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UN initiative to protect schools in war zones vetoed by Britain

RT | February 9, 2016

Britain has refused to sign up to a UN agreement on protecting schools in wartime, which has been signed by 51 states, despite the fact it was drawn up by a former UK military officer.

The agreement was championed by the UN children’s fund UNICEF to protect schools from attack during conflicts. It aimed to set out a “safe schools declaration” and provide guidelines for military forces.

However, it was reported on Tuesday by the Telegraph newspaper that Foreign Secretary Phillip Hammond had effectively vetoed the move after having opposed it as head of two government departments.

Already signed by 51 nations, the initiative was developed in response to deadly attacks on schools in Syria and Yemen.

In a statement on Monday, Amnesty International senior crisis advisor Lama Fakih reported how schools were being targeted with deadly effect in Yemen, where a Sunni/Shia proxy war is currently being fought with Saudi and Iranian backing.

“The Saudi Arabia-led coalition launched a series of unlawful airstrikes on schools being used for educational – not for military – purposes, a flagrant violation of the laws of war,” she wrote.

“Schools are central to civilian life, they are meant to offer a safe space for children. Yemen’s young school pupils are being forced to pay the price for these attacks,” she added.

It was hoped Britain would be a leading voice in the campaign to protect schoolchildren and schools after the high-profile campaign against sexual violence in warzones led by Phillip Hammond’s predecessor William Hague and movie star Angelina Jolie.

But Britain, like the other permanent members of the UN Security Council, did not sign up.

It is rumored that the Ministry of Defence (MoD) and Foreign Office have been put off by fears of litigation given the volume of cases brought against the military for alleged crimes in the Iraq and Afghan occupations.

Initially it appears that of the three government departments whose support was needed only the MoD – then under Hammond – was resisting, while the Department for International Development (DFID) and Hague’s Foreign Office were supportive.

Hammond’s subsequent shift from defense to the Foreign Office is felt to have poisoned both the military and diplomatic ministries against the initiative, despite the fact the agreement was drawn up by a former British naval officer.

Steven Haines, who drew up the British military rulebook for the 2003 Iraq invasion, is now a professor of international law at the University of Greenwich.

He told the Telegraph of his disappointment at the government’s response to his proposals.

“The stumbling block was Philip Hammond at Defence,” he said.

“It’s very frustrating.

“There’s no way that I was going to draft something that would embarrass the British government.”

The declaration, which was launched in Norway in 2015, commits governments to six guidelines including one which prevents military forces for using from using active schools as military bases.

It was thought that if Britain signed up then its role as a trainer of foreign troops would help to engender respect for schools and schoolchildren among military forces globally.

A Foreign Office spokesman defended the move, telling the paper that while they “support the spirit of the initiative, we have concerns that the Guidelines do not mirror the exact language and content of International Humanitarian Law.

“Therefore the UK, along with several other countries, was not able to sign the Safe Schools Declaration in Oslo in May 2015,” the spokesman said.

Britain’s concern about future legal cases may spring from its controversial military support for regional ally Saudi Arabia in the Gulf theocracy’s war in Yemen.

That support has included both material backing, in the form of weapons and munitions traded by UK arms firms subject to government license, and the presence of British military personnel as advisors to the Saudi military.

The UK government maintains the military advisors are present in Saudi headquarters to ensure international law is followed.

February 9, 2016 Posted by | Militarism, War Crimes | , , , , , | Leave a comment

Foreign Secretary refused to intervene for Brit rendered to Ethiopia

Reprieve | January 25, 2015

The Foreign Secretary refused to contact the Ethiopian government to protest its abduction of a British man, it’s emerged, despite warnings from Foreign Office (FCO) staff that the man was at risk of execution.

Andargachew ‘Andy’ Tsege, a father of three from London, was abducted in Yemen and rendered to Ethiopia seven months ago today. Mr Tsege, who is a prominent critic of the Ethiopian government, remains in incommunicado detention. The Ethiopian government has refused to reveal his whereabouts, or confirm whether it plans to carry out a death sentence imposed in absentia in 2009.

Internal FCO emails obtained through subject access requests by Mr Tsege’s family show that UK officials were extremely concerned that he would be mistreated or executed – but that despite this, nearly a month after the incident, the Foreign Secretary declined requests to intervene in his case.

An internal email sent by senior FCO staff several days after Mr Tsege’s disappearance says: “I think we should be aiming for a Ministerial call asap, given concerns about welfare and the DP [death penalty]… we should be raising at senior levels and getting in Ministerial follow-up (letter or call) asap to make clear how unhappy we are about this.”

A separate message suggested there should be consequences at “a UK citizen being kidnapped and returned against his will to a country which has passed two death sentences on him. A country which is in receipt of vast quantities of UK development assistance. Don’t we need to do more than give them a stern talking to?”

A number of urgent internal FCO messages asked the incoming Foreign Secretary Phillip Hammond to contact the Ethiopian Foreign Minister in the days following the incident, the documents show. However, Mr Hammond’s office rebuffed the requests, saying: “we’ve also had a request from [Foreign Minister] Tedros’ office for an introductory call with the Foreign Secretary, but I don’t think we are going to be able to find time for that at the moment. […] On this letter, I’m nervous about asking the Foreign Secretary to sign something so negative in his first correspondence”.

The FCO has told lawyers for Mr Tsege’s family at human rights charity Reprieve that the UK Government has no grounds to challenge the legality of his removal from Ethiopia.

Maya Foa, director of Reprieve’s death penalty team, said: “It is clear that those working for the Foreign Secretary know how perilous the situation is for Andy Tsege. They know that Andy has committed no crime, that his extradition was probably unlawful, and that there are grave risks to his safety. What’s shocking is that the Foreign Secretary appears time and time again to have blocked any meaningful action that could potentially bring this British father home to his family, unharmed. Andy has now been held in solitary and incommunicado detention for over seven months, under sentence of death. One has to question what interests the Foreign Secretary is putting above the life and safety of his citizen, when all those around him are calling for him to do more.”

January 25, 2015 Posted by | Full Spectrum Dominance | , , , | 2 Comments