Irish American News - August
2006
COLUMNS - "Mick" - by Mike Morley
http://www.irishamericannews.com/
THE LONG GAME
It’s been said the Irish spirit is reflected in its national sport, hurling- a raucous, explosive game played at breakneck speed, with origins dating back over 3 millennia. England prefers the long game. Cricket, not nearly as ancient as hurling, dates to pre-Norman times and is achingly slow and deliberate.
In the long game with its former American colony, as with the Irish, Britain never quits. She is back again seducing our senators to strip away the human rights endowed to us in American extradition law.
Below is a letter I wrote to Senator Obama, and will forward to members of the Foreign Relations Committee and others. Britain is on the fast track with this one. Please
contact members of the Senate
ASAP, before it’s too late. And ask any government official, local or otherwise that you know or have voted for, to please pass on your concerns to the Senate. That input gets attention.
Dear Senator:
Last November, on short notice to those opposed, your Committee held hearings on Britain’s push to amend our extradition treaty with the UK and Northern Ireland. Senator Dodd remarked then how few people were in the hearing room. He took it to mean the UK and US governments had “done their homework” this time, comparing the calm atmosphere with the 1986 hearings and the “controversy” back then over Britain’s attempt to cripple the protections of American law. Twenty years ago Irish Americans helped save at least part of the “political offense exception” a tenet of American law since Thomas Jefferson’s time. That exception protects us from being handed over to countries where, due to our race, religion, nationality or political opinions, we, as judged by an American court, might face serious prejudice or harm. The original treaty, like most U.S. extradition pacts with foreign countries, gives American judges latitude to rule on the merits of requests.
At the 2005 hearing two witnesses for the U.S. government, representing the departments of State and Justice, denied the validity of all objections raised against stripping those protections from American law. They claimed terms such as “provisional” arrest for 60 days were “standard” in US treaties with foreign powers. They also denied that peoples’ homes and other property would be seized without due process, and claimed ex post facto laws were really not uncommon.
Chairman Lugar asked them how often the political exception had been an issue in extraditions since 1986. They replied that the amendment has not been invoked in recent years. That seemed to imply its pointlessness. No one in the hearing room suggested that Britain ceased filing extradition requests concerning N. Ireland because, in light of severe human rights violations there, those requests, under the current law, might face embarrassing denials in American courts. No senator thought to ask the government witnesses why, if the protections of the law are pointless, is Britain so hell-bent on having them removed.
Like a dealer passing crack in a schoolyard; offering his “mark” free hits to get him hooked, Britain’s latest ploy is to enforce the treaty unilaterally, granting extradition requests to the US, including those for 3 high-profile British bankers flown here just days prior to this latest
Senate hearing. Now Britain is saying, “You can’t renege, you owe us”. On July 12, treaty
“opponents” in parliament issued a statement: "Since the UK-US Extradition Treaty of 2003 was signed, the US has demanded the extradition of over 40 British citizens without having to provide any evidence.” "Even if the US ratifies the treaty, Britain cannot seek the extradition of any US citizen without first proving a case in a US court… British citizens have inferior rights compared to their American counterparts."
That’s the point. British citizens do “have inferior rights compared to their American counterparts”. Despite the wigs, and the fancy language and trappings, their legal system also is inferior to ours. Are we then to dilute American rights in deference to the law in England, a
country with an established religion, and lacking the protections of our Bill of Rights?
Similar arguments were made in 1986 when Britain successfully lobbied the Senate to amend American law. Northern Ireland Secretary Tom King reminded senators that Margaret Thatcher allowed U.S. warplanes to fly from British bases for a strike against Libya a month before. Senate refusal to consent to the extradition treaty, King said, ''would simply not be understood in the U.K.”
For a one-time flyover, Britain was rewarded with permanent abridgement of Americans’ rights. President Reagan was given a knighthood by QEII in 1989.
British ministers including Tony Blair, Baroness Scotland and UK foreign secretary Margaret Beckett, are right now lobbying senators and administration officials to ratify further amendments to the treaty.
Washington should know better. The U.S. now has to face the heat of worldwide condemnation for adopting "the five techniques" (wall-standing; hooding; subjection to noise; deprivation of sleep; deprivation of food and drink) that Britain used 35 years ago to torture Irish Catholic citizens herded into extralegal internment camps. That policy led to a 1978 judgment finding Britain was in violation of the European Convention on Human Rights.
Are we now to ignore why the political exception was drafter into American law in the first place? Have we forgotten why Washington refused to extradite Citizen Genet… why Justice Jay resigned his seat on the Supreme Court… why Jefferson, the premier Republican of his time, bested Adams in the 1800 election?
You are being told to allow Americans to be carried off to non-jury trials in courtrooms where testimony by police officials and unseen, anonymous “witnesses”, uncorroborated by any supporting evidence, is accepted as fact.
Here, in part, is the statement by civil rights attorney Rosemary Nelson before the International Operations and Human Rights Sub-committee of the US House International Relations Committee hearing on Human Rights in Northern Ireland, September 29th 1998:
“I have been a solicitor in private practice in Northern Ireland for the past twelve years. My clients are drawn from both sides of the community. For the last ten years I have been representing suspects detained for questioning about politically motivated offences. All of these clients have been arrested under emergency laws and held in specially designed holding centers. Since I began to represent such clients and especially since I became involved in a high profile murder case, I have begun to experience difficulties with the RUC (Royal Police).
"These difficulties have involved RUC officers, at their most serious, making threats against my personal safety including death threats. All of these remarks have been made to my clients in my absence because lawyers in Northern Ireland are routinely excluded from interviews with clients detained in the holding centers.
"This behavior on the part of RUC officers has worsened during the last two years and particularly since I began to represent the residents of the Garvaghy Road, who have objected to an Orange Order march passing through their area from Drumcree Church. Last year I was present on the Garvaghy Road when the parade was forced through. I had been present on the road for a number of days because I had instructions from my clients to apply for an emergency judicial review of any decision allowing the parade to pass through the area. When the police began to move into the area in force in the early hours of 5th July, I went to the police lines and identified myself as a lawyer representing the residents. I asked to speak to the officer in charge. At that point I was physically assaulted by a number of RUC officers. The officers responsible were not wearing any identification numbers and when I asked for their names I was told to "fuck off". I complained about the assault and abuse but to date have obtained no satisfactory response from the RUC.
"Since then my clients have reported several death threats against myself and members of my family. I have also received threatening telephone calls and letters. Although I have tried to ignore these threats, inevitably I have had to take account of the possible consequences for my family and for my staff. No lawyer in Northern Ireland can forget what happened to Patrick Finucane nor dismiss it from their minds. The allegations of official collusion in his murder are particularly disturbing and can only be resolved by an independent inquiry into his murder, as has been recommended by the UN Special Rapporteur. I would be grateful if the Sub-committee could do all in its power to bring about such an inquiry, by communicating to the United Kingdom government its belief that an inquiry in this case would in fact be a boost to the peace process…
"I believe that one of the reasons that RUC officers have been able to indulge in such systematic abuse against me is that the conditions under which they interview clients detained under emergency laws allow them to operate without sufficient scrutiny. My access to my clients can be deferred for periods of up to 48 hours. I am never allowed to be present while my clients are interviewed.
"Another reason why RUC officers abuse me in this way is because they are unable to distinguish me as a professional lawyer from the alleged crimes and causes of my clients. This tendency to identify me with my clients has led to accusations by RUC officers that I have been involved in paramilitary activity, which I deeply and bitterly resent. The Special Rapporteur has recommended that RUC officers be sensitised to the important role played defense lawyers in the criminal justice system. To date this recommendation had not been implemented. I should be grateful if this Subcommittee would ask the UK government what steps they intend to take to act on this recommendation.
"I, like many others, was pleased to see the human rights provisions included in the recently signed Agreement. In particular I was pleased that the Agreement looked to the early removal of the emergency provisions legislation which has been in place in some shape or form since the inception of the state. The existence of this legislation has seriously undermined public confidence in the rule of law and led to numerous miscarriages of justice, some of which have involved my clients. I was therefore very disappointed when, in the wake of the horrific Omagh bombing, new and draconian legislation was introduced which further erodes suspects' due process rights. For example, the legislation provides for the opinion of a senior RUC officer that someone is a member of a proscribed organization to be accepted as evidence by the courts. I and many of my colleagues fear that if these laws are used they will lead to further miscarriages of justice.” |
Mrs. Nelson thanked the committee chairman and returned to Belfast. (Note: Northern Ireland Ombudsman, Nuala O’Loan has confirmed that whether or not British security
forces were proved to be involved in the Omagh
bombing, as many suspect, they did choose to ignore several clear warnings prior to the attack.)
Britain is now urging you to adopt similar draconian and undemocratic measures and
apply them to Americans.
A year before her Washington testimony, Mrs. Nelson represented the family of
Portadown Catholic Robert Hamill. On April 27th 1997, Robert was returning from Portadown city
center with his friend, Gregory Girvan, and two girls. They were heading for the Catholic estate on
Garvaghy Road. A gang of up to 30 Protestant youths set on them. The two girls flung
themselves over Robert and his friend to protect them, but Gregory was kicked unconscious.
Robert was beaten into a coma and never regained consciousness. He died twelve days later.
The attack took place in full view of four RUC officers in a police Land Rover, and 200
yards from an RUC station. The officers wore body armor and were armed with machine guns,
but made no attempt to intervene. They simply sat in their vehicle until the attack was over. They
made no arrests and did not report the incident back at their station.
In a typical outcome for such murders, evocative of the very worst abuses in the American South
half a century ago, the Director of Public Prosecutions chose not to prosecute. None of the
officers who observed the attack were suspended from duty, nor was any disciplinary action
taken.
In a typical outcome for such murders, evocative of the very worst abuses in the American South half a century ago, the Director of Public Prosecutions chose not to prosecute. None of the officers who observed the attack were suspended from duty, nor was any disciplinary action taken. And the peace process hasn’t halted these attacks. Two months ago Michael McIlveen, a student at St. Patrick’s high school in Ballymena, left a movie house in the town’s center and was attacked by a dozen Protestant youths. Michael was kicked, stomped and beaten with a baseball bat. He died the next day.
Ballymena is the home town of DUP leader Ian Paisley, and a no-go area for Catholics.
Though invited by the murdered boy’s family, who are his constituents, Paisley, as is his custom
with Catholics, would not even attend the funeral.
McIlveen was the third young Catholic murdered within nine months.
On Easter Saturday, another young Catholic from the same Dunclug estate as McIlveen was
beaten and stabbed in a daylight attack at the town’s Tower shopping centre, suffering a
punctured lung.
As I write, another young Catholic man lies in critical condition with a fractured skull and
possible brain damage after attending a barbecue in Derry’s Protestant Waterside area. Paul
McCauley was attacked by up to eight men on Sunday, July 17. A friend who was with him
suffered a fractured jaw, and another was badly bruised.
Despite inflexible blindness to these stories by the American press, they are the reality
of a centuries-old government-sanctioned cultural and religious domination into which you are
being told to extradite American residents.
On March 15 1999, six months after her appeal for help to the US Congress, civil rights
attorney and mother of three Rosemary Nelson was headed for her office. Just yards from her
Lurgan home a bomb exploded under her car. She died two hours later.
Police have yet to charge anyone with her murder, and despite strong suspicions to the
contrary, say they have no evidence of a police conspiracy.
We Irish, of all world peoples, know well that while England’s tactics evolve over the
centuries, her strategy remains constant. It has been declared a country with:
“a history of repeated injuries and usurpations, all having in direct object the establishment of an absolute
Tyranny…”
The Crown has been indicted: “For transporting us beyond Seas to be tried for pretended
offences. For quartering large bodies of armed troops among us:
For protecting them, by a mock Trial from punishment for any Murders which they should commit
on the Inhabitants...”
You’ve read it before. The quotes are from a straightforward single page document of
only 1300 words: our Declaration of Independence. These are also grievances long held by Irish
men and women living under the Crown.
You may recall one other grievance: “For taking away our Charters, abolishing our most
valuable Laws and altering fundamentally the Forms of our Governments:”
Whose interests will you serve by removing safeguards set in place at the founding of
our Republic? And what are those safeguards worth? Would you trade them for a fleeting
advantage in a minor, soon forgotten dispute, or for a foreign honorarium? If American principles
can be bartered away so cheaply by our leaders, then the 9\11 hijackers could have saved the
world the heartache. The American Idea is already on its knees.
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