UK Airports at high alert - Page 5

jambutty · 12-08-2006, 10:06

I have no intention of bandying words with you on this point Cyfr although I will remind you that it was you who started it with disparaging remarks about my opinion on the issue.

I, however, will end it.

andrewb · 12-08-2006, 12:56

Well thats because your opinion was horseradish with a pinch of complete and utter conspiracy... Ah well!

semihere · 14-08-2006, 15:59

From Craig Murray's website:

The UK Terror plot: what's really going on?

I have been reading very carefully through all the Sunday newspapers to try and analyse the truth from all the scores of pages claiming to detail the so-called bomb plot. Unlike the great herd of so-called security experts doing the media analysis, I have the advantage of having had the very highest security clearances myself, having done a huge amount of professional intelligence analysis, and having been inside the spin machine.

So this, I believe, is the true story.

None of the alleged terrorists had made a bomb. None had bought a plane ticket. Many did not even have passports, which given the efficiency of the UK Passport Agency would mean they couldn't be a plane bomber for quite some time.

In the absence of bombs and airline tickets, and in many cases passports, it could be pretty difficult to convince a jury beyond reasonable doubt that individuals intended to go through with suicide bombings, whatever rash stuff they may have bragged in internet chat rooms.

What is more, many of those arrested had been under surveillance for over a year - like thousands of other British Muslims. And not just Muslims. Like me. Nothing from that surveillance had indicated the need for early arrests.

Then an interrogation in Pakistan revealed the details of this amazing plot to blow up multiple planes - which, rather extraordinarily, had not turned up in a year of surveillance. Of course, the interrogators of the Pakistani dictator have their ways of making people sing like canaries. As I witnessed in Uzbekistan, you can get the most extraordinary information this way. Trouble is it always tends to give the interrogators all they might want, and more, in a desperate effort to stop or avert torture. What it doesn't give is the truth.

The gentleman being "interrogated" had fled the UK after being wanted for questioning over the murder of his uncle some years ago. That might be felt to cast some doubt on his reliability. It might also be felt that factors other than political ones might be at play within these relationships. Much is also being made of large transfers of money outside the formal economy. Not in fact too unusual in the British Muslim community, but if this activity is criminal, there are many possibilities that have nothing to do with terrorism.

We then have the extraordinary question of Bush and Blair discussing the possible arrests over the weekend. Why? I think the answer to that is plain. Both in desperate domestic political trouble, they longed for "Another 9/11". The intelligence from Pakistan, however dodgy, gave them a new 9/11 they could sell to the media. The media has bought, wholesale, all the rubbish they have been shovelled.

We then have the appalling political propaganda of John Reid, Home Secretary, making a speech warning us all of the dreadful evil threatening us and complaining that "Some people don't get" the need to abandon all our traditional liberties. He then went on, according to his own propaganda machine, to stay up all night and minutely direct the arrests. There could be no clearer evidence that our Police are now just a political tool. Like all the best nasty regimes, the knock on the door came in the middle of the night, at 2.30am. Those arrested included a mother with a six week old baby.

For those who don't know, it is worth introducing Reid. A hardened Stalinist with a long term reputation for personal violence, at Stirling Univeristy he was the Communist Party's "Enforcer", (in days when the Communist Party ran Stirling University Students' Union, which it should not be forgotten was a business with a very substantial cash turnover). Reid was sent to beat up those who deviated from the Party line.

We will now never know if any of those arrested would have gone on to make a bomb or buy a plane ticket. Most of them do not fit the "Loner" profile you would expect - a tiny percentage of suicide bombers have happy marriages and young children. As they were all under surveillance, and certainly would have been on airport watch lists, there could have been little danger in letting them proceed closer to maturity - that is certainly what we would have done with the IRA.

In all of this, the one thing of which I am certain is that the timing is deeply political. This is more propaganda than plot. Of the over one thousand British Muslims arrested under anti-terrorist legislation, only twelve per cent are ever charged with anything. That is simply harrassment of Muslims on an appalling scale. Of those charged, 80% are acquitted. Most of the very few - just over two per cent of arrests - who are convicted, are not convicted of anything to do terrorism, but of some minor offence the Police happened upon while trawling through the wreck of the lives they had shattered.

Be sceptical. Be very, very sceptical.

http://www.craigmurray.co.uk/

Once again - take EVERYTHING you read in the mainstream media with a bucket load of salt - especially when it comes from the mouths of politicians. And always remember the tag line from V for Vendetta - "People shouldn't fear their governments, governments should fear their people".

jambutty · 14-08-2006, 18:03

I look forward to the day when 23 British citizens (one has already been released without charge) have to answer to a charge of terrorism in court. Methinks I will wait and wait and wait.

cashman · 14-08-2006, 19:58

Quote:

Originally Posted by jambutty

I look forward to the day when 23 British citizens (one has already been released without charge) have to answer to a charge of terrorism in court. Methinks I will wait and wait and wait.

i think its very funny,not ha-ha, that no charges have yet been brought, also have not much faith in intelligence, re- the poor buggar in london, also the house with the chemical weapons, not exactly an inspiring track record in recent times. __________ sorry just slipped in the bullsh**.

andrewb · 22-08-2006, 10:36

Quote:

Originally Posted by jambutty

I look forward to the day when 23 British citizens (one has already been released without charge) have to answer to a charge of terrorism in court. Methinks I will wait and wait and wait.

You no longer have to wait. http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk/5273104.stm

11 Been charged and I think all but 1 are still being held.

I can't find the link anymore but it seems many items of evidence have been found including stuff to make bombs.

SPUGGIE J · 22-08-2006, 12:05

So were are those who advocate that the arrests are racially predudesed?

cashman · 22-08-2006, 16:13

well if as alleged they have found martyerdom videos - of any of the charged 11 i think the punishment should fit the crime- blow the buggars up.

jambutty · 22-08-2006, 16:36

It is one thing claiming to have evidence but it is an entirely different matter having that evidence accepted in a court of law and getting a conviction.

The acid test is the judge announcing; “I find you guilty of ……..”

Hopefully this isn’t just more spin and the potential killers are proven to be guilty of terrorist activities and get their dues.

Tealeaf · 23-08-2006, 10:32

Quote:

Originally Posted by jambutty

It is one thing claiming to have evidence but it is an entirely different matter having that evidence accepted in a court of law and getting a conviction.

The acid test is the judge announcing; “I find you guilty of ……..”

Unfortunatly, Jambo, the judge does not make that announcement in an English Court of Law; the jury decides on the guilt or non guilt of the accused and the judge merely states "You have been found guilty...."

Our legal system has evolved to deal with criminal beheaviour, not with widespread terrorist activity.There are three major problems with this. Firstly, the accused has the right to reject certain jurors and so there is a good chance that you will end up with a jury where at least one or two members are sympatetic to the accused and their aims. Result? hung verdict and retrial. Secondly, the British system is adversorial rather than inquisitorial and thus proof of conspiracy is very, very difficult to make, even more so for the third reason, the signing up to European human rights legislation and the barriers that imposes upon a successful prosecution.

jambutty · 23-08-2006, 11:32

Jambo Tealeaf? Who is Jambo?

Oh! You mean me - jambutty. Please do me the courtesy of using my proper user name.

Much obliged for the correction my learned colleague. In my own defence I would offer that as I’ve never been in a court of law where a jury is sitting, for any reason whatsoever, so I am not familiar with the terminology used. However courtesy of films and TV I am familiar with how a jury is selected and what happens during a trial. I can’t remember what the judge said though.

The fact that our system is adversarial, as you so eloquently put it, will make it very hard to prove the case against those currently charged with terrorist offences.

But thanks for the update because other readers may not be so familiar and will learn something.

I have heard quotes that suggest it will be some two years before the whole affair is done and dusted. To me, that means that the police are struggling with real evidence.

Time will tell I guess.