Select Committee on Foreign Affairs Minutes of Evidence


Examination of Witnesses (Questions 40-48)

KATE ALLEN AND TOM PORTEOUS

30 APRIL 2008

  Q40  Mr. Hamilton: Pakistan obviously gives some cause for concern. I know that Human Rights Watch has been very worried, especially, I think, about the way in which the courts and the judges have been undermined by President Musharraf's arrest and sacking of members of the judiciary in Pakistan. Your Human Rights Watch submission claims that the UK may have been complicit in a number of human rights abuses linked to counter-terrorism in Pakistan. How confident are you that these are accurate allegations? What sort of evidence do you have?

  Tom Porteous: First, there is obviously a problem here. Let me give you a little bit of context. We are trying to pull together the evidence, and obviously it is very difficult to come by, because these are serious allegations. But it is pretty clear that the US and the UK are relying rather heavily on the well-known abusive Pakistani intelligence agency, the Inter-Services Intelligence, in their counter-terrorism operations. We have documented the abuses of the ISI for many years. It has well-known links with extremist elements in Afghanistan, with the Taliban, in Pakistan and in the Arab world. In fact, it was behind the Taliban initially, as you will remember. It is one of the most brutal intelligence agencies in the world and yet the US and the UK have been relying rather heavily on it in their counter-terrorism efforts in that particular region and, as far as the UK is concerned, in its counter-terrorism efforts at home, because obviously there is a large British community of Pakistani origin.

  We also know from this report, among other things, that the UK is grappling with the dilemma of what to do about evidence that is important for combating terrorism but is also suspect because there is a suspicion that it has been extracted under terrorism. It is pretty clear, reading between the lines of that section in the Foreign Office's report, that it is referring to Pakistan here. It is obviously having to deal with this problem. That is the sort of background.

  When it comes to the detail, you probably read the front page report of The Guardian yesterday which identifies two men, British citizens, Salahuddin Amin and Zeeshan Saddiqui, who were arrested in Pakistan at the request of the British authorities. They were then allegedly—there is quite good evidence for this, not only their own statements but also medical evidence—quite brutally treated over long periods and tortured and interrogated. Now it seems that in these cases, and in a couple of other cases that we are also aware of, British Security Service officials were brought in to interrogate them during their period of detention by the Pakistani authorities.

  In these two cases, the detention appears to have been illegal—they were not charged and there was no due process—and the treatment was allegedly very brutal. We were a corroborative source for the Guardian story in both those cases. We are aware of two other cases where the British appear to have been involved in interrogating suspects in Pakistan who, according to their lawyers, were allegedly tortured. One of them is Rangzeib Ahmed and the other Rashid Rauf, who was allegedly an important player in the Heathrow bombing of last year.

  As one of the lawyers for these men, Tayab Ali, said in The Guardian, "at the very worst, the British Security Service instigates the illegal detention and torture of British citizens, and at the very best turns a blind eye to torture." It is incredible that British agents would not be aware of the kind of treatment these men could expect at the hands of the Pakistani intelligence agency. Either way, the circumstances seem to amount to complicity and collusion in the mistreatment of these men.

  To conclude, there might appear in the short term to be some advantage in relying so heavily on such abusive tactics in counter-terrorism but, in the longer term, we feel that it will be a disaster, because your are just piling up the grievances and the sense of injustice that fuels radicalisation and acts as a recruiting sergeant for terrorism. Condoning torture, therefore, even if it is only implicit, is a question of national security. The other point is that, if we are going to get to the bottom of what these suspects are supposed to have done, which is a crucial question, and if we are to give them proper trials, the fact that they were tortured will prejudice that process.

  Q41  Mr. Hamilton: These are very serious allegations. Have you had any response from the British Government or Government Ministers?

  Tom Porteous: We have raised some of these concerns with the British Government over the past months and we have met with denials.

  Chairman: I am conscious of the time. Ms Allen, is there anything you wish to add to that?

  Kate Allen: Just one point: the entry in the FCO's human rights report on Pakistan is very disappointing. It is hugely uncritical. It barely mentions the impact of the state of emergency on human rights. It is an example of a lack of consistency of approach by the FCO. Friend or foe, there should be a consistent approach when tackling human rights and not a pretence that issues do not exist.

  Q42  Chairman: Thank you. I would like to briefly touch on the situation in Israel and the occupied Palestinian territories. No doubt, we will have other opportunities to talk about this issue, but what is your assessment of the current situation? The FCO says that the situation has not improved over the course of the last year. Would you regard that as an understatement?

  Kate Allen: Yes, we consider that there has been a marked deterioration in the last year. A range of issues, such as the collective punishments that are being meted out to Palestinians by Israeli actions, should be brought to an end. The issues surrounding the continuation of the settlements and the existence of the fence, or the wall, need to be brought to some conclusion. Amnesty condemn indiscriminate rocket attacks from Gaza into Israel. We think that there is a complete deterioration in the relationship between the Palestinian Authority and Hamas. Ordinary citizens are suffering as a result.

  Chairman: Do you want to add anything?

  Tom Porteous: Yes. The situation in Gaza is particularly bad, and we think it is important that the British Government should call it what it is: collective punishment. We had a conversation recently with a Foreign Office official, and he privately agreed that it was collective punishment, but said that for political reasons it was impossible for the British Government to say, as the EU Commissioner has done, that that is what it is. It is important to use this language of collective punishment and indiscriminate military action when talking about the situation in Gaza, whether it is a question of measures that the Israelis take against the Gazans or attacks by Palestinian militias against Israelis, which are also indiscriminate.

  Q43  Chairman: What about Palestinian-on-Palestinian violence—internal Palestinian violence? Have you any assessment of that? Is that situation getting worse?

  Tom Porteous: Obviously, with the split between Hamas and Fatah, it is certainly getting worse. There is not much that the UK, the EU or the US can do to exercise any sort of influence over Hamas, because they do not talk to Hamas. At least, there is no political, diplomatic leverage. I think that it is very important for the EU and the UK to use their influence over Fatah, which is considerable. The EU is providing support through a project called EU COPPS—the EU Co-ordinating Office for Palestinian Police Support—and I think that human rights should be put at the heart of that support effort.

  Q44  Chairman: Can I now switch focus? In your written evidence, both of you have commented on the inadequacy of the references to Saudi Arabia in the FCO's human rights report, and you in Human Rights Watch have specifically made comparisons with Zimbabwe in terms of the level of language used. Why do you think we pull our punches with regard to Saudi Arabia?

  Tom Porteous: It is no secret; it is because of strategic, counter-terrorism, commercial and energy security interests. Saudi Arabia is a very important ally of the UK, as we saw during the visit of King Abdullah, when the red carpet was rolled out. We think it is important for the UK to engage on all those issues, but we think that the UK should also engage on the issue of human rights.

   In Saudi Arabia, there is not even, really, a pretence of democracy. As we said in a report that came out last week, women there are treated as minors for the whole of their lives—they are legally treated as children. Hundreds of security detainees are held without charge for months or years on end. Torture is widespread. There is very little accountability for abuses by agents of the state. Critics of the Government and political dissidents are routinely harassed, whether they are on the radical Islamist side or on the moderate reformist side. Precisely because of the UK's strategic interest in Saudi Arabia, we think it important that the UK should be addressing squarely these questions of reform, because the long-term stability of that country depends, we feel, on progress with regard to human rights.

  Kate Allen: I would just like to add to that picture. The use of the death penalty has increased in the last year. In 2006, we saw 39 people executed. In 2007, the figure was 158. That included the execution of Dhahian Rakan al-Sibai'i, a 15-year-old who was beheaded on 21 July last year. We at Amnesty International campaigned to stop that execution, obviously unsuccessfully. As has been said, torture is routinely used. The highest number of lashes imposed that we have know of was on two men accused of sodomy who received 7,000 lashes. We know of at least three people who had their right hand amputated above the wrist.

  Trade and security issues are important, but these abuses take place within the Saudi regime. The UK Government need to raise these issues with the Saudi Government and not just in the Two Kingdoms' Dialogue. Again, it is difficult with these dialogues. When they have no set ambitions, they go on and on and become an excuse for a lack of public debate and accountability for Governments who treat their people in such an appalling way.

  Chairman: I am going to move to another continent.

  Q45  Andrew Mackinlay: For speed, I will just mention the countries: the Maldives—small but important, but remote; out of sight and out of mind—Colombia and Iran. If we have no more time, can I just bounce those three off them?

  Kate Allen: Can I get back to you on the Maldives?

  Tom Porteous: I do not have any comment on the Maldives. I do not know much about it.

  Q46  Andrew Mackinlay: Okay. Colombia and Iran are big things, are they not?

  Tom Porteous: Kate, shall I do Colombia and you do Iran?

  Chairman: Can you do Colombia?

  Tom Porteous: I will do Colombia and Kate can do Iran to save time.

  The important issue the Committee should focus on is UK military aid to Colombia. We think the British Government could be doing more to use aid as a lever for improvements in the record of the Colombian military. The military has a record of being associated with paramilitaries, which are responsible for very serious abuses. It also has a record of being involved in extra-judicial executions.

  Those paramilitaries have been involved in the assassination of large numbers of trade union activists over recent years. That should be of concern for the Labour party in particular but also for anyone who cares about human rights. The problem is that the military aid the British Government grant to Colombia is unconditional with regard to any kind of human rights improvements. We think that that sends a bad message. The military in Colombia will go on getting these military goodies without having to do anything in return with respect to human rights. So we would very much like the British Government to make its aid conditional on an improvement.

  In fact, the UK seems to be being saddled with a policy that even the American Government have moved beyond. After the Democrats took control of Congress last year, they froze some military aid to Colombia on human rights grounds. We think that the UK should at least get back into step with the policy of the Americans.

  Chairman: Iran.

  Kate Allen: The entry in the human rights report remains critical of Iran and highlights serious deterioration. Amnesty would agree with that. Again, talking about the death penalty, in 2007, at least 335 people were executed, including at least six child offenders. So far this year, 80 people have been executed, including at least one child offender.

  Torture continues. There are also huge concerns about the nature of trials and the way in which people are dealt with. In terms of arrests and detention, human rights defenders, political activists and minority communities are targeted.

  Freedom of expression continues to be under real pressure, including access to the internet and press freedom. Many newspapers have been shut down. NGOs are harassed. As I said earlier in terms of women organising, there is a campaign for equality, which women in Iran are very bravely pursuing. The aim is to collect 1 million signatures calling for an end to legalised discrimination against women, and many of the women involved in that have been arrested and imprisoned. It is a bleak situation.

  In the absence of an EU-Iran human rights dialogue, the UK Government continue to work through international partners and NGOs, and also through the UN, to maintain a spotlight on the country. We hope that work will continue.

  Chairman: Thank you.

  Q47  Sir John Stanley: As you may have seen, we had a full-scale debate in Westminster Hall two or three weeks ago regarding our last report on Russia. We covered a number of human rights issues in that debate. I want to focus on just one of those. In a country where, sadly, human rights seem to be going backwards, one of the few flickerings of hope is the enormous courage of a limited number of people in the media who are determined to write as accurately as they can—to write, in particular, because television is pretty well blocked and radio is mostly blocked as well—about what has gone on under the Putin regime and what will now go on under his successor.

  A number of those people have lost their jobs and some have been kicked out of the country. Some, sadly, have died in unknown circumstances, and there would appear to be strong circumstantial evidence that the fact of their having written critical comments about the Putin regime was not unrelated to their deaths. What, if anything, do you think the British Government can do to try to support this small group of very, very brave people who are standing up in the media for—and putting themselves at personal risk for—freedom of expression in Russia?

  Tom Porteous: I think the British Government are not in a very good position to take the lead in the EU on speaking out firmly to the Russians on the issue of freedom of expression, because of the poor relationship at the moment, for various reasons with which you are familiar, between the UK and Moscow. However, I think that, behind the scenes in the EU, the UK should be encouraging its EU partners to speak out very clearly on these issues and to send a very strong message to Russia that this kind of treatment of the media—this kind of quiet but rather lethal restriction and repression of freedom of expression—is something that the EU takes very seriously, and will put at the front of its dialogue with Russia.

  Unfortunately, this is not the only problem in Russia. There is also a severe crackdown on civil society, also rather quiet but rather lethal. They have been tying up NGOs in endless bureaucracy so that they cannot get on and do their work. There is also, of course, the problem in the north Caucasus, which remains in spite of the fact that the war fighting in Chechnya has come to an end. The conflict is there, and it is spreading from Chechnya into the rest of the north Caucasus, so there is a strategic issue there as well.

  There is one flicker of light, which is that the President-elect, Dmitry Medvedev, has pledged to uphold the rule of law, but, unfortunately, if you look at his history and the history of his career, he has been a very close associate of Putin and closely connected to Putin's policies over the last few years. In fact, Putin himself, when he came to power, made exactly the same pledges, which were, sadly, disappointed. However, the pledges have been made and the EU should build on those and insist that those pledges should be honoured.

  Kate Allen: I have a very small point to add. At Amnesty, we obviously work with many individuals who are under pressure. We have worked with journalists who have been working in Chechnya and we have had them here in the UK. We have brought them to the attention of the UK Government, and on a very individual level there is a cloak of protection that can be given to individuals when that takes place and when support is seen to be given to individuals who are working in that way.

  Q48  Sir John Stanley: You referred earlier to the very serious human rights abuses that have taken place in the Democratic Republic of the Congo and the abuses you were referring to were African against African, basically. I just want to highlight another issue because, very sadly, some of the abuses that have taken place there have been committed from within the UN contingents.

  We have had very serious allegations of sexual abuses and, more recently, we have had allegations of abuses and exploitation of minerals and illegal mineral trading of the country's minerals by both the Indian contingent and the Pakistani contingent. Could you give us your perspective on how adequate or not you judge the UN's present capacity to look honestly, objectively and rigorously at disciplinary failures and possible criminal activities by members of UN contingents? Because any military force that is unable to do this will never be able to stand up for human rights.

  Tom Porteous: The UN has the capacity but it does not necessarily have the political will to conduct the necessary investigations. In fact, in the case of the recent scandal over the trade of arms for minerals by certain contingents within the United Nations Mission in the Democratic Republic of the Congo, there was an investigation—there were several investigations; there were several reports, but they were suppressed. Each time the matter went up the chain of command, the report was watered down. That is why, in the end, it had to come through the media rather than through the internal processes of the UN, because it was clear that the UN was trying to whitewash this whole situation. But we hope that with this kind of media attention, this will actually shame the UN into taking the rigorous action that is required to deal with this issue.

  On the issue of sexual abuse, the UN does have more political will to act, because these are very serious taboos and so we are more hopeful. On the issue of corruption, the UN really needs to get its act together and find the political will to do what it is perfectly capable of doing.

  Chairman: Thank you very much. We are grateful to Ms Allen and Mr. Porteous. Once again, we have covered a large area, and this has been very helpful to us. Next week, the Minister, Lord Malloch-Brown, will be giving evidence to us and we will also be pursuing our inquiries later when we come to write the report. Thank you very much.





 
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