A coalition of 14 legal, human rights, and anti-torture organizations is intervening in one of the most important cases to reach Britain's highest court, the House of Lords. The case, which started yesterday, was to be heard by a panel of seven judges instead of the usual five, and will be watched by governments around the globe.
The resultant ruling -- whether or not evidence obtained abroad from third parties who may have been tortured is admissible in domestic courts -- is "likely to have profound implications for the worldwide ban on torture," according to the non-governmental organization Human Rights Watch, one of the interveners.
The judges will hear an appeal against a 2-1 decision by the appeal court of England and Wales last year that the British government was entitled to rely on such evidence in special terrorism cases, as long as Britain "neither procured nor connived at" the torture.
"When it comes to torture, the rules of the game must not change," said Holly Cartner, a spokeswoman for the US-based Human Rights Watch.
Under the UN Convention Against Torture, to which 140 states including Britain are party, evidence obtained under torture is inadmissible in any court proceedings. But the appeal court held that, because the convention is not part of UK law, the courts did not have to exclude such evidence. The House of Lords ruling, expected by the end of the year, could have an impact on Britain's attempts to return terrorist suspects to countries with poor human rights records such as Jordan and Algeria .
The lords' appeal is by 10 foreign nationals, mainly Algerians, subjected to indefinite detention without trial in the high-security Belmarsh prison, south London, and elsewhere before the House of Lords ruled the regime unlawful last December.
Kehinde Sanni spends his days smoothing out dents and repainting scratched bumpers in a modest autobody shop in Lagos. He has never left Nigeria, yet he speaks glowingly of Burkina Faso military leader Ibrahim Traore. “Nigeria needs someone like Ibrahim Traore of Burkina Faso. He is doing well for his country,” Sanni said. His admiration is shaped by a steady stream of viral videos, memes and social media posts — many misleading or outright false — portraying Traore as a fearless reformer who defied Western powers and reclaimed his country’s dignity. The Burkinabe strongman swept into power following a coup in September 2022
TRUMP EFFECT: The win capped one of the most dramatic turnarounds in Canadian political history after the Conservatives had led the Liberals by more than 20 points Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney yesterday pledged to win US President Donald Trump’s trade war after winning Canada’s election and leading his Liberal Party to another term in power. Following a campaign dominated by Trump’s tariffs and annexation threats, Carney promised to chart “a new path forward” in a world “fundamentally changed” by a US that is newly hostile to free trade. “We are over the shock of the American betrayal, but we should never forget the lessons,” said Carney, who led the central banks of Canada and the UK before entering politics earlier this year. “We will win this trade war and
‘FRAGMENTING’: British politics have for a long time been dominated by the Labor Party and the Tories, but polls suggest that Reform now poses a significant challenge Hard-right upstarts Reform UK snatched a parliamentary seat from British Prime Minister Keir Starmer’s Labor Party yesterday in local elections that dealt a blow to the UK’s two establishment parties. Reform, led by anti-immigrant firebrand Nigel Farage, won the by-election in Runcorn and Helsby in northwest England by just six votes, as it picked up gains in other localities, including one mayoralty. The group’s strong showing continues momentum it built up at last year’s general election and appears to confirm a trend that the UK is entering an era of multi-party politics. “For the movement, for the party it’s a very, very big
The Philippines yesterday slammed an “irresponsible” Chinese state media report claiming a disputed reef in the South China Sea was under Beijing’s control, saying the “status quo” was unchanged. Tiexian Reef (鐵線礁), also known as Sandy Cay Reef, lies near Thitu Island, or Pagasa, where the Philippines stations troops and maintains a coast guard monitoring base. Chinese state broadcaster CCTV on Saturday said that the China Coast Guard had “implemented maritime control” over Tiexian Reef in the middle of this month. The Philippines and China have been engaged in months of confrontations over the South China Sea, which Beijing claims nearly in its
RSS