British Prime Minister Tony Blair is expected to be forced into a humiliating climbdown this week over his plans to detain terrorist suspects without charge for up to 90 days, despite the near unanimous backing of the police in the UK and the British general public.
In a letter to the Guardian, the chief constable of Greater Manchester and the senior member of the police terrorism committee, Michael Todd, bluntly warns that it is vital that their view is heard about the need for greater powers of detention of terror suspects.
Todd writes: "We have given that professional advice on one basis and one basis only, that these were the changes that professionals dir-ectly involved in the fight against terrorism felt were necessary to protect the people of this country from attack."
"That is the view not only of [London's] Metropolitan police, but of chief constables across the country and the terrorism committee that represents them," he writes.
His letter is unlikely to change enough backbenchers' minds for Blair to win a Commons vote tom-orrow, but it does pose questions for the Conservative leadership amid signs that some senior Tories feel they have been dragged into siding wholesale with civil liberties groups and against the security forces.
Blair -- who would hold his monthly press conference yesterday and address his critics in the parliamentary party last night -- remains strongly committed to the 90 days, claiming opponents of the reform are being "dangerously complacent" about the terrorist threat.
Home Secretary Charles Clarke, will also meet backbenchers as well as holding talks with opposition parties on a likely compromise of 28 days, described on Sunday as the "absolute outer limit of what is acceptable" by the shadow attorney general, Dominic Grieve.
A YouGov poll for Sky News shows overwhelming popular support for the government's position, with 72 percent believing the maximum detention time should be extended to 90 days. Of those, 41 percent said that it should be granted only with the approval of a senior judge. The government has already said extension should be authorized by a senior judge with appeal to the high court.
The poll found that 16 percent backed a proposal by rebel Labour members of parliament (MPs) to extend the current limit to 28 days.
The lord chancellor, Lord Falconer, indicated however that the government would have to give ground.
Former Cabinet minister Frank Dobson warned of a breakdown in trust inside the parliamentary party if Clarke and the whips reneged on their commitment last week to back down over the issue.
Auschwitz survivor Eva Schloss, the stepsister of teenage diarist Anne Frank and a tireless educator about the horrors of the Holocaust, has died. She was 96. The Anne Frank Trust UK, of which Schloss was honorary president, said she died on Saturday in London, where she lived. Britain’s King Charles III said he was “privileged and proud” to have known Schloss, who cofounded the charitable trust to help young people challenge prejudice. “The horrors that she endured as a young woman are impossible to comprehend and yet she devoted the rest of her life to overcoming hatred and prejudice, promoting kindness, courage, understanding
‘DISRESPECTFUL’: Katie Miller, the wife of Trump’s most influential adviser, drew ire by posting an image of Greenland in the colors of the US flag, captioning it ‘SOON’ US President Donald Trump on Sunday doubled down on his claim that Greenland should become part of the US, despite calls by the Danish prime minister to stop “threatening” the territory. Washington’s military intervention in Venezuela has reignited fears for Greenland, which Trump has repeatedly said he wants to annex, given its strategic location in the arctic. While aboard Air Force One en route to Washington, Trump reiterated the goal. “We need Greenland from the standpoint of national security, and Denmark is not going to be able to do it,” he said in response to a reporter’s question. “We’ll worry about Greenland in
PERILOUS JOURNEY: Over just a matter of days last month, about 1,600 Afghans who were at risk of perishing due to the cold weather were rescued in the mountains Habibullah set off from his home in western Afghanistan determined to find work in Iran, only for the 15-year-old to freeze to death while walking across the mountainous frontier. “He was forced to go, to bring food for the family,” his mother, Mah Jan, said at her mud home in Ghunjan village. “We have no food to eat, we have no clothes to wear. The house in which I live has no electricity, no water. I have no proper window, nothing to burn for heating,” she added, clutching a photograph of her son. Habibullah was one of at least 18 migrants who died
Russia early yesterday bombarded Ukraine, killing two people in the Kyiv region, authorities said on the eve of a diplomatic summit in France. A nationwide siren was issued just after midnight, while Ukraine’s military said air defenses were operating in several places. In the capital, a private medical facility caught fire as a result of the Russian strikes, killing one person and wounding three others, the State Emergency Service of Kyiv said. It released images of rescuers removing people on stretchers from a gutted building. Another pre-dawn attack on the neighboring city of Fastiv killed one man in his 70s, Kyiv Governor Mykola
RSS