Britain - Shamed by appalling human rights abuses

[Voice1]

Just found this article, from the New Statesman. Amnesty have just released a damning report on human rights under Blair & Co:

http://www.newstatesman.com/200602270004

In a shocking report on Britain, Amnesty International attacks the government for persecuting innocent people, tearing up our freedoms and undermining the judiciary. By Martin Bright

The British government stands accused. A special Amnesty International report on this country's human-rights record, details of which are published for the first time here, lays out a shocking catalogue of erosion of liberties and downright abuse, most of it in the name of the war against terror. A chilling picture emerges from its pages of a country panicked by a security nightmare and ripping up its own freedoms.

The language is stark: terrorist suspects find themselves "effectively persecuted" and held for years in "a Kafkaesque world" on the basis of secret accusations, with "devastating consequences" for them and their families. The conditions for some of them in Belmarsh Prison, Amnesty judges, amount to "cruel, inhuman and degrading treatment".
......

[Monkey see Monkey Do]

1. Amnesty link & comments from Blair's press conference this morning

(scroll down for report or summary of report)

http://web.amnesty.org/pages/stoptorture-220206-features-eng

From today's press conference:

"Question time. Your objection to Guantánamo Bay being "an anomaly" is "mealy-mouthed" says Sky News. Why won't you go further? Mr Blair says he's said it's an anomaly, and "has nothing more to add".

The BBC picks up on this, and asks about whether Iraq is descending into civil war. The PM comes back on the detention camp and adds "don't forget the context in which this has happened - the slaughter of 3,000 people on September 11. It's important we remember those people who died in the terrorist attack and the huge amount of anger in America."

(...)

Channel 4 news presenter Jon Snow complains that Mr Blair will not use his "unique access" to the White House to call for the close down of Guantánamo, or investigate extraordinary rendition. The PM says Guantánamo is in a "different category" from rendition flights and he won't go into it again. He then says, "there is no evidence any of these 200 flights are rendition". The Americans say they will not send people to countries with torture without a guarantee they won't be abused, he adds.

The PM complains that today's Amnesty report does not give enough context to the "human right" to live without the threat of terrorism. We will not return anyone to any country without assurances about their treatment but we cannot be expected to keep people in this country indefinitely who espouse terrorism."

(...)

The Guardian follows up on the same line - "is it sustainable to stay in office if a flagship reform gets through" thanks to Tory support? And, then on Guantánamo, Patrick Wintour says he has looked up "anomaly" in the dictionary, and it carries no moral meaning. Is it enough to describe it simply as an anomaly, and not introduce a moral judgment, he asks the PM.
12.45pm

The PM gives no answer to the Guantánamo question."

http://politics.guardian.co.uk/media/story/0,,1716179,00.html

(emphasis mine to further highlight the idiocy of this wannabe dictator)

[Voice1]

2. Thanks for that

Blimey - Sky News calling Blair "mealy mouthed"! They're in mutiny.