the colonial yoke, but they will also have grounds for questioning the international community on its indifference to their cry for freedom and justice, and its apathy to the too heavy price that has been paid for these noble aspirations. Indeed, the question of Palestine is the current litmus test for the human condition under modernity. Palestinians bear not only the burden of liberating themselves but also of unmasking humanity's false pretensions; ie exposing the realities of power that always trump universalist and humanist postures. In this sense, Palestinians are the voice of the wretched of the earth.

European Court of Human Rights upholds absolute prohibition against torture

• 28 Feb 2008
• Today the European Court of Human Rights upheld the absolute prohibition against torture requiring Governments to protect individuals who may face torture in their home country.
• In a test case closely watched by European Governments and human rights organisations, the Grand Chamber determined in Saadi v Italy that Italy could not return a Tunisian national deemed a security risk to his country of origin because he faced a real threat of torture.
  
  Director of Liberty Shami Chakrabarti said:
  
  “If the Grand Chamber had watered down the absolute prohibition against torture there would have been no putting this genie back in the bottle. It would have been a green light for extraordinary rendition and even the direct use of torture as an interrogation technique.
  
  The refusal to compromise on torture distinguishes us from tyrants and terrorists alike. Today’s re-statement of the law will aid the battle for hearts and minds, ensuring that suspects are brought to justice and democratic values prevail.”
  
  In contradiction to the argument of the United Kingdom as a third-party intervener with the support of the Italian Government, the Court determined that it was not possible to weigh the risk that a person might be subjected to ill-treatment against his dangerousness to the community if not sent back.
  
  CONTACT: Jen Corlew on 0207 378 3656 or 079 7383 1128
  
  
  NOTES TO EDITORS
  
  1. The European Court of Human Rights delivered its Grand Chamber judgment in the case of Saadi v Italy (application no. 37201/06) at 08:30am GMT on 28 February 2008.
  
  2. Facts of the case in Saadi v Italy:
  
  The case concerns an application brought by a Tunisian national, Nassim Saadi, who was born in 1974 and lives in Italy. The father of an eight-year-old child whose mother is an Italian national, Saadi had a valid residence permit for Italy which expired in October 2002. The application considered his possible deportation to Tunisia, where he claims to have been sentenced in absentia in 2005 to 20 years’ imprisonment for membership of a terrorist organisation and incitement to terrorism. After his application for political asylum in Italy was rejected in 2006, Saadi lodged an application with the European Court of Human Rights alleging that enforcement of his deportation to Tunisia would expose him to the risk of being subjected to torture, inhuman or degrading treatment contrary to Article 3 of the European Convention on Human Rights.
  
  3. The European Court of Human Rights decision upholds the finding in the 1996 Chahal v United Kingdom case that it is not possible to weigh the risk of ill-treatment against the reasons put forward for the expulsion in order to determine whether the responsibility of a State is engaged under Article 3, even where such treatment is inflicted by another State.
  
  4. In the judgment, Judge Myjer said: “…States are not allowed to combat international terrorism at all costs. They must not resort to methods which undermine the very values they seek to protect…Upholding human rights in the fight against terrorism is first and foremost a matter of upholding our values, even with regard to those who may seek to destroy them…”

Hizb ut-Tahrir Britain

Dear Sir/Madam,

The Archbishop of Canterbury Dr Rowan Williams’s recent lecture on Islam in English Law has attracted widespread comment and worldwide media exposure. Whilst Dr Williams did not face the execution of Archbishop Cramner, he was subjected to a virtual ‘lynch’ mob by the British media and political establishment. The man once described in the press as ‘thoughtful’ and ‘intellectual’ was branded ‘bonkers’ and a ‘traitor’. Beckett was assassinated, Williams merely character assassinated; ironically by many of those that told Muslims to calm down during the Danish cartoons saga. They demanded in no uncertain terms that Dr Williams resign his office, and did all but burn his effigy.

Some now look past the exaggeration and distortion, to what he actually said and have begun considering some of the underlying issues. We welcome this, for such issues require careful consideration and cool debate, not mass hysteria and rigid thinking. Though we disagree with much in the Archbishop’s speech, Hizb ut-Tahrir Britain does welcome the opportunity to tackle some of these wider issues. We have done so in a brief paper attached to the end of this letter.

There is a great need for an informed debate between the alternatives of Secular law and the Islamic Shariah. We don’t say this because we are seeking to establish Islamic law in Britain. We are not. Our goal has been, since the beginning, to establish such a state in the Muslim world where the beliefs of the populace are already in harmony with the political system we seek. Our desire to have a debate is no more than to ensure that people are given the maximum exposure to all arguments across the ideological spectrum, so that people can arrive informed at any point of view they choose to hold.

However, any such debate must be characterised by certain aspects. Firstly, it must be substantive, avoiding superficial stereotypes and caricatures on both sides. Secondly, it must examine both alternatives. If we are to hear condemnation of Islam’s policies on women and Islam’s penal code then let us at least examine the lamentable track record of secular liberal democracies on tackling crime and the discrimination of women, who are still paid 20% less than their male equivalents. If we are to hear condemnations made about Islam’s positions on capital punishment, the sanctity of life and violence let us also examine the record of secular liberal democracy on its plethora of wars, state sponsored torture and abortion on demand (now reaching over a hundred thousand people a year in the UK alone). Finally, to be real a debate it must be between people who hold differing ideological views, ensuring that people are challenged from the comfort of their own entrenched positions. A debate contained between secularists alone, regardless of whether they are Muslim or Non Muslim would be a pseudo-debate where people of like minds consider the alternative views, which can never provide the full clarity that is so critical to the discourse at hand.

We sincerely look forward to hearing from anyone who is open to such a debate, and to discuss terms of timing and platform. Similarly, we would love to hear from anyone who might be interested to be better informed about our views and hear – in public or in private - how we feel Muslims and Non Muslims might live side by side within the UK.

Yours sincerely,

20^th February 2008

Fault Lines within Secular States

The Archbishop of Canterbury was not the first to comment on the seeming inability within this liberal democracy to manage the passionate religious beliefs of millions of its citizens. A monopoly exists in the public sphere that increasingly excludes people of faith. It is no longer exclusively the far right in Europe who voice vitriolic hatred of public religious expression, most especially Islamic expression.

It seems increasingly clear that the historical compromise of confining religious views to the church or mosque is becoming out dated, irrelevant and untenable for a variety of reasons. Firstly more and more religious people are now questioning why their values alone must be confined to the private arena. The fact that some of history’s major social advancements have been made by people motivated by their religious beliefs seems to have been wiped from the collective memory of Europe: the provision of economic and political rights to women in 7^th century Arabia, the abolition of slavery in the UK led by Wilberforce and the civil rights movement in the USA. All were driven by people with impeccable religious credentials. Secondly, many are attracted to religion in the west because of what they see as an emerging social malaise and spiritual void. For them modern society should aspire to be about more than GDP, rabid individualism and wars for oil. Lastly, secular Europe has had a poor record when it comes to its treatment of minorities generally; especially religious minorities. Whether the grotesque anti-Semitism of the 1930’s and 1940’s (or the much softer version that both predated and succeeded this), the oppression meted out to Catholics within Britain over the past four centuries (and indeed to protestants elsewhere in Europe) or more recently the French banning of the Hijab, this track record should remind everyone of the dictum that those who do not study history will be doomed to repeat it. The severe backlash against the Archbishop’s lecture, which saw some characterising him as “the most dangerous man in Britain”, fuels public anxiety about diversity in modern Britain in a way that only widens the divide between communities.

Many cited equality under the law as being paramount when explaining their opposition to the Archbishop‘s speech. All the main political parties as well as mainstream commentators repeated this as their main critique. On the face of it this seems a bedrock principle, but it is by no means universally applied in the United Kingdom. Different laws in several matters govern citizens of the United Kingdom living in Scotland, Wales, Northern Ireland and London. Politicians of all parties are accelerating plans towards devolution claiming that they want to derogate more powers, laws and decision making to local populations. This opportunity to decide legislation at the local level, as any decentralised system will testify, will inevitably start to challenge a notion of everyone living under the same “British laws and British values” championed by Prime Minister Gordon Brown.

But regional devolution is not the only exception to this principle. MP’s enjoy a whole host of privileges from setting their own pay, receiving generous expenses, to being exempt from libel laws in the House of Commons. Non-domiciles currently enjoy a more favourable tax status than those who are residents of the UK. The Conservative party is on record of wanting to give married couples a more favourable status in law. The Police and Armed forces are banned from striking, a right given to every other worker. The Treasury has sought to attract billions of pounds of inward investment by changing laws to attract ‘Shariah compliant’ investors, raising the share price of many a high street bank (the lucrative side of Shariah law in Britain!) These few examples should dispel the notion that we have a one size fits all legal system within the UK, without even mentioning the supranational laws from Europe that run parallel to any parliamentary statue.

Whilst not seeking to build a case for some kind of parallel system in Britain for certain minorities, it is important to point out the huge inconsistencies in the arguments of those who accept all of the above, yet will not accommodate Muslims to the extent other minorities are, simply because of their prejudice against religion. There are many legal inconsistencies and exemptions that exist in Britain, but increasingly there seems no exemption or concession when it comes to providing any space for matters of religious conscience, as the recent closure of Catholic adoption agencies illustrates.

We in Hizb ut-Tahrir believe that for citizens to live under one law would also be fundamental within a future Caliphate - with one significant caveat. We believe Jews, Christians and other faiths should be given their own legal jurisdiction in matters that relate to personal aspects such as marriage or divorce. Unlike the majority of commentators who have dismissed the Archbishop‘s call for something similar to be applied to Britain for religious minorities, we do not believe allowing such exceptions will spell the end of civilisation as we know it.

What is Shariah?

The most significant part of the backlash against Dr Williams’ comments was the use of Shariah law as his main example to illustrate the need for secular societies to provide more space for religious canons. If he had used Buddhism as his example, the reaction might only have been confined to the BBC Parliament channel. But the image of Shariah has become so blackened that it has clearly become impossible to have any reasonable conversation without resorting to superficial stereotypes. To judge Shariah law by its penal code, as several commentators have mentioned, is like judging western civilisation by Guantanomo Bay, “water boarding” and the electric chair.

Shariah law encompasses many areas: politics, economics, social matters or personal matters. Shariah law is as much about helping the poor and healthcare as it is about punishing those who steal. It is about education and helping orphans and those who are mentally ill, as well as about deterring adultery.

Shariah law cannot be implemented in its entirety on an individual or community level. It requires a state, or the Caliphate; in today’s parlance one rooted in popular acceptance through transparent elections. But some matters of Shariah are no concern of the state – even within the Islamic system. These matters, such as personal ritual worship, morals and family matters, are the matters which might fall into the realm of what Muslims mean when they refer to Shariah in the UK. Other areas of Shariah are absolutely conditional upon the State or Islamic authority, and hence have no relevance to the debate going on in the UK. These include the criminal law and penal code. Discussing Shariah law in the abstract is therefore fraught with danger.

When Muslims begin to call for its implementation in the Muslim world, we often hear dire warnings from western capitals about the dangers of the re-emergence of such a state. Yet, the Caliphate has been the norm in the Muslim world. For 93% of its history the Muslim world has had a Caliphate. It is almost undisputed that the Caliphate in its heyday was at the forefront of scientific advancement and ‘community cohesion’ (thus contradicting the myth that religious based systems oppress other faiths). Carly Fiorini, the former CEO of Hewlett Packard, graciously stated this in 2001 about Islamic civilisation. ‘Within its dominion lived hundreds of millions of people, of different creeds and ethnic origins. One of its languages became the universal language of the world, the bridge between the peoples of a hundred lands. And this civilization was driven more than anything, by invention. Its writers created thousands of stories. Its poets wrote of love, when others before them were too steeped in fear to think of such things. When other nations were afraid of ideas, this civilization thrived on them, and kept them alive.’

Why not Shariah in the Muslim world?

The Archbishop was criticised on the assumption that he was advocating a parallel system of law contrary to the wishes of the vast majority of the British people, not based upon ‘British values’. Yet when it comes to what system of law should be implemented in the Muslim world this is exactly what the British and other western politicians do. They argue against a political and legal framework that carries popular support and based upon the values and heritage of the people. It is one thing to argue that you don’t want Shariah law in Britain, and quite another to say that the Muslim world can’t have it either.

In survey after survey, the overwhelming majority of Muslims support the implementation of such a law which they believe will deliver the requisite Islamic objectives of the protection of human life, the mind, human dignity, private property, religion, security and the state. A poll by the University of Maryland cited about two thirds of people across the Muslim world supporting the Caliphate.

What Foreign Secretary David Miliband blandly calls nation building is at best cultural imperialism and at worst malevolent ideological cleansing. Western governments will simply not countenance the establishment of any regime in the Muslim world that opposes the current secular-liberal-capitalist status quo. Today western armies sit in Afghanistan and Iraq similar to their imperial forefathers, busy creating laws, canons and constitutions for their new colonial clients while denying people what they want: the establishment of a law consistent with their fundamental beliefs. Charles Clarke, the former Home Secretary, summarised what many others had already said while visiting the US in 2006: "...there can be no negotiation about the re-creation of the Caliphate; there can be no negotiation about the imposition of Shariah Law…These values are fundamental to our civilisation and are simply not up for negotiation."

It is little wonder that Muslims in Britain collectively shook their heads at the fanatical hysteria that followed Dr Williams’ comments that mildly raised a question about some limited accommodation for people of faith. Some could argue that in comparison, the response in the Muslim world at the attempt to impose western secular law by the barrel of a gun in countries like Afghanistan and Iraq has been positively restrained

British soldiers accused of executing civilians

Lawyers say battle may have ended in 'atrocious episode' of torture and killing.

Ambushed by fighters of the Mahdi army, the soldiers of the Princess of Wales's Royal Regiment attacked with everything they had, from bayonets to tank shells. The fierce gunfight became known as the Battle for Danny Boy, the name British troops gave to a junction on Route 6, just south of Amara on the road to Basra.

If allegations made yesterday are true, the battle on May 14 2004 also led to the torture and execution of up to 20 Iraqi civilians, some of whom were mutilated before they died. It may be that British soldiers and officers covered up "one of the most atrocious episodes in British army history," lawyer Martyn Day said yesterday.

Allegations of mistreatment of Iraqi civilians at Camp Abu Naji, the British base near Amara, were first reported in the Guardian a month after the battle. Military police were asked to investigate and cleared the soldiers of any wrongdoing.

Day and fellow lawyer Phil Shiner pursued the case of the surviving Iraqi civilians and collected witness statements. Last month, a report by a senior army officer admitted that British troops deployed in Iraq were given "scant" information on how to treat civilian detainees and needed "a better understanding between right and wrong".

This month, the high court dismissed an attempt to prevent the Guardian from repeating the original allegations of serious abuse of Iraqis by British soldiers, and described the way the Ministry of Defence handled the case as "barmy".

In London yesterday, the lawyers disclosed fresh witness statements by five of the Iraqis, photographs of corpses and death certificates of the men who died.

Detailed witness statements from the five men - Hussein Jabbari Ali, Hussain Fadhil Abass, Atiyah Sayid Abdelreza, Madhi Jassim Abdullah and Ahmad Jabber Ahmood - describe what they heard while in detention, when they said they were cuffed and forced to wear blacked-out goggles.

The statements tell of hearing other men screaming, moaning in pain and choking, and the sound of gunfire.

Abdelreza's statement says: "I believed people were being killed. I have never heard anything like that sound ever before in my life. It shocked me and filled me with such terror."

The five include two farmers, a student, a taxi driver and a baker, according to the statements. Their lawyers said they had "absolutely nothing" to do with the insurgent Mahdi army.

Death certificates of Iraqis who were killed, also disclosed yesterday, describe how they came to their brutal end. "Several gunshot wounds to body - severance of sexual organs," one states. "Gunshot to head," another reads. One notes: "Gunshot in face, pulling out of the eye, breaking the jaw, gunshot to the chest."

Day is seeking compensation for those who survived the alleged ordeal. Shiner is seeking a judicial review of what he says is the failure of the MoD to conduct a proper inquiry into the allegations. The Human Rights Act demands an independent public inquiry when there is prima facie evidence of serious wrongdoing by the state, he has told the high court.

He said yesterday that the record of the army prosecuting authorities demanded that the issue should be taken out of their hands. The attorney general should intervene immediately and Scotland Yard should take over the case, he said.

Shiner admitted that much of the evidence relied on the interpretation of what the five Iraqis heard while blindfolded. No postmortem examinations had taken place on the bodies of the 20 dead men. But on the basis of the evidence he believed his clients were telling the truth.

"It may be that none of this happened. We need a public inquiry to establish the facts." The British soldiers, he said, had been engaged either in "acts of immense bravery or acts of incredible brutality". He added: "We're not saying we know what happened; we're saying on the balance of probabilities we think our clients are telling the truth."

Day said: "The burning question for us as a nation is whether these 24 hours represented the British army at its best or the British army at its worst".

Yesterday's witness statements implied that Iraqi men had been executed by being shot at close range, strangled or having their throats cut, the lawyers said. British soldiers have said they were told to take some bodies of dead Iraqis back to their camp, though it is unclear why.

A Panorama programme on the incident will be broadcast on Monday. A BBC spokesman said yesterday: "Panorama has spent over a year talking to battlefield survivors, medical staff and Iraqi former prisoners in Iraq, Turkey and Jordan.

"The programme critically examines claims made by lawyers who are representing the Iraqis in their action against the British government.

"Of all the allegations they make, the programme concludes that the evidence is strongest that prisoners were mistreated. Panorama has seen no proof that prisoners died at the hands of their captors at or after the Battle of Danny Boy."

A spokesman for the MoD said yesterday: "Allegations of mistreatment, unlawful killing and mutilation by British troops following an incident at Vehicle Checkpoint Danny Boy were thoroughly investigated by the RMP [Royal Military Police].

"Their investigation lasted 10 months, involved the interviewing of over 150 British personnel and 50 Iraqi nationals, and found no evidence to support these allegations. New allegations are part of an ongoing RMP (Special Investigation Branch) investigation and judicial review, and it would be inappropriate to comment further."

Referring to previous cover-ups of abuse by British troops as well as the latest allegations, Shiner said yesterday: "Until we as a nation face up to this evidence we cannot hope for the fundamental reforms required to ensure these things never happen again." He added that the British did not want to be talked about "in the same vein as the Japanese in the second world war or the Americans at My Lai".

In his book Dusty Warriors, Richard Holmes describes the Battle for Danny Boy and its aftermath. He said the British soldiers found that a large crowd had assembled and when they returned to camp they reported that there was "a rumour circulating that the dead had been captured alive and then executed".

The two lawyers said yesterday they had asked the MoD for copies of the army's medical logs, photographs and the military police report into the incident. The ministry, they said, refused to hand them over.

Al-Majar: latest news

Transcript of Press Conference held by Phil Shiner, Public Interest
Lawyers, and Martyn Day, Leigh Day & Co.

Martyn Day, Leigh Day & Co
Phil Shiner, Public Interest Lawyers


Phil Shiner:

What Martyn Day and I are about to reveal was shocking to us when we
first heard it and we would be very surprised if it did not shock the
nation. We are about to make available evidence that in May 2004 in a
British Army base in Abu Naji in Southern Iraq, British soldiers may well
have been responsible for

· The executions of up to 20 Iraqi civilians.
· The torture of many of these 20 before death.
· The torture of nine other survivors.
· Horrific bodily mutilations prior to some of the executions.

There is an important context to this incident. It is a matter of
public record that there were serious systemic failings in the UK’s
detention policy during the UK’s occupation of South East Iraq. The conclusions
of the Secretary of State for Defence in the light of the Aitken
report released at the end of January are that:

· There is no evidence of systematic abuse.
· There were a few isolated incidents of abuse committed by a few
rotten apples.
· The military justice system involving soldiers investigating other
soldiers and then different soldiers deciding whether any soldiers should
be prosecuted before a Panel of soldiers is fit for purpose.

From our work we are clear that he is completely wrong. Leaving aside
the evidence you are about to hear the public record shows that whilst
in custody with UK forces:

· Iraqi civilians were killed
· Manyf Iraqis were tortured, abused or subjected to degrading or
humiliating treatment.
· All Battle Groups were using hooding and stress techniques as
Standard Operating Procedure.
· The five techniques banned by the Heath Government in 1972 returned
(that is hooding, stressing, deprivation of sleep, deprivation of food
and water, and the use of noise).
· Our interrogators were trained to use hooding and stressing and these
were written policies.

Do not believe for one second that we make these allegations lightly or
without the evidence available to substantiate every single word of
what we say. Do not believe for one second those with most to hide –
those who got the law and policy completely wrong – those who would have
you believe there is nothing to face up to. Do not believe those who
would have you think it was just a few rogue soldiers and just one man,
Baha Mousa, who was tortured to death.

What went on whilst UK forces had the custody of Iraqi civilians is a
disgrace, a stain on our nation, and a terrible stain on the reputation
of all the good soldiers who have operated in Iraq and who behaved
themselves properly and in accordance with the law.

It is with the heaviest of hearts that I have to say that killings,
executions, torture, and abuse, sexual and religious humiliation of
civilians became all too common during the British occupation of Iraq– all
whilst these civilians were in the custody of UK forces. It is the law in
this country that in custody cases such as these there is a
particularly high burden on the State to explain itself. There is the clearest
evidence available of systematic abuse and systemic failings at the very
highest levels of politicians, the civil service and the military.
There has also been a deliberate and so far effective cover-up so that the
vast majority of the British public are blissfully unaware of what was
done in their name. Until we as a nation face up to this evidence we
cannot hope for the fundamental reforms required to ensure these things
can never happen again. We do not want to be talked about in the same
vein as the Japanese in the Second World War or the Americans at My Lai,
but unless we stand up and say as a nation that this cannot happen in
our name- that is where we seem to be headed.

Martyn Day:

Four weeks ago, Phil Shiner and I travelled over to Istanbul to meet
with five of the survivors of what happened on 14 & 15 May 2004 at Abu
Naji. Our two firms are instructed to bring a damages claim in relation
to the events of the 14/15th May 2004 and further to call for a public
enquiry into the events of that day.

We travelled to Turkey with the anticipation that the five were
alleging that they had been tortured and abused while in British custody and
were obviously very aware of the alleged mutilations to the bodies of
the Iraqis killed on 14/15 May. We had no inkling of what the five
witnesses were to tell us over the four days that we interviewed them.

We are providing you with the full versions of their statements through
until they left Abu Naji on 15 May. I am going to describe in general
terms how they ended up being caught up in the battle that raged on 14
May and then Mazin Younis, who took on the task of interpreting for us
during the four days in Istanbul and who is the President of the Iraqi
League, will read out some of the passages from those statements to
give you all an understanding of the horrific allegations that our clients
are making as to what happened on the night of 14/15 May.

[Slide of area]

All five of our clients are labourers who have largely lived, through
their lives, in the town of Majar. In the afternoon of 14 May, a battle
raged between the British Army and the Mehdi Army of the Iraqis.

Our five clients all say that they were simply in the vicinity of the
battle and had absolutely nothing to do with the Medhi Army. In support
of this is the fact that when eventually they were brought before the
Iraqi courts all of them were found not guilty of the charges by the
trial judge or their convictions were quashed on appeal. Four of the men
say that they were farmers who had land or animals in the immediate
vicinity of where the battle was taking place and this being harvest time,
they were all working with many other Iraqis in the fields at the time
when the battle commenced. One of the men said he was out collecting a
present being tubs of yoghurt, for a wedding he was going to later that
day.

All of the clients say that when the shooting started they took cover
and once the shooting ended they were swept up by British Army soldiers
and beaten, kicked, and generally assaulted and then taken into the APC
carriers that then took them back to the British Army Camp at Abu
Naji. They were handcuffed and blind folded and each of them was then
interrogated on one or two occasions and when they were not being
interrogated they were sat down on a chair. Mazin Younis will now describe what
each of the five witnesses say that they heard from that point.

Order of Witnesses
Witness Statement of Hussein Jabbari Ali (paras 28- 31 stopping at 'I
started calling for Haidar and Hamid but I got no answer')

Witness Statement of Hussain Fadhil Abass (paras 19- 25 stopping after
words 'It is not something I will ever forget'.)

Witness Statement of Atiyah Sayid Abdelreza (para 25- 27)

Witness Statement of Madhi Jassim Abdullah (para 10 from words 'About
an hour after my return-- - - - ' to para 11)

Witness Statement of Ahmad Jabber Ahmood (- para 20- 22)


Phil Shiner:

What you have heard is evidence that these 5 survivors have witnessed
seemingly in three separate venues at close hand:

· The execution of up to 15 men
· Between 4 and 5 of these executions involving shots at close range
and the remainder some sort of strangulation or throat cutting.
· Some of these executions preceded by torture or mutilations that are
so horrific that our clients could not describe the prolonged screaming
without breaking down.

These five survivors have been badly beaten and abused. Some of the
beatings out in the fields or at Abu Naji were so vicious that it is a
wonder the victims survived themselves. If what we have taken as evidence
is true the perpetrators of these crimes were merciless and
unbelievably brutal and cruel.

But what they have heard is unbearable to contemplate. I show you now
the image from a video taken by a member of the community as the body
bags were returned to the local hospital the next day, and as the body
bags are opened up. It is a horrific image apparently showing a dead man
with a missing eye that has been removed or gouged out.

Was this what the first witness heard: men having their eyes gouged out
and screaming in agony before final dispatch? Was it eyes gouged out
plus other mutilations and then final dispatch?

Clearly these and other pressing questions must be answered in public.

Martyn Day:

There are massive contradictions between what these five Iraqis have
said as against what the British Army have said. Some 12 British Army
soldiers and officers were given medals for what happened in the battle
that preceded these events in Abu Naji. The burning question for us as a
nation is whether these 24 hours represented the British Army at its
best or the British Army at its worst.

We have tried to examine as best we can the evidence of what the Iraqis
are saying as against what we know the British Army to have said in
terms of the events of that day. The Army says that it picked up 20
bodies from the battlefield, with nine prisoners, took them back to Abu Naji
for identification purposes and then released the bodies the following
day to the Iraqi medics from Majar hospital. In addition to what we
have seen from the British Army, we have the evidence of the death
certificates and have talked with some of the people from the hospital who
attended on the bodies that were picked up from Abu Naji. We now set out
a section of the video that was taken at the time when the bodies were
taken back from Abu Naji to the Majar hospital.

VIDEO FOOTAGE SHOWN

We fully accept that what we see is a group of very traumatised Iraqis,
obviously very upset by the bodies that returned from the British Army
camp at Abu Naji. This evidence needs to be looked at alongside the
death certificates that the doctors at the hospital set out in relation
to the dead bodies.

We provide you in the press packs with copies of the death certificates
and their translations. Of the 27 death certificates, 20 were in
relation to the bodies that were returned to the Iraqis from Abu Naji on
15th May. Those death certificates show the following.

[Show Photos]

Here are the two men who the certificates say had their eyes gouged
out:

Here is a man who is said to have had his penis cut off

Here is one of the men who died from a single shot to the head or from
a bullet administered very close to the body.

Here is a man with evidence of torture to the right side of his body.

In addition there are other cases, which allege torture including
strangulation, facial mutilation: a broken arm, a broken jaw and the man
seen in the video footage with his arm almost severed.

The evidence from the Iraqi doctors gives strong supporting evidence to
the allegations of the five men that they heard the torture and
executions of a whole series of Iraqis during that night of 14 and 15 May.

The position of the Iraqis and the British soldiers could not therefore
be more diametrically opposed.

For the British Army version to be true there are two possibilities:-

a) the five Iraqis and the doctors have got together to conspire
against the British – to try and paint them in a bad light. If this was the
case, it is the only instance that I know of where it has been alleged
that any conspiracy has taken place by Iraqis in this way never mind one
on such a massive scale- and why would this be happening now?

b) the second possibility is that the doctors were exaggerating what
they saw or misunderstood the injuries and that the five Iraqis are
simply mistaken- they were hearing something else happening- but what
mitigates against this is the detail of the statements- and the clarity of
what the doctors saw. How does a penis drop off? How are eyes gouged out?
There does not seem to us much to suggest that the doctors did get it
wrong.

For the Iraqi version of events to be true, soldiers and officers from
the British Army would have to have conspired to cover up one of the
most atrocious episodes in British Army history.

In gauging the possibility of this happening the British Army has quite
some explaining to do as to four rather fundamental coincidences that
need to be put in place for their version of events to be accepted.
Those four coincidences are

1. That a totally unusual if not unique decision was made to bring into
the Abu Naji camp the dead bodies of the Iraqis killed. Was that order
made and if so why and still further why is it that up to nine bodies
were left on the battle front if this was such a key issue for the
British Army?

2. A number of the medals were awarded because of the bravery of the
British soldiers as a result of a bayonet charge that supposedly took
place. It has been recognised that in this day and age a bayonet charge is
phenomenally unusual but presumably, from the Army’s view, it goes
someway to help explain some of the injuries that the dead suffered.

3. The nature of a number of the injuries of the Iraqis would seem to
us to be highly unusual in a battlefield, i.e. quite how so many of the
Iraqis sustained single gunshots to the head and from seemingly at
close quarter, how did two of them end with their eyes gouged out, how did
one have his penis cut off, some have torture wounds, etc.

4. Perhaps the most remarkable coincidence of all is that in this
battle, according to the British Army, the Iraqis they took to Abu Naji seem
to have either been killed out right or to have survived with not a
scratch. Again we are not military men but it seems to us highly unusual
that you would end a battle with people being in these two extreme
positions with absolutely no one being wounded.

Further, from our experience of what happened with the Mousa cases, the
Camp Breadbasket incident, the drowning boy incidents, and the total
failure of the subsequent court martials, to successfully prosecute
anyone who had not admitted guilt or been caught in the act, the notion of
British soldiers getting together and conspiring to avoid prosecution
has worked in the past.

Phil Shiner and I have a combined experience of 60 years of
interviewing clients in the field. For us both the evidence of these five
witnesses was entirely compelling. Additionally, we have had each of our five
Iraqi clients assessed by an independent psychiatrist who is very clear
that each of the men has suffered a very traumatic incident here. When
putting all this together with the supporting evidence of the Iraqi
doctors and the death certificates and when comparing this totality of
evidence with the coincidences that would need to occur for the British
Army’s story to be accepted we have to say that on the basis of the
evidence currently available we are of the view that our clients’
allegations, that the British were responsible for the torture and deaths of up
to 20 Iraqis, may well be true.

Phil Shiner:

Martyn Day and I spent five days with these witnesses. We have analysed
their evidence alongside evidence from other sources and we have
concluded that, on balance, our clients’ version is the true one. As Martyn
Day has stressed the Ministry of Defence’s explanation does not make
sense and aspects of it are frankly absurd (the notion of making young
soldiers, presumably traumatised by having to bayonet these men to death
in hand to hand combat, share the same APC back to base with bloody and
gory corpses in order that these barely recognisable faces can be
identified is simply incredible).

However the Royal Military Police have already conducted, they say, a
lengthy and painstaking investigation of its own involving interviewing
over 200 witnesses. They found no evidence of criminal wrongdoing. They
say all of the 20 were killed in combat and no one was tortured.

It is this same flawed military system that so spectacularly failed in
the Mousa incident. Even ex-Chief of Defence Staff, Mike Jackson, and
the present one, Richard Dannatt admit that, with the military process
now exhausted, no one is any the wiser who killed Baha Mousa.

Thus, our two firms now call on the Attorney General to intervene. She
has overall supervisory control of the Army Prosecuting Authority. She
has the ultimate say-so as to whether anyone should be prosecuted for
what are domestic crimes (if proven) including war crimes under the
International Criminal Court Act 2001. We require the Attorney General to
take this matter away from the military and put it immediately in the
hands of Scotland Yard. Our five clients – and other key witnesses –
stand ready to be interviewed by Scotland Yard at short notice here in the
UK.

Martyn Day:

The role of the RMP in investigating not just this incident but
previous incidents in Iraq is far from impressive. In briefings by the Army
this week it would appear it is looking to hide behind the RMP’s
investigation. But in this case the RMP did not even interview these five
witnesses, five of only nine survivors from Abu Naji, about the events of
that terrible night. That is why they are looking to interview them again
now. Further, to our knowledge there was no attempt to try and carry
out post mortems on the bodies to see if what the Iraqi doctors were
saying was correct. Absolutely central evidence if a genuine attempt was
being made to establish the veracity or otherwise of these allegations.

As Phil Shiner and I have said, on the evidence we have seen, we
believe that our clients’ allegations are likely to be true, but what is
crucial is that an immediate and thorough investigation is carried out into
what happened. We have no faith that the RMP will carry out that
investigation with the requisite skill and determination, but more
importantly, neither do our clients. In today’s parlance we no longer consider
that when it comes to Iraq that the RMP is fit for purpose!

Scotland Yard must be given the task of carrying out this investigation
but further there must be a public enquiry into these events. The key
question for the British people is whether or not our army was
responsible for an act of immense bravery or acts of terrible brutality.
Whether or not there is enough evidence to prosecute individual soldiers, it
will only be by an open public enquiry that this question will be
answered.


Al-Majar: latest news
Transcript of Press Conference held by Phil Shiner, Public Interest
Lawyers, and Martyn Day, Leigh Day & Co.

Martyn Day, Leigh Day & Co
Phil Shiner, Public Interest Lawyers


Phil Shiner:

What Martyn Day and I are about to reveal was shocking to us when we
first heard it and we would be very surprised if it did not shock the
nation. We are about to make available evidence that in May 2004 in a
British Army base in Abu Naji in Southern Iraq, British soldiers may well
have been responsible for

· The executions of up to 20 Iraqi civilians.
· The torture of many of these 20 before death.
· The torture of nine other survivors.
· Horrific bodily mutilations prior to some of the executions.

There is an important context to this incident. It is a matter of
public record that there were serious systemic failings in the UK’s
detention policy during the UK’s occupation of South East Iraq. The conclusions
of the Secretary of State for Defence in the light of the Aitken
report released at the end of January are that:

· There is no evidence of systematic abuse.
· There were a few isolated incidents of abuse committed by a few
rotten apples.
· The military justice system involving soldiers investigating other
soldiers and then different soldiers deciding whether any soldiers should
be prosecuted before a Panel of soldiers is fit for purpose.

From our work we are clear that he is completely wrong. Leaving aside
the evidence you are about to hear the public record shows that whilst
in custody with UK forces:

· Iraqi civilians were killed
· Manyf Iraqis were tortured, abused or subjected to degrading or
humiliating treatment.
· All Battle Groups were using hooding and stress techniques as
Standard Operating Procedure.
· The five techniques banned by the Heath Government in 1972 returned
(that is hooding, stressing, deprivation of sleep, deprivation of food
and water, and the use of noise).
· Our interrogators were trained to use hooding and stressing and these
were written policies.

Do not believe for one second that we make these allegations lightly or
without the evidence available to substantiate every single word of
what we say. Do not believe for one second those with most to hide –
those who got the law and policy completely wrong – those who would have
you believe there is nothing to face up to. Do not believe those who
would have you think it was just a few rogue soldiers and just one man,
Baha Mousa, who was tortured to death.

What went on whilst UK forces had the custody of Iraqi civilians is a
disgrace, a stain on our nation, and a terrible stain on the reputation
of all the good soldiers who have operated in Iraq and who behaved
themselves properly and in accordance with the law.

It is with the heaviest of hearts that I have to say that killings,
executions, torture, and abuse, sexual and religious humiliation of
civilians became all too common during the British occupation of Iraq– all
whilst these civilians were in the custody of UK forces. It is the law in
this country that in custody cases such as these there is a
particularly high burden on the State to explain itself. There is the clearest
evidence available of systematic abuse and systemic failings at the very
highest levels of politicians, the civil service and the military.
There has also been a deliberate and so far effective cover-up so that the
vast majority of the British public are blissfully unaware of what was
done in their name. Until we as a nation face up to this evidence we
cannot hope for the fundamental reforms required to ensure these things
can never happen again. We do not want to be talked about in the same
vein as the Japanese in the Second World War or the Americans at My Lai,
but unless we stand up and say as a nation that this cannot happen in
our name- that is where we seem to be headed.

Martyn Day:

Four weeks ago, Phil Shiner and I travelled over to Istanbul to meet
with five of the survivors of what happened on 14 & 15 May 2004 at Abu
Naji. Our two firms are instructed to bring a damages claim in relation
to the events of the 14/15th May 2004 and further to call for a public
enquiry into the events of that day.

We travelled to Turkey with the anticipation that the five were
alleging that they had been tortured and abused while in British custody and
were obviously very aware of the alleged mutilations to the bodies of
the Iraqis killed on 14/15 May. We had no inkling of what the five
witnesses were to tell us over the four days that we interviewed them.

We are providing you with the full versions of their statements through
until they left Abu Naji on 15 May. I am going to describe in general
terms how they ended up being caught up in the battle that raged on 14
May and then Mazin Younis, who took on the task of interpreting for us
during the four days in Istanbul and who is the President of the Iraqi
League, will read out some of the passages from those statements to
give you all an understanding of the horrific allegations that our clients
are making as to what happened on the night of 14/15 May.

[Slide of area]

All five of our clients are labourers who have largely lived, through
their lives, in the town of Majar. In the afternoon of 14 May, a battle
raged between the British Army and the Mehdi Army of the Iraqis.

Our five clients all say that they were simply in the vicinity of the
battle and had absolutely nothing to do with the Medhi Army. In support
of this is the fact that when eventually they were brought before the
Iraqi courts all of them were found not guilty of the charges by the
trial judge or their convictions were quashed on appeal. Four of the men
say that they were farmers who had land or animals in the immediate
vicinity of where the battle was taking place and this being harvest time,
they were all working with many other Iraqis in the fields at the time
when the battle commenced. One of the men said he was out collecting a
present being tubs of yoghurt, for a wedding he was going to later that
day.

All of the clients say that when the shooting started they took cover
and once the shooting ended they were swept up by British Army soldiers
and beaten, kicked, and generally assaulted and then taken into the APC
carriers that then took them back to the British Army Camp at Abu
Naji. They were handcuffed and blind folded and each of them was then
interrogated on one or two occasions and when they were not being
interrogated they were sat down on a chair. Mazin Younis will now describe what
each of the five witnesses say that they heard from that point.

Order of Witnesses
Witness Statement of Hussein Jabbari Ali (paras 28- 31 stopping at 'I
started calling for Haidar and Hamid but I got no answer')

Witness Statement of Hussain Fadhil Abass (paras 19- 25 stopping after
words 'It is not something I will ever forget'.)

Witness Statement of Atiyah Sayid Abdelreza (para 25- 27)

Witness Statement of Madhi Jassim Abdullah (para 10 from words 'About
an hour after my return-- - - - ' to para 11)

Witness Statement of Ahmad Jabber Ahmood (- para 20- 22)


Phil Shiner:

What you have heard is evidence that these 5 survivors have witnessed
seemingly in three separate venues at close hand:

· The execution of up to 15 men
· Between 4 and 5 of these executions involving shots at close range
and the remainder some sort of strangulation or throat cutting.
· Some of these executions preceded by torture or mutilations that are
so horrific that our clients could not describe the prolonged screaming
without breaking down.

These five survivors have been badly beaten and abused. Some of the
beatings out in the fields or at Abu Naji were so vicious that it is a
wonder the victims survived themselves. If what we have taken as evidence
is true the perpetrators of these crimes were merciless and
unbelievably brutal and cruel.

But what they have heard is unbearable to contemplate. I show you now
the image from a video taken by a member of the community as the body
bags were returned to the local hospital the next day, and as the body
bags are opened up. It is a horrific image apparently showing a dead man
with a missing eye that has been removed or gouged out.

Was this what the first witness heard: men having their eyes gouged out
and screaming in agony before final dispatch? Was it eyes gouged out
plus other mutilations and then final dispatch?

Clearly these and other pressing questions must be answered in public.

Martyn Day:

There are massive contradictions between what these five Iraqis have
said as against what the British Army have said. Some 12 British Army
soldiers and officers were given medals for what happened in the battle
that preceded these events in Abu Naji. The burning question for us as a
nation is whether these 24 hours represented the British Army at its
best or the British Army at its worst.

We have tried to examine as best we can the evidence of what the Iraqis
are saying as against what we know the British Army to have said in
terms of the events of that day. The Army says that it picked up 20
bodies from the battlefield, with nine prisoners, took them back to Abu Naji
for identification purposes and then released the bodies the following
day to the Iraqi medics from Majar hospital. In addition to what we
have seen from the British Army, we have the evidence of the death
certificates and have talked with some of the people from the hospital who
attended on the bodies that were picked up from Abu Naji. We now set out
a section of the video that was taken at the time when the bodies were
taken back from Abu Naji to the Majar hospital.

VIDEO FOOTAGE SHOWN

We fully accept that what we see is a group of very traumatised Iraqis,
obviously very upset by the bodies that returned from the British Army
camp at Abu Naji. This evidence needs to be looked at alongside the
death certificates that the doctors at the hospital set out in relation
to the dead bodies.

We provide you in the press packs with copies of the death certificates
and their translations. Of the 27 death certificates, 20 were in
relation to the bodies that were returned to the Iraqis from Abu Naji on
15th May. Those death certificates show the following.

[Show Photos]

Here are the two men who the certificates say had their eyes gouged
out:

Here is a man who is said to have had his penis cut off

Here is one of the men who died from a single shot to the head or from
a bullet administered very close to the body.

Here is a man with evidence of torture to the right side of his body.

In addition there are other cases, which allege torture including
strangulation, facial mutilation: a broken arm, a broken jaw and the man
seen in the video footage with his arm almost severed.

The evidence from the Iraqi doctors gives strong supporting evidence to
the allegations of the five men that they heard the torture and
executions of a whole series of Iraqis during that night of 14 and 15 May.

The position of the Iraqis and the British soldiers could not therefore
be more diametrically opposed.

For the British Army version to be true there are two possibilities:-

a) the five Iraqis and the doctors have got together to conspire
against the British – to try and paint them in a bad light. If this was the
case, it is the only instance that I know of where it has been alleged
that any conspiracy has taken place by Iraqis in this way never mind one
on such a massive scale- and why would this be happening now?

b) the second possibility is that the doctors were exaggerating what
they saw or misunderstood the injuries and that the five Iraqis are
simply mistaken- they were hearing something else happening- but what
mitigates against this is the detail of the statements- and the clarity of
what the doctors saw. How does a penis drop off? How are eyes gouged out?
There does not seem to us much to suggest that the doctors did get it
wrong.

For the Iraqi version of events to be true, soldiers and officers from
the British Army would have to have conspired to cover up one of the
most atrocious episodes in British Army history.

In gauging the possibility of this happening the British Army has quite
some explaining to do as to four rather fundamental coincidences that
need to be put in place for their version of events to be accepted.
Those four coincidences are

1. That a totally unusual if not unique decision was made to bring into
the Abu Naji camp the dead bodies of the Iraqis killed. Was that order
made and if so why and still further why is it that up to nine bodies
were left on the battle front if this was such a key issue for the
British Army?

2. A number of the medals were awarded because of the bravery of the
British soldiers as a result of a bayonet charge that supposedly took
place. It has been recognised that in this day and age a bayonet charge is
phenomenally unusual but presumably, from the Army’s view, it goes
someway to help explain some of the injuries that the dead suffered.

3. The nature of a number of the injuries of the Iraqis would seem to
us to be highly unusual in a battlefield, i.e. quite how so many of the
Iraqis sustained single gunshots to the head and from seemingly at
close quarter, how did two of them end with their eyes gouged out, how did
one have his penis cut off, some have torture wounds, etc.

4. Perhaps the most remarkable coincidence of all is that in this
battle, according to the British Army, the Iraqis they took to Abu Naji seem
to have either been killed out right or to have survived with not a
scratch. Again we are not military men but it seems to us highly unusual
that you would end a battle with people being in these two extreme
positions with absolutely no one being wounded.

Further, from our experience of what happened with the Mousa cases, the
Camp Breadbasket incident, the drowning boy incidents, and the total
failure of the subsequent court martials, to successfully prosecute
anyone who had not admitted guilt or been caught in the act, the notion of
British soldiers getting together and conspiring to avoid prosecution
has worked in the past.

Phil Shiner and I have a combined experience of 60 years of
interviewing clients in the field. For us both the evidence of these five
witnesses was entirely compelling. Additionally, we have had each of our five
Iraqi clients assessed by an independent psychiatrist who is very clear
that each of the men has suffered a very traumatic incident here. When
putting all this together with the supporting evidence of the Iraqi
doctors and the death certificates and when comparing this totality of
evidence with the coincidences that would need to occur for the British
Army’s story to be accepted we have to say that on the basis of the
evidence currently available we are of the view that our clients’
allegations, that the British were responsible for the torture and deaths of up
to 20 Iraqis, may well be true.

Phil Shiner:

Martyn Day and I spent five days with these witnesses. We have analysed
their evidence alongside evidence from other sources and we have
concluded that, on balance, our clients’ version is the true one. As Martyn
Day has stressed the Ministry of Defence’s explanation does not make
sense and aspects of it are frankly absurd (the notion of making young
soldiers, presumably traumatised by having to bayonet these men to death
in hand to hand combat, share the same APC back to base with bloody and
gory corpses in order that these barely recognisable faces can be
identified is simply incredible).

However the Royal Military Police have already conducted, they say, a
lengthy and painstaking investigation of its own involving interviewing
over 200 witnesses. They found no evidence of criminal wrongdoing. They
say all of the 20 were killed in combat and no one was tortured.

It is this same flawed military system that so spectacularly failed in
the Mousa incident. Even ex-Chief of Defence Staff, Mike Jackson, and
the present one, Richard Dannatt admit that, with the military process
now exhausted, no one is any the wiser who killed Baha Mousa.

Thus, our two firms now call on the Attorney General to intervene. She
has overall supervisory control of the Army Prosecuting Authority. She
has the ultimate say-so as to whether anyone should be prosecuted for
what are domestic crimes (if proven) including war crimes under the
International Criminal Court Act 2001. We require the Attorney General to
take this matter away from the military and put it immediately in the
hands of Scotland Yard. Our five clients – and other key witnesses –
stand ready to be interviewed by Scotland Yard at short notice here in the
UK.

Martyn Day:

The role of the RMP in investigating not just this incident but
previous incidents in Iraq is far from impressive. In briefings by the Army
this week it would appear it is looking to hide behind the RMP’s
investigation. But in this case the RMP did not even interview these five
witnesses, five of only nine survivors from Abu Naji, about the events of
that terrible night. That is why they are looking to interview them again
now. Further, to our knowledge there was no attempt to try and carry
out post mortems on the bodies to see if what the Iraqi doctors were
saying was correct. Absolutely central evidence if a genuine attempt was
being made to establish the veracity or otherwise of these allegations.

As Phil Shiner and I have said, on the evidence we have seen, we
believe that our clients’ allegations are likely to be true, but what is
crucial is that an immediate and thorough investigation is carried out into
what happened. We have no faith that the RMP will carry out that
investigation with the requisite skill and determination, but more
importantly, neither do our clients. In today’s parlance we no longer consider
that when it comes to Iraq that the RMP is fit for purpose!

Scotland Yard must be given the task of carrying out this investigation
but further there must be a public enquiry into these events. The key
question for the British people is whether or not our army was
responsible for an act of immense bravery or acts of terrible brutality.
Whether or not there is enough evidence to prosecute individual soldiers, it
will only be by an open public enquiry that this question will be
answered.


Al-Majar: latest news
Transcript of Press Conference held by Phil Shiner, Public Interest
Lawyers, and Martyn Day, Leigh Day & Co.

Martyn Day, Leigh Day & Co
Phil Shiner, Public Interest Lawyers


Phil Shiner:

What Martyn Day and I are about to reveal was shocking to us when we
first heard it and we would be very surprised if it did not shock the
nation. We are about to make available evidence that in May 2004 in a
British Army base in Abu Naji in Southern Iraq, British soldiers may well
have been responsible for

· The executions of up to 20 Iraqi civilians.
· The torture of many of these 20 before death.
· The torture of nine other survivors.
· Horrific bodily mutilations prior to some of the executions.

There is an important context to this incident. It is a matter of
public record that there were serious systemic failings in the UK’s
detention policy during the UK’s occupation of South East Iraq. The conclusions
of the Secretary of State for Defence in the light of the Aitken
report released at the end of January are that:

· There is no evidence of systematic abuse.
· There were a few isolated incidents of abuse committed by a few
rotten apples.
· The military justice system involving soldiers investigating other
soldiers and then different soldiers deciding whether any soldiers should
be prosecuted before a Panel of soldiers is fit for purpose.

From our work we are clear that he is completely wrong. Leaving aside
the evidence you are about to hear the public record shows that whilst
in custody with UK forces:

· Iraqi civilians were killed
· Manyf Iraqis were tortured, abused or subjected to degrading or
humiliating treatment.
· All Battle Groups were using hooding and stress techniques as
Standard Operating Procedure.
· The five techniques banned by the Heath Government in 1972 returned
(that is hooding, stressing, deprivation of sleep, deprivation of food
and water, and the use of noise).
· Our interrogators were trained to use hooding and stressing and these
were written policies.

Do not believe for one second that we make these allegations lightly or
without the evidence available to substantiate every single word of
what we say. Do not believe for one second those with most to hide –
those who got the law and policy completely wrong – those who would have
you believe there is nothing to face up to. Do not believe those who
would have you think it was just a few rogue soldiers and just one man,
Baha Mousa, who was tortured to death.

What went on whilst UK forces had the custody of Iraqi civilians is a
disgrace, a stain on our nation, and a terrible stain on the reputation
of all the good soldiers who have operated in Iraq and who behaved
themselves properly and in accordance with the law.

It is with the heaviest of hearts that I have to say that killings,
executions, torture, and abuse, sexual and religious humiliation of
civilians became all too common during the British occupation of Iraq– all
whilst these civilians were in the custody of UK forces. It is the law in
this country that in custody cases such as these there is a
particularly high burden on the State to explain itself. There is the clearest
evidence available of systematic abuse and systemic failings at the very
highest levels of politicians, the civil service and the military.
There has also been a deliberate and so far effective cover-up so that the
vast majority of the British public are blissfully unaware of what was
done in their name. Until we as a nation face up to this evidence we
cannot hope for the fundamental reforms required to ensure these things
can never happen again. We do not want to be talked about in the same
vein as the Japanese in the Second World War or the Americans at My Lai,
but unless we stand up and say as a nation that this cannot happen in
our name- that is where we seem to be headed.

Martyn Day:

Four weeks ago, Phil Shiner and I travelled over to Istanbul to meet
with five of the survivors of what happened on 14 & 15 May 2004 at Abu
Naji. Our two firms are instructed to bring a damages claim in relation
to the events of the 14/15th May 2004 and further to call for a public
enquiry into the events of that day.

We travelled to Turkey with the anticipation that the five were
alleging that they had been tortured and abused while in British custody and
were obviously very aware of the alleged mutilations to the bodies of
the Iraqis killed on 14/15 May. We had no inkling of what the five
witnesses were to tell us over the four days that we interviewed them.

We are providing you with the full versions of their statements through
until they left Abu Naji on 15 May. I am going to describe in general
terms how they ended up being caught up in the battle that raged on 14
May and then Mazin Younis, who took on the task of interpreting for us
during the four days in Istanbul and who is the President of the Iraqi
League, will read out some of the passages from those statements to
give you all an understanding of the horrific allegations that our clients
are making as to what happened on the night of 14/15 May.

[Slide of area]

All five of our clients are labourers who have largely lived, through
their lives, in the town of Majar. In the afternoon of 14 May, a battle
raged between the British Army and the Mehdi Army of the Iraqis.

Our five clients all say that they were simply in the vicinity of the
battle and had absolutely nothing to do with the Medhi Army. In support
of this is the fact that when eventually they were brought before the
Iraqi courts all of them were found not guilty of the charges by the
trial judge or their convictions were quashed on appeal. Four of the men
say that they were farmers who had land or animals in the immediate
vicinity of where the battle was taking place and this being harvest time,
they were all working with many other Iraqis in the fields at the time
when the battle commenced. One of the men said he was out collecting a
present being tubs of yoghurt, for a wedding he was going to later that
day.

All of the clients say that when the shooting started they took cover
and once the shooting ended they were swept up by British Army soldiers
and beaten, kicked, and generally assaulted and then taken into the APC
carriers that then took them back to the British Army Camp at Abu
Naji. They were handcuffed and blind folded and each of them was then
interrogated on one or two occasions and when they were not being
interrogated they were sat down on a chair. Mazin Younis will now describe what
each of the five witnesses say that they heard from that point.

Order of Witnesses
Witness Statement of Hussein Jabbari Ali (paras 28- 31 stopping at 'I
started calling for Haidar and Hamid but I got no answer')

Witness Statement of Hussain Fadhil Abass (paras 19- 25 stopping after
words 'It is not something I will ever forget'.)

Witness Statement of Atiyah Sayid Abdelreza (para 25- 27)

Witness Statement of Madhi Jassim Abdullah (para 10 from words 'About
an hour after my return-- - - - ' to para 11)

Witness Statement of Ahmad Jabber Ahmood (- para 20- 22)


Phil Shiner:

What you have heard is evidence that these 5 survivors have witnessed
seemingly in three separate venues at close hand:

· The execution of up to 15 men
· Between 4 and 5 of these executions involving shots at close range
and the remainder some sort of strangulation or throat cutting.
· Some of these executions preceded by torture or mutilations that are
so horrific that our clients could not describe the prolonged screaming
without breaking down.

These five survivors have been badly beaten and abused. Some of the
beatings out in the fields or at Abu Naji were so vicious that it is a
wonder the victims survived themselves. If what we have taken as evidence
is true the perpetrators of these crimes were merciless and
unbelievably brutal and cruel.

But what they have heard is unbearable to contemplate. I show you now
the image from a video taken by a member of the community as the body
bags were returned to the local hospital the next day, and as the body
bags are opened up. It is a horrific image apparently showing a dead man
with a missing eye that has been removed or gouged out.

Was this what the first witness heard: men having their eyes gouged out
and screaming in agony before final dispatch? Was it eyes gouged out
plus other mutilations and then final dispatch?

Clearly these and other pressing questions must be answered in public.

Martyn Day:

There are massive contradictions between what these five Iraqis have
said as against what the British Army have said. Some 12 British Army
soldiers and officers were given medals for what happened in the battle
that preceded these events in Abu Naji. The burning question for us as a
nation is whether these 24 hours represented the British Army at its
best or the British Army at its worst.

We have tried to examine as best we can the evidence of what the Iraqis
are saying as against what we know the British Army to have said in
terms of the events of that day. The Army says that it picked up 20
bodies from the battlefield, with nine prisoners, took them back to Abu Naji
for identification purposes and then released the bodies the following
day to the Iraqi medics from Majar hospital. In addition to what we
have seen from the British Army, we have the evidence of the death
certificates and have talked with some of the people from the hospital who
attended on the bodies that were picked up from Abu Naji. We now set out
a section of the video that was taken at the time when the bodies were
taken back from Abu Naji to the Majar hospital.

VIDEO FOOTAGE SHOWN

We fully accept that what we see is a group of very traumatised Iraqis,
obviously very upset by the bodies that returned from the British Army
camp at Abu Naji. This evidence needs to be looked at alongside the
death certificates that the doctors at the hospital set out in relation
to the dead bodies.

We provide you in the press packs with copies of the death certificates
and their translations. Of the 27 death certificates, 20 were in
relation to the bodies that were returned to the Iraqis from Abu Naji on
15th May. Those death certificates show the following.

[Show Photos]

Here are the two men who the certificates say had their eyes gouged
out:

Here is a man who is said to have had his penis cut off

Here is one of the men who died from a single shot to the head or from
a bullet administered very close to the body.

Here is a man with evidence of torture to the right side of his body.

In addition there are other cases, which allege torture including
strangulation, facial mutilation: a broken arm, a broken jaw and the man
seen in the video footage with his arm almost severed.

The evidence from the Iraqi doctors gives strong supporting evidence to
the allegations of the five men that they heard the torture and
executions of a whole series of Iraqis during that night of 14 and 15 May.

The position of the Iraqis and the British soldiers could not therefore
be more diametrically opposed.

For the British Army version to be true there are two possibilities:-

a) the five Iraqis and the doctors have got together to conspire
against the British – to try and paint them in a bad light. If this was the
case, it is the only instance that I know of where it has been alleged
that any conspiracy has taken place by Iraqis in this way never mind one
on such a massive scale- and why would this be happening now?

b) the second possibility is that the doctors were exaggerating what
they saw or misunderstood the injuries and that the five Iraqis are
simply mistaken- they were hearing something else happening- but what
mitigates against this is the detail of the statements- and the clarity of
what the doctors saw. How does a penis drop off? How are eyes gouged out?
There does not seem to us much to suggest that the doctors did get it
wrong.

For the Iraqi version of events to be true, soldiers and officers from
the British Army would have to have conspired to cover up one of the
most atrocious episodes in British Army history.

In gauging the possibility of this happening the British Army has quite
some explaining to do as to four rather fundamental coincidences that
need to be put in place for their version of events to be accepted.
Those four coincidences are

1. That a totally unusual if not unique decision was made to bring into
the Abu Naji camp the dead bodies of the Iraqis killed. Was that order
made and if so why and still further why is it that up to nine bodies
were left on the battle front if this was such a key issue for the
British Army?

2. A number of the medals were awarded because of the bravery of the
British soldiers as a result of a bayonet charge that supposedly took
place. It has been recognised that in this day and age a bayonet charge is
phenomenally unusual but presumably, from the Army’s view, it goes
someway to help explain some of the injuries that the dead suffered.

3. The nature of a number of the injuries of the Iraqis would seem to
us to be highly unusual in a battlefield, i.e. quite how so many of the
Iraqis sustained single gunshots to the head and from seemingly at
close quarter, how did two of them end with their eyes gouged out, how did
one have his penis cut off, some have torture wounds, etc.

4. Perhaps the most remarkable coincidence of all is that in this
battle, according to the British Army, the Iraqis they took to Abu Naji seem
to have either been killed out right or to have survived with not a
scratch. Again we are not military men but it seems to us highly unusual
that you would end a battle with people being in these two extreme
positions with absolutely no one being wounded.

Further, from our experience of what happened with the Mousa cases, the
Camp Breadbasket incident, the drowning boy incidents, and the total
failure of the subsequent court martials, to successfully prosecute
anyone who had not admitted guilt or been caught in the act, the notion of
British soldiers getting together and conspiring to avoid prosecution
has worked in the past.

Phil Shiner and I have a combined experience of 60 years of
interviewing clients in the field. For us both the evidence of these five
witnesses was entirely compelling. Additionally, we have had each of our five
Iraqi clients assessed by an independent psychiatrist who is very clear
that each of the men has suffered a very traumatic incident here. When
putting all this together with the supporting evidence of the Iraqi
doctors and the death certificates and when comparing this totality of
evidence with the coincidences that would need to occur for the British
Army’s story to be accepted we have to say that on the basis of the
evidence currently available we are of the view that our clients’
allegations, that the British were responsible for the torture and deaths of up
to 20 Iraqis, may well be true.

Phil Shiner:

Martyn Day and I spent five days with these witnesses. We have analysed
their evidence alongside evidence from other sources and we have
concluded that, on balance, our clients’ version is the true one. As Martyn
Day has stressed the Ministry of Defence’s explanation does not make
sense and aspects of it are frankly absurd (the notion of making young
soldiers, presumably traumatised by having to bayonet these men to death
in hand to hand combat, share the same APC back to base with bloody and
gory corpses in order that these barely recognisable faces can be
identified is simply incredible).

However the Royal Military Police have already conducted, they say, a
lengthy and painstaking investigation of its own involving interviewing
over 200 witnesses. They found no evidence of criminal wrongdoing. They
say all of the 20 were killed in combat and no one was tortured.

It is this same flawed military system that so spectacularly failed in
the Mousa incident. Even ex-Chief of Defence Staff, Mike Jackson, and
the present one, Richard Dannatt admit that, with the military process
now exhausted, no one is any the wiser who killed Baha Mousa.

Thus, our two firms now call on the Attorney General to intervene. She
has overall supervisory control of the Army Prosecuting Authority. She
has the ultimate say-so as to whether anyone should be prosecuted for
what are domestic crimes (if proven) including war crimes under the
International Criminal Court Act 2001. We require the Attorney General to
take this matter away from the military and put it immediately in the
hands of Scotland Yard. Our five clients – and other key witnesses –
stand ready to be interviewed by Scotland Yard at short notice here in the
UK.

Martyn Day:

The role of the RMP in investigating not just this incident but
previous incidents in Iraq is far from impressive. In briefings by the Army
this week it would appear it is looking to hide behind the RMP’s
investigation. But in this case the RMP did not even interview these five
witnesses, five of only nine survivors from Abu Naji, about the events of
that terrible night. That is why they are looking to interview them again
now. Further, to our knowledge there was no attempt to try and carry
out post mortems on the bodies to see if what the Iraqi doctors were
saying was correct. Absolutely central evidence if a genuine attempt was
being made to establish the veracity or otherwise of these allegations.

As Phil Shiner and I have said, on the evidence we have seen, we
believe that our clients’ allegations are likely to be true, but what is
crucial is that an immediate and thorough investigation is carried out into
what happened. We have no faith that the RMP will carry out that
investigation with the requisite skill and determination, but more
importantly, neither do our clients. In today’s parlance we no longer consider
that when it comes to Iraq that the RMP is fit for purpose!

Scotland Yard must be given the task of carrying out this investigation
but further there must be a public enquiry into these events. The key
question for the British people is whether or not our army was
responsible for an act of immense bravery or acts of terrible brutality.
Whether or not there is enough evidence to prosecute individual soldiers, it
will only be by an open public enquiry that this question will be
answered.