Thanks for mentioning this article Craig. What's also interesting and disturbing is the attempts to question the verdict and the abilities of the jury to deal with such a complicated trail of evidence, and the assumption that the 'problem' was the jury and not the lack of real, hard, evidence against the plotters.

I'm all for prosecuting terrorists with everything the law can throw at them, but only if they really are terrorists with the ability to make real bombs. Prosecuting hot-headed, incompetent, half-wits, seems to have a different purpose entirely, as propaganda and justification for the 'war of terror'.

Absolutely agreed. (BTW I fear macshealbhaich may have missed my irony on the other posting)

As septicisle says: "Half the reason why there will be so much surprise at the verdict is that they failed to bother to report almost any of the defence case..."

If you look at the Beeb news website, you simply cannot find the comments of the defence barrister, which must have proved very convincing.

This comment from http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk/7605583.stm is a bit of a worry too:

"Prosecutors have until the end of the month to consider a retrial of the men."

Did New Labour abolish double jeopardy along with habeas corpus?

Actually, yes, I do believe they did.

More and more depressing and worrying. Right now on the BBC News website, News Front Page, there are two stories side-by-side.
One, about court proceedings in the case of the raid on the Northern Bank, which shouts loudly that the case is being heard without a jury.
The other, about the liquid bomb case, which shouts about how astonished and disappointed everyone is about the jury.
Anyone want to run a book on how many years jury trials will continue in England?
And is it a complete coincidence that next to those two stories on the same list is the news that Tarique Ghaffur has been relieved of duties at Scotland Yard?

It's all depressing and disturbing, especially the almost total lack of any comments relating to the defence case.

I really doubt that jury trials will survive the 'war of terror'; they are 'quaint' remnants of another age.

I always believed the later part of the Blair years was a watershed in British politics. The lies required to convince the nation and parliament were so obvious and grotesque and undermined the essence of traditional 'bourgeois' democracy, for always. At least that's my considered opinion. We've entered a new era. I think having 'got away' with Iraq, anything is now possible for the executive branch of government.

Can 'democracy' be re-established in Britain, I doubt it, and the longer the 'war of terror' continues the more classic democracy in its British version will be undermined.

I think the watershed came around the early 90s when the UK was on the brink of bankruptcy and sold its soul to the USA to survive. From then on secret illegal activities were vastly expanded to keep the countries head above water and tocontribute to USA global expansion schemes.

Hi craig is your email address working??