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If Being Frozen To Death Doesn’t Work, Being Starved To Death Comes Next

By Patrick Clarke | December 14, 2022

First we were placed under virtual house arrest. Now we are being frozen by soaring fuel bills and energy supply shortages in those same homes. Coming next, we are to be starved. All in pursuit of one of the Net Zero cults: Covid or carbon emissions. Too bleak a picture? We have only to look across the North Sea to one of our nearest neighbours, the Netherlands.

Surprisingly for such a small country (it is only about twice the size of Wales), the Netherlands is the second largest food exporter in the world, second only to the United States. It is Europe’s largest meat exporter. Four million cows, 13 million pigs and 104 million chickens are reared annually. It provides vegetables to many of its Western European neighbours.

One would assume this success story would be widely cherished, especially in an era of increasing food insecurity and shortages, with other key sources such as Ukraine under serious threat due to the continuing conflict there.

Remarkably, and many would say sinisterly, the polar opposite is the case. The supposed crime of the Dutch farmers? They have fallen foul of the ‘Zero Carbon’ fixation of the Climate Change Cultists who control so much of the current political and economic agenda.

One of that agenda’s chief targets is agriculture, particularly the use of nitrogen. The Dutch are at the top of the tree for nitrogen use per hectare of cultivated land, at nearly twice the European average.

The European Commission has given strict guidelines to EU member states to reduce their use of nitrogen. To comply with this the Dutch Government introduced laws to enforce a reduction of 50 per cent in nitrogen emissions by 2030. Such draconian targets can only come with draconian enforcement measures.

Dutch farming is being strangled through an assortment of regulations, including new flood prevention regulations, bizarrely given the success of the Dutch in preventing flooding over the centuries despite the fact that large parts of the country are below sea level, having been reclaimed from the sea.

Perhaps worst of all, one of the Government’s new laws bans the children of farmers from inheriting the farm when their parents retire or die. Once a farmer stops farming, their entire family becomes banned from farming in the Netherlands again. A whole way of life plus decades, sometimes even centuries, of experience is being gratuitously thrown away.

Where regulation fails, mandatory purchasing of land by the state is feared to be the next step as farmers have so far shown little interest in selling any of their land. Around 300,000 hectares of farmland is earmarked to be converted into nature conservation areas between now and 2040. More than 1,000 farms face forcible closure.

Nor is it just the Dutch Government that the farmers are battling. A panoply of NGOs are on the case too, using the courts to pursue any part of the government at national or provincial level deemed to be faltering in enforcing these objectives.

Those of us in the UK, long weary of seeing how political charities and activist lawyers run rings round attempts to enforce curbs on immigration, will be familiar with the process.

It’s worth pointing out too that, despite Brexit, Northern Ireland still has to implement these same EU directives as part of the Northern Ireland protocol. Thanks for that one, Theresa May, Boris Johnson and Rishi Sunak. So while today it is Dutch farming under siege from its own government, tomorrow it will be farming in Northern Ireland that is compelled to go through the same pain.

Interestingly, no one has yet stepped forward with a credible plan for how these vital lost sources of food are going to be replaced. The Dutch Government hopes that it will come from artificially created meat from laboratories and is investing in this technology, though how it can be sufficiently scaled up remains to be seen. Given what is already widely known about the harmful effects of eating too many processed foods instead of natural foods, such as the triggering of obesity and potential heart disease, it has to be asked whether this is a desirable course, or indeed what the further health implications for users may be.

Some would say the whole agenda is a straight forward grab by bad actors intent on taking control of the world’s food resources, for whom Net Zero objectives provide a convenient camouflage for their own lust for power, control and yet more wealth than they already have. The usual suspects certainly spring to mind.

Others argue that out-of-control digital technocrats are so conditioned to assuming they can control anything, however complex, that they can’t accept that some things remain beyond human control, such as airborne viruses and the climate.

Each failure to learn that simple lesson is leading to ever more intensive efforts to achieve that control, control that must be achieved at all costs. Either way, vicious cycles of more authoritarianism, human misery arising from absurd and seriously harmful measures, plus more setbacks in failing to reach unobtainable goals lie ahead. Unless we can shake off the grip of these technocrats on our societies and the political institutions in thrall to them, the prospect of starving to death will become our grim reality in an increasingly tyrannical world.

Think that couldn’t happen here? Just look at Sri Lanka, though as with the Dutch farmers, most of the media and nearly every politician would prefer you not to!

December 17, 2022 Posted by | Civil Liberties, Malthusian Ideology, Phony Scarcity | , , , | 4 Comments

Ireland’s book of condolence for Palestinians killed in Gaza blocked by pro-Israel groups

MEMO | May 21, 2018

A request by the Irish Republican Party, Sinn Fein, to open a book of condolence in Belfast city council for Palestinians killed in Gaza last week was blocked by Unionists allied with the Northern Ireland Friends of Israel group.

Denouncing the book of condolence as “deeply shameful”, the Israeli lobby group accused Sinn Fein of supporting terrorists for wanting to mark the killing of Palestinians by Israeli occupation forces in Gaza.

The two main Unionist parties, who have strong ties with the pro-Israel lobby group, blocked the request, which forced Sinn Fein to open an internal book of condolence. According to the rules, a book of condolence can only be opened with the agreement of all parties at City Hall.

The Belfast Telegraph reported that the Social Democratic and Labour Party (SDLP) council group leader Tim Attwood said he was “disappointed” that Unionists blocked the book of condolence “to mark the killings and injuries inflicted on the people of Gaza”.

“People of Belfast are horrified and wish to express their sympathy at the tragic loss of life,” he added.

Meanwhile,  Sinn Fein group leader on the Belfast City Council, Deirdre Hargey, was reported as saying that her party would be opening its own book of condolence in the party’s room at City Hall, open to all members of the public.

The request for the book of condolence came after a number of Palestinian solidarity protests were held across Northern Ireland last week. Sinn Fein reacted to the killing and the pro-Palestinian demonstration by also demanding the expulsion of the Israeli ambassador.

This is the second time in two months that the plight of Palestinians became a cause of tension in Belfast. In March the Northern Ireland Friends of Israel group invited the Israeli ambassador to the UK, Mark Regev, to speak at an event in the local public library. Activists denounced the decision saying that Regev “has a long history of excusing, apologising and justifying [Israel’s] murder, torture and genocide as well as land theft from the indigenous population of Palestine.”

Members of the community in Belfast who supported the decision to open a book of condolence were disappointed by the Unionist parties. They told MEMO that many Unionist politicians and councillors were members of the Friends of Israel and revealed that Unionist parties have all hosted friends of Israel events.

May 21, 2018 Posted by | Ethnic Cleansing, Racism, Zionism, Solidarity and Activism, War Crimes | , , , , , , , | 1 Comment

Poll Shows More Britons Favoring Brexit Than Keeping Northern Ireland

Sputnik – March 27, 2018

Opinion surveys have shown British attitudes becoming increasingly fragmented and polarized, with radically different views about the country’s future.

A poll commissioned by the London-based LBC Radio station and published on March 26 has shown that a greater proportion of the British population support prioritizing the United Kingdom’s exit from the European Union than retaining Northern Ireland as part of the UK. The survey was conducted over two days from March 21 to 22.

​36 percent of the 1,630 adults in Great Britain said Brexit was of chief importance to them, with 29 percent giving priority to the union with Northern Ireland and 22 percent said that neither was of any importance to them. Residents of Northern Ireland itself were not included in the poll.

Brexit negotiations between London and Brussels have brought an unprecedented level of concern over how to preserve the unity of the UK, as Ireland has threatened to veto an agreement that creates a hard border with the UK and the Democratic Unionist Party which shares power with Theresa May in London has refused to back any separate status for Northern Ireland that might weaken its links to the rest of the country.Northern Ireland, like Scotland and London, voted to remain in the EU in the June 2016 referendum, with at least 56 percent backing the Remain campaign. Despite also backing Remain, the DUP has since come to support the UK leaving the EU’s Customs Union and the Single Market, so as to keep the country bound to London.

Under the terms of the Good Friday Agreement, which ended the decades-long period of conflict known as The Troubles in 1998, the question of whether the country remains united with Britain or joins with the Republic of Ireland must be made solely by the people of Northern Ireland.

March 27, 2018 Posted by | Aletho News | , , , | Leave a comment

The plight of Irish political prisoners

PressTVUK | January 8, 2018

The incarceration of Irish political prisoners in British prisons in the North of Ireland is rarely discussed in the mainstream media. In this special report recently televised, Press TV in partnership with ‘Crimes of Britain’ examine the plight of Irish political prisoners in including allegations of internment and torture.

January 9, 2018 Posted by | Subjugation - Torture, Timeless or most popular, Video | , , | 1 Comment

Secret Death Squads Backed by Thatcher Government Killed Hundreds in N. Ireland

Sputnik – 17.06.2015

Following the broadcast of an Irish documentary, a number of human rights groups are calling on London to take responsibility for its role in colluding with paramilitary groups in Northern Ireland. These actions allegedly resulted in the deaths of hundreds of Catholics, all to support the Crown.

In 1974, a coordinated attack was launched in the Irish cities of Dublin and Monaghan. On May 17, three car bombs were detonated during rush hour in the nation’s capital. Only 90 minutes later, a fourth explosion went off in Monaghan, just south of the border with Northern Ireland. Thirty-three people were killed. An estimated 300 were injured.

The loyalist paramilitary group Ulster Volunteer Force claimed responsibility for the attack, and in a recent Irish documentary, “Collusion,” a member of the group claims that the bombings were conducted under direction from the British Army. The goal: to implement a civil war.

This is only one of several claims levied against the Thatcher government for its role in the Troubles, and in the face of “overwhelming evidence of collusion,” human rights groups and Irish officials are calling for the British government to own up.

“As a result of the RTE programme ‘Collusion’ showing the knowledge by British Prime Ministers of the murder of Catholics with British army assistance, it is time for the Irish Government to stop asking and start demanding,” said Senator Mark Daly, according to Irish Central.

The allegations suggest that the British Army’s secret Force Research Unit (FRU) recruited and managed members of paramilitary organizations in its efforts in “destroying” the IRA.

These gangs, acting under orders from the army, executed hundreds of innocent people. According to Anne Cadwallader, author of “Lethal Allies,” a single loyalist group may have been responsible for the deaths of 120 Catholics.

Other evidence also points to British involvement in the assassination of Belfast solicitor Pat Finucane. Famed lawyer of Bobby Sands, leader of the Republican hunger strike in Maze Prison, Finucane was gunned down by members of the Ulster Defence Association who were acting as paid informants for the Royal Ulster Constabulary.

“Carry on – just don’t get caught,” British government officials told former Special Branch head, Raymond White, according to the documentary.

Allegations also say Thatcher’s administration attempted to downplay investigations into murders involving collusion, and former Police Ombudsman Nuala O’Lown said that authorities in London were still involved in covering British involvement as late as 2003.

“Soft diplomacy has got us nowhere it’s time to ask the EU, UN and the Hague war crimes tribunal to carry out investigations,” Daly said. “The British Prime Minister and State were no better than a third world dictatorship ordering a terror campaign by murder gangs who deliberately and indiscriminately murdered Catholic and Irish Citizens.”

On Thursday, Taoiseach Enda Kenny will meet with Prime Minister David Cameron in London. While part of those discussions will involve economic matters between the two countries, Kenny is also expected to discuss “legacy issues,” seeking British documents which detail the collusion.

But even if Kenny succeeds, it may be too late.

“The initial British response at political level was denial. The second phase was usually cover-up and the last phase eventually was apology,” former secretary general of the Department of Foreign Affairs Sean Donlon said during the documentary.

“But the apology, of course, never came in the lifetime of the administration which had been involved.

June 17, 2015 Posted by | False Flag Terrorism, Timeless or most popular, War Crimes | , , | 2 Comments

Prominent counter-insurgency general sued over N. Ireland killing

RT | April 28, 2015

The British Army’s most prominent and decorated counter-insurgent, who helped suppress anti-colonial rebellions in Ireland, Malaya and Kenya, is being sued by the family of a man killed by Irish loyalist paramilitaries in 1973.

General Frank Kitson, now in his late 80s, is accused of negligence, misfeasance in office and breaching Article 2 of the European Convention of Human Rights (ECHR) over the death in the early 1970’s of Eugene Heenan.

Heenan, a construction worker, was killed in east Belfast after a Loyalist threw a grenade into a packed minibus in which he was a passenger.

Heenan’s widow, Mary, is bringing the legal action against Kitson.

As well as being a career soldier, Kitson drew on his vast experience of irregular warfare to author several books on the subject of counter-insurgency and is held to be one of the leading theorists on the subject.

Solicitor Kevin Winters of KRW Law, heading Mary Heenan’s legal team, told the Guardian : “This week we have issued proceedings against the MoD [Ministry of Defence] and Frank Kitson on behalf of our clients, the relatives of Patrick Heenan.

“These are civil proceedings for damages but their core value is to obtain truth and accountability for our clients as to the role of the British Army and Frank Kitson in the counter-insurgency operation in the north of Ireland during the early part of the conflict.”

The case hinges on Kitson’s alleged role in the engagement by security forces of local loyalist militias to meet British strategic aims to contain and disrupt republican groups like the IRA.

Winters also cited elements of Kitson’s own seminal work on counter-insurgency, saying that “manipulation of the rule of law, infiltration and subversion” were tactics which were all “core to the Kitson military of doctrine endorsed by the British Army and the British government at the time.”

The Kitson doctrine also inspired the creation the controversial Military Reaction Force (MRF), a Northern Ireland-based unit of urban Special Forces soldier which operated in Ireland during the 1970s.

The MRF has since been accused of carrying out a number of killings – including civilian bystanders.

While former soldier and loyalist paramilitary Albert Baker was given a life sentence for the murder of Heenan, he later claimed to have links with UK intelligence services.

Mary Heenan’s legal team argue Kitson is liable for the death due to the role of his command and influence in the incident which killed Heenan.

The legal action will be the first in a series by families affected by the actions of loyalist militias during the period.

The Kitson case would be the first which attempted to hold a senior officer individually accountable for a death during the Troubles.

In a statement the MOD said: “The Ministry of Defence has received no official notification of this case, nor are we aware of any evidence which would support the allegations.”

April 28, 2015 Posted by | War Crimes | , , | Leave a comment

London bombing ~ 7/7 Crime and Prejudice

7/7: Crime and Prejudice from Tom Secker on Vimeo.

77Archive

The most comprehensive documentary on 7/7 questions and conspiracy theories. 7/7: Crime and Prejudice explores the 7/7 cold case via new evidence from the recent inquests and discusses the war on terror in the context of numerous miscarriages of justice and acts of violence committed by the state.

The first section of the film examines the history of the British state’s use of double agents, from the Victorian Anarchists through WW2 to the war in Northern Ireland. It concludes by examining contemporary cases of injustice and violence carried out as part of the war of terror against Muslims.

The second section of the film is a multi-dimensional study of the new evidence made available at the recent inquests. It looks at the evidence of a wider conspiracy and the fundamental flaws in the official narrative and the police investigation. It also discusses why the dialogue about ‘intelligence failures’ itself fails to address the very real possibility of state involvement in the attacks.

The final section of the film returns to the Anarchists and the case of Martial Bourdin, Britain’s first suicide bomber, in 1894. The mythology surrounding Bourdin is used as a foundation for examining the numerous films, tv shows training exercises and real life events that either predicted 7/7 or were influenced by the attacks. The question of conspiracy theories is addressed through an original analysis unique to this film.

7/7 Crime and Prejudice combines a presentation of the cutting edge of July 7th research with a deeply contextual analysis that casts light on largely unexamined aspects of the war on terror.

For further information about 7/7 please visit the website of the July 7th Truth Campaign and their dedicated 7/7 Inquests blog:

http://julyseventh.co.uk/

http://77inquests.blogspot.com/

March 9, 2015 Posted by | Deception, False Flag Terrorism, Timeless or most popular, Video | , , | 2 Comments

A short history of British torture

ICC | December 2005

When the House of Commons was debating how much to increase the time limit for detention without trial the question of torture came up. Officially this was limited to the nice considerations of whether it was all right to send people to places where torture is used and whether Britain can use information collected by the use of torture in other countries. This discussion gave an impression of democratic Britain as the home of civilised behaviour where the very idea of torture is repugnant to our legislators – unlike, say, the US with its secret CIA jails and where Cheney has been labelled the ‘Vice President for Torture’. In reality, the British state has a long history of using and developing a whole range of torture techniques.

Interrogation in Northern Ireland

Between 1971 and 1975 more than 2000 people were interned without trial by the state in Northern Ireland. Picked up without having any charges laid, or knowing when they were going to be released, detainees were subject to all sorts of treatments, some coming under the heading of ‘interrogation in depth’. Apart from prolonged sessions of oppressive questioning, serious threats, wrist bending, choking and beatings, there were instances of internees being forced to run naked over broken glass and being thrown, tied and hooded, out of helicopters a few feet above the ground. The ‘five techniques’ at the centre of the interrogators’ work were: sensory deprivation through being hooded (often while naked); being forced to stand against walls (sometimes for over 20 hours and even for more than 40); being subjected to continuous noise (from machinery such as generators or compressors for periods of up to 6 or 7 days); deprivation of food and water; sleep deprivation for periods of up to week. Relays of interrogation teams were used against the victims.

The British state tried to discredit reports of torture. Stories were fed to the media about injuries being self-inflicted – “one hard-line Provisional was given large whiskies and a box of king-size cigarettes for punching himself in both eyes” (Daily Telegraph, 31/10/77). There were indeed instances of self-harm, but these were either suicide attempts or done with the hope of being transferred to hospital accommodation.

Then the press said that any measures were justified if they helped to ‘prevent violence’. They contrasted “ripping out fingernails, beating people with steel rods and applying electric shocks to their genitalia” (Daily Telegraph 3/9/76), examples of “outright brutality”, with the measures used in Northern Ireland.

In 1978 the European Court of Human Rights said that the techniques Britain had used caused “intense physical and mental suffering and … acute psychiatric disturbance”, but that while this was “inhuman and degrading treatment” it didn’t amount to torture. This was a victory for the British state because it was keen to use means that would cause the maximum distress to the victim with the minimum external evidence. They had been previously referred to the European Court over torture in Cyprus, but in fact British interrogators had been using various combinations of the ‘five techniques’ for a long time. When the army and RUC approached Northern Ireland’s Prime Minister, Brian Faulkner, for formal approval “They told him that the ‘in-depth’ techniques they planned to use were those the army had used … many times before when Britain was faced with insurgencies in her colonies, including Palestine, Malaya, Kenya, Cyprus, the British Cameroons, Brunei, British Guyana, Aden, Borneo, Malaysia and the Persian Gulf” (Provos The IRA and Sinn Fein Peter Taylor).

By any means deemed necessary

British intervention in the Malayan ‘emergency’ in the 1950s has been held up as a model of suppression and ‘counter-insurgency’. Apart from the camps established, the murder squads, use of rigid food controls, burning down villages and the imposition of emergency regulations, the use of torture was an integral part of British operations. With 650,000 people uprooted and ‘resettled’ in New Villages, or put in concentration camps, there was also a programme of ‘re-education’.

British action in Kenya in the 1950s also showed what British civilisation was prepared to do. At various times over 90,000 ‘suspects’ were imprisoned, in either detention camps or ‘protected villages’. At one point Nairobi (population 110,000) was emptied, with 16,500 then detained and 2,500 expelled to reserves. Assaults and violence, often to the point of death, were extensive. As in Malaya, ‘rehabilitation’ was one of the goals of the operation. More than 1000 people were hanged, using a mobile gallows that was taken round the country. Overall, maybe 100-150,000 died through exhaustion, disease, starvation and systematic brutality.

Recent revelations in The Guardian (12/11/5) concerned a secret torture centre, the “London Cage”, that operated between July 1940 and September 1948. Three houses in Kensington were used to interrogate some 3500 German officers, soldiers and civilians. Still in use for three years after the end of the war, interrogation included beatings, being forced to stand to attention for up to 26 hours, threats of execution or unnecessary surgery, starvation, sleep deprivation, dousings with cold water etc. “In one complaint lodged at the National Archives, a 27-year-old German journalist being held at this camp said he had spent two years as a prisoner of the Gestapo. And not once, he said, did they treat him as badly as the British.”

No exceptions

There is a continuity in the British state’s actions. The Lieutenant Colonel in charge of the ‘London Cage’ received an OBE for his interrogation work in the First World War. In the 1950s there were reports of Britain experimenting with drugs, surgery and torture with a view to designing techniques that would be effective but look harmless. In the 1970s thousands of army officers and senior civil servants were trained to use psychological techniques for security purposes. Inevitably, the truth about current activities is not in the public domain.

In general, British democracy has been better than others at concealing the brutal way its state functions. Anything that is exposed is denied or dismissed as being an isolated excess. In France the extensive use of torture in the war in Algeria was publicised as part of a battle between different factions of the colonial aparatus. Victims had hoses inserted in their mouths and their stomachs filled with water, electrodes were put on genitals, heads were immersed in water. During the Battle of Algiers 3-4000 people ‘disappeared’: fatal victims of French torture techniques.

Although France, and more recently the US in Iraq and Guantanamo Bay, have been less successful than Britain in keeping their actions under wraps, all these “democracies” use the most brutal methods of interrogation and detention. They also learn from each other’s activities, most notably in Vietnam, where the US drew on British experience in Malaya as much as earlier French experience in Indo-China.

Source

January 1, 2014 Posted by | Civil Liberties, Subjugation - Torture, Timeless or most popular | , , , , , , | 3 Comments

UK army unit admits killing policy in 1970s N Ireland

Press TV – November 21, 2013

New revelations show an undercover unit of the British army was sanctioned to carry out a shoot-to-kill policy in Belfast, the capital of Northern Ireland, in the 1970s during conflicts known as the Troubles.

The Troubles refers to the violent thirty-year ethno-nationalist conflict that began in Northern Ireland with a civil rights march in Londonderry on October 5, 1968, and came to an end with the Good Friday Agreement on 10 April 1998. The constitutional status of Northern Ireland is said to be at the heart of the conflict, which spilled over into England, the Republic of Ireland and even into parts of Europe.

The UK army unit, dubbed the Military Reaction Force (MRF), admitted for the first time that they had killed an unspecified number of Irish Republic Army (IRA) members regardless of them being armed or not.

Former members of the MRF made the confession to the BBC’s Panorama programme, saying that they had been tasked with “hunting down” the IRA in west Belfast and that they observed no laws in commissioning their mission.

The MRF, which was disbanded in late 1972, had also killed unarmed people on the street in drive-by shootings without any independent evidence showing they were part of the IRA.

“We were not there to act like an army unit, we were there to act like a terror group,” said one former soldier.

The force comprised about 40 men hand-picked from across the British army who operated in west Belfast for an 18-month period between 1971 and 1973, including all through 1972.

“The ex-members said their elite status meant they didn’t believe military regulations against opening fire unless their lives were in immediate danger applied to them,” said the report.

The revelations come as the families of victims in the conflict said they are outraged by Northern Ireland Attorney General John Larkin’s proposal to end the Troubles-related prosecutions.

The offer was made irrespective of the fact that more than 3,000 deaths are being investigated by detectives from the Historical Enquiries Team (HET) as part of the peace process.

November 21, 2013 Posted by | Civil Liberties, Subjugation - Torture, Timeless or most popular, War Crimes | , , , , , , | Comments Off on UK army unit admits killing policy in 1970s N Ireland

To Become A Jew…

A Loyalist from Northern Ireland becomes Jewish, he plans to move to Israel and settle and start a new life. He exclaims that Palestine was a “political invention” and tells Palestinians who have lived there their whole life “you have had a nice holiday, time to go home”. This is an extremely valid argument as this man has never set foot on the Land of Israel or Palestine. This Snippet was taken from the BBC documentary called Shalom Belfast.

Gilad Atzmon comments:

We are not dealing here with Jewish race or gene. Taking on the Jewish religion in this case introduces a set of supremacist non ethical beliefs. This is what Jewishness is all about.

October 27, 2013 Posted by | Ethnic Cleansing, Racism, Zionism, Timeless or most popular, Video | , , , , , , | 2 Comments

Northern Ireland all set for G8 police state

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Press TV – June 14, 2013

British police are preparing one of their most unprecedented security operations, involving water cannons and summary hearings, for next week’s G8 summit in Northern Ireland.

Police Service of Northern Ireland district commander Chief Superintendent Pauline Shields said more than 8,000 officers are being dispatched to Northern Ireland to help local police in the security operations.

The arrangements include a daunting four-mile security fence around the Lough Erne Golf Resort that will host the summit on Monday and Tuesday next week, while another barbed wire barrier is being set up outside the area.

The police have also deployed several mobile water cannons to frighten off potential protesters with a seven-mile area of the Lough Erne lake itself being closed down and patrolled by police boats.

“I would say the scale of the G8 in Northern Ireland is the biggest operation that the Police Service of Northern Ireland has ever had to deal with and probably as big as any police service throughout the UK would have dealt with,” Shields said.

This comes as she dismissed concerns that the police are gearing up a heavy-handed response to any protests outside the summit venue.

Police say they have made 260 extra prison cells available in nearby Omagh, Country Tyrone, and in the Northern Irish capital of Belfast, while sixteen judges will be on standby to hold summary hearings for arrested demonstrators.

But Shields claimed the measures are only meant to “facilitate” peaceful protests.

“We will have a policing operation in place that will facilitate peaceful protest…. We believe there may be a small minority of people who may be intent on causing disorder – we would ask people to abide by the law and if they break the law, then we will be in a position to deal robustly with them,” she said.

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June 14, 2013 Posted by | Civil Liberties, Full Spectrum Dominance | , , | Comments Off on Northern Ireland all set for G8 police state

UN lashes out at Britain’s human rights record

RT | June 2, 2013

The UN’s torture watchdog has hit out at the British government for human rights abuses. In its harshest criticism yet of the British government, the panel warned that urgent action is needed for the country to meet international standards.

The UN Committee against Torture focused on human rights abuses during the so-called war on terror and the mistreatment of prisoners in British custody in Iraq. It also flagged up some 40 separate incidents on which the UK government must act.

The findings highlighted the British governments actions following 9/11 and the commission urged the British government to quickly establish an inquiry into whether detainees held overseas were ill-treated or tortured by British officials.

The report reads that the committee is “deeply concerned at the growing number of serious allegations of torture and ill-treatment, as a result of the state party’s military interventions in Afghanistan and Iraq.”

The UN team also slammed what they called “an escape clause” in the Criminal Justice Act (1988), which allows British officials to escape prosecution for inflicting severe pain or suffering if they can show that they had “lawful authority, justification or excuse” for doing so.

Another legal loophole the committee voiced concern about is the Intelligence Services Act (1994), which effectively insures that intelligence officers cannot be prosecuted within the UK once a warrant giving them lawful authority has been signed by a government minister.

The panel was disappointed at the failure to date to prosecute anyone for the torture of Iraqi prisoners and in particular the failure to convict anyone for the murder of Baha Mousa who died in British custody in 2003. Only one soldier received a one-year sentence for admitting inhumane treatment.

There was also concern with the government’s planned introduction of secret court procedures in July for issues that may affect national security under the Justice and Security Act. Closed Material Procedures as they are known make it easier to use hearsay evidence or evidence obtained through torture, the committee maintains. The system of Special Advocates – lawyers who are vetted and chosen by the government – “have a very limited ability to conduct a cross-examination and cannot discuss full content of confidential materials with their client thus undermining the right to a fair trial,” the report reads.

The watchdog also urged the UK government to halt the deportation of failed asylum seekers to Sri Lanka. The deportation of failed Tamil asylum seekers has led to their torture or ill-treatment on return and the UK government hasn’t changed its policy on the issue despite a ruling by the High Court in February ordering them to suspend deportations.

The government was criticized in its handling of the case of Shaker Aamer, the last remaining UK resident in Guantanamo. The committee regretted that despite the “best endeavors” of the UK to try and get him released “there are no encouraging signs of this happening soon”.

There were also accusations against the UK government on several issues connected with Northern Ireland. The Northern Irish justice system must abolish all non-jury trials the report concludes, adding that historical investigations into past misconduct, particularly of military officials, must not be delayed or suspended.

The committee asked that police officers only use tasers when they face “a real and immediate threat to life or risk or serious injury”.

There was also unease that the age of criminal responsibility in England, Wales and Northern Ireland has not been raised from 10-years, despite calls by more than 50 organizations for this to be done.

Further concerns were raised about the steady increase of the prison population over the past decade and the problem of overcrowding. To help rectify the issue the committee urged the government make wider use of non-custodial sentences.

In a further blow, committee members accused the UK delegation of being evasive when questioned about Britain’s human rights record during a two-day hearing in Geneva last month.

The British government was given a year to explain how it could improve its human rights record in 4 key areas: overseas torture, getting Shaker Aamer out of Guantanamo, stopping the forced deportation of Sri Lanka asylum seekers and setting up inquiries into past abuses in Northern Ireland.

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June 2, 2013 Posted by | Civil Liberties, Subjugation - Torture, War Crimes | , , , , , | Comments Off on UN lashes out at Britain’s human rights record

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