Despite numerous representations and an Early Day Motion signed by the large majority of Scotland’s MPs, Theresa May has ordered that Majid Ali, a Glasgow City College student, be deported back to almost certain torture and probable death in Pakistan in just twenty minutes from now. I attended the demonstration on his behalf yesterday at the Scottish Office.
Majid is a member of the much persecuted Baloch minority. Two of his immediate family have been “disappeared” by the Pakistani military since his asylum application was submitted. There is no doubt that given the numerous MP’s who have raised his case, and the well-supported early day motion, civil servants will have put the decision to May personally. She was however not even prepared to grant a delay for a look at the evidence. May is very likely not merely pandering to the racist UKIP voting electorate – she is on the far right of politics herself. The callous sacrifice of Majid Ali is proof, if any more were needed, that this Conservative administration is nothing to do with Cameron’s purported “compassionate conservatism.” They are the nasty party indeed.
But it also gives a stark example of the meaningless nature of the “enhanced devolution” in the new Scotland Act. Majid Ali’s community and Scotland’s elected representatives all want to keep him here, as an asset to his community and to our country. But even once the new Scotland Act is passed, it still would be Theresa May and the London Home Office who are the arbiters in all immigration and nationality matters.
For me, independence is the answer, and the only way Scotland will be able to operate as an ethical state. But for those Scots gradualists who actually believe in this devolution distraction, the absence of any input in immigration matters is a crucial example of how inadequate the proposed “new powers” are.
The majority of all extant UK statute laws apply equally in England and Scotland, but in Scotland are enforced by different administrative and judicial processes. While the UK is unfortunately a single state, it will have the same laws and regulations on immigration applying throughout. But there is no reason whatsoever that, as with so many other areas of law, the administration, judicial function and discretionary powers under the laws should not be devolved from London to Scotland as regards persons in Scotland.
That this is not so much as on the table shows how sham are the proposed “extra powers”. And that Majid Ali is being deported by Theresa May against universal Scottish opinion, shows the contempt which this Tory government intends to display against Scotland.
Assuming the deportation go ahead, the next useful step is to put pressure on Theresa May through letters to MPs to account for what happens to him after his return. There is a chance that forcing the British Government to make enquiries of the Pakistani Government about him may just keep him alive.
Abe Rene
10/06/2015 10:18am
You might want to take these arguments into consideration.
http://www.amnistia-internacional.pt/files/Relatoriosvarios/Confianca_Europeia_nas_garantias_diplomaticas_contra_a_tortura_negocio_arriscado.pdf
Including:-
“The second prong of Amnesty International’s opposition to diplomatic assurances arises from inherent deficiencies in diplomatic assurances that militate against them providing a reliable safeguard against torture and other ill-treatment. Among these concerns, examples of which are described in sections below, are the following:
Given the absolute nature of the prohibition of torture under international law, its status as a crime under international law, and the stigma associated with its use, governments that practise torture routinely deny it;
Deniability is made plausible by the routine failure of the state to investigate allegations of torture and bring those responsible to account, creating an environment of impunity for perpetrators; and by the fact that torture is usually practised in secret, with the collusion of law enforcement and other government personnel, including medical staff in some cases, and with
the understanding that no one will be held accountable for the abuse;
Persons subject to torture and other ill-treatment are often afraid to recount their abuse to their lawyers, family members, and monitors for fear of reprisals against them or their families;
In the event a breach is alleged, bilateral diplomatic assurances are not legally binding and lack an enforcement mechanism, leaving it to the two governments involved to voluntarily assume responsibility for investigating breaches of the assurances and holding perpetrators accountable;
Governments have no incentive to acknowledge a breach of diplomatic assurances, and indeed have strong incentives to remain ignorant of or to ignore potential breaches; such an acknowledgement would not only amount to an admission that the governments had violated the absolute ban on torture and sending people to places where they were at risk of torture, but would likely complicate efforts to rely on assurances in the future;
Even when breaches are detected by the sending government, there is no evidence to support the notion that serious diplomatic consequences will result, and it has no means of ensuring a cessation of the breaches or effective protection of the individual;
Attempts to forcibly return people in reliance on a bilaterally-negotiated diplomatic assurance covering transfers based on “security” or “terrorism” grounds may lead to some individuals being labelled as “terrorists” who may not have been so labelled by the receiving country in the past; the assurances themselves thus may put people at risk of ill-treatment on return.”
The question is not whether diplomatic assurances have been sought and received. The question is how much they are worth.
Kind regards,
John
Craig
Who cares if I got that wrong? The West is only concerned with creating war and division. They back both Assad and Saudi genocidal terrorists. The people are caught in the middle.
US General Petraus spent his time in Iraq generating sectarian division to destroy Iraq. What that evolved into was Islamic State which is a USUKIS creation for global hegemony. When the global highway goes from London to Karachi it will then be driven on to shanghai.
Nobody cares whose side who is on. USUKIS only want to destroy the Muslim world and anyone who says that is apparently ” crazed with hate” or many other put-downs bandied around by the would-be trolls looking for a contract with MI5 like habba’s or anon1.
You think you are a whistleblower, but your whistle turns out to be no more than a tiny pin-prick in a turqoise-haired plastic FCO troll’s bum.
British divide-and-rule tactics were responsible for the creation of Pakistan. At first, the British tried to use the excuse of protecting minorities like Muslims in order to avoid giving total independence to India. But when that became impossible, Plan B was to create a separate Muslim state of Pakistan where the British military could continue to be stationed. And indeed the RAF stayed on in Pakistan until 1956 (at which point the U.S. took over).
Oh, I forgot to mention that the U2 flights that took off from Pakistan in the 1950’s had RAF pilots serving secretly in that capacity. So the RAF stayed on secretly in Pakistan at least until 1958. Revealed: the RAF’s secret Cold War heroes: In the late Fifties, the CIA used British pilots to fly U2 spyplanes over the Soviet Union. Some of them were decorated.
Radio Scotland running a news article on the story,saying Majid was a model student,the NUS now fear Mr Ali will, be a victim of Pakistan’s kill and dump squads.
Pakistan’s all Britain’s fault? Tell me the subcontinent wouldn’t have torn itself apart anyway.We didn’t create Hindu-Muslim animosity.
Giyane, you were right about the most important matter.
This article in today’s Counterpunch is very good:
http://www.counterpunch.org/2015/06/10/did-the-war-in-syria-just-become-a-regional-war/
Hindu-Muslim animosity in India was much less strong before the British stoked it up. Read William Dalrymple’s books about India in the late 18th and early 19th centuries.
As an Irish-American whose father came from the Ulster county of Cavan, I am all too well aware of how the same divide-and-rule tactics were used in Ireland.
If I were a certain Irish-American poster I’d stick to something I was vaguely qualified to talk about (eg, the applicability of Athenian democracy ca. 500BC to C21 Great Britain).
Rather than blathering on about the Raj, where his anti-British feelings come out rather too obviously 🙂
Or even the Irish Republic part of Ulster.
Bengali author Madhusree Mukerjee’s Churchill’s Secret War: The British Empire and the Ravaging of India during World War II , although its primary subject is the Bengali famine of 1942-3, has a great deal to say about the British and Churchill in particular egging Jinnah and the Muslim League to press for an independent Pakistan in the last years of the Raj.
Immigration really needs to be devolved to Holyrood,with a aging population,immigrants,are a vital part of any future Scotland.
Unfortunately Westminster takes a completely opposite view as it kowtows to its south east voters who’ve had their fill of immigrants and want no more.
Independence is the key,if you don’t have control of all the levers of government,then it becomes very difficult to plan the future,with future generations in mind.
I’d go as far to say Scotland hasn’t and never will exceed expectations (albeit the Scottish Enlightenment period) until independence is obtained,and that terrifies the ruling class at Westminster,Buckingham Palace and Whitehall.
What is the relevance of all these old chestnuts about the British role in the Indian sub-continent to the subject of this thread?
Some people just have to get in their daily ration, don’t they.
O/T.
Hans Last has just died at 84 years of age,better known as James Last.
Here’s one of his better known ditties,called Happy Heart.
http://m.youtube.com/watch?v=iQ87nO8cm24
Westminster won’t even allow foreign student to stay on in Scotland after graduation,for a period which would allow them to pay taxes,and contribute to society through spending etc.
Forget devolving more meagre and meaningless powers,independence is the way forward.
Sadly, the native elites in Pakistan have continued, and intensified, the divide-and-rule strategy. They didn’t have to. If they’d had any real national feeling they wouldn’t have. But they’re only in it for the personal loot. They regard the country as a living carcass from they can feed, endlessly. They are vampires and as a social class require a long stake through the heart. The problem now is that they would be likely to be replaced by (their own, created) army of stormtrooping lumpenprol zombies. The whole thing has become a House of Horror. Meanwhile, as everywhere, people simply try to get on with their lives.
Hey – my icon has changed! How’s that happened? I seem now to be sporting the Cross of Iona! 🙂
Suhayl,
It’ll change if you entered another email address, or mistyped your usual one.
This article by a well informed writer, Eric Draitser, informs us of the likely progression of the war in Syria into a regional war.
The Shifting Battlefield
Did the War in Syria Just Become a Regional War?
by ERIC DRAITSER
There are growing indications that the war in Syria has now entered a new and dangerous phase that threatens to engulf the entire Middle East in a broad regional war. The news that Iran has sent significant numbers of Iranian, Iraqi, and Afghan troops to take active part in defense of Syria has the potential to transform the conflict into one with global implications as Iran’s key regional rivals – Turkey, Saudi Arabia, and Israel – continue to support jihadi factions in their war against the government of Bashar al-Assad.
/..
http://www.counterpunch.org/2015/06/10/did-the-war-in-syria-just-become-a-regional-war/
Some feeding of well-fed faces will be taking places at the Mansion House tonight as Gideon promises more austerity. All the gold plate is out and the tables are set. Mr Peston on the Six O’clock News gave us a peek and Mr Robinson speaks as a mouthpiece for Gideon here.
Osborne to confirm Budget surplus law
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-33074500
PS Menu not known.
Have a look at this:
“Video: Shocking words of Israeli leaders read aloud in Irish parliament”
http://electronicintifada.net/blogs/ali-abunimah/video-shocking-words-israeli-leaders-read-aloud-irish-parliament
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Richard_Boyd_Barrett
The divide-and-rule tactics led to the troubles in Ireland, which hopefully are now resolved, and, more seriously, to the hostility between India and Pakistan, which may yet, if we are unlucky, result in a nuclear war that could mean the end of the human race.
Then there is Israel and the problems it creates in the Middle East (something else that could result in a nuclear war). A major reason for the Balfour Declaration establishing a Jewish national home in Palestine was that the British wanted to settle near the Suez Canal a national group that could be relied upon to resist any Arab attempt to take over the Suez Canal, on which depended British communications with India, on which depended Britain’s status as a great power. Eugene Rogan’s new book The Fall of the Ottomans: The Great War in the Middle East focuses on how two Ottoman attempts during the First World War to take the Suez Canal led British statesmen to think along these lines. There were other reasons for the Balfour Declaration, but this was a major one. And in the succeeding decades, the British, true to form, played the Arabs and the Jews in Palestine off against each other.
As for the Syrian war, I wonder if Erdogan’s chastening in the Turkish election will end up helping Assad. Erdogan’s obsession with toppling Assad has been very unpopular with a lot of the Turkish population.
Lysias
10 Jun, 2015 – 3:19 pm
“O/T, Accidental discovery of blood, collagen in dinosaur bones could rewrite textbooks.”
……………………………………………………………………
Fascinating Lysias but Habbabkuk and some others won’t believe it because your link is to Russia Today.
It’s an example of Putin’s disinformation.
Habbabkuk (la vita è bella)
10 Jun, 2015 – 4:44 pm
“What is the relevance of all these old chestnuts about the British role in the Indian sub-continent to the subject of this thread?”
…………………………………………………………………………
Obviously Habbabkuk you don’t like Britain’s role in the Indian sub-continent to be aired.
“…all these old chestnuts…” i.e. myths, or to you, lies.
You use the same language when “discussing” Israel.
Dunno if this has been posted yet.
“Palestinians set to file complaints against Israel at ICC”:
“Foreign Minister Riyad al-Maliki says the Palestinian Authority is planning to file two war crimes complaints against Israel at the International Criminal Court (ICC).
Al-Maliki said Tuesday that the two files, which are over Israel’s illegal settlement activities in the occupied West Bank and its latest devastating attack on the besieged Gaza Strip, will be submitted to the Hague-based court on June 25.
According to Press TV, the Minister said all preparations for submitting the two lawsuits have been made by Palestinian and international experts.”
http://english.pnn.ps/2015/06/09/palestinians-set-to-file-complaints-against-israel-at-icc/
Well. Good luck with that, eh.
Should provide some interesting diversions on here though.
@Doug S et al. re-“rewriting textbooks”
We’re all Russians and speak (old)Russian!
Not according to RT but the NYT & more DNA
http://www.nytimes.com/2015/06/16/science/dna-deciphers-roots-of-modern-europeans.html?_r=0
If only he had taken there on an EasyJet flight, he might have survived, having landed in a provincial town near to Lahore instead.
In Bangladesh.
Some think the partitioning (INDIA-PAK) was a mistake. What choice did they have? Civil War was the alternative. We don’t see Scot/Indies murdering UKIPs and billowing smoke from racial/ethnic fires…..yet.