Here we have the three Ds – destitution, detention and, finally, deportation
By Yasmin Alibhai-Brown
(source: The Independent)
Last week a British ship returned from Brazil after it was found to be carrying 1,400 tons of noxious waste to be dumped there. The Environment Agency says the UK does not allow the transfer of volatile rubbish to pollute poorer nations. That is the official position. The truth is that it still happens unless there is a furore, as there was with the Brazilian authorities. Sending thorny problems abroad is a long and hearty tradition. In the glory days of empire, subject nations were used and misused to sustain the industrial might of the ruling power. Troublesome people too were banished to distant shores.
From the late 18th century prisoners – many innocent or guilty only of trivial offences against the rich – were pushed off to Australia. Today, our declared56has led to suspects – including British citizens – being held and tortured in Middle Eastern prisons, and many Muslims who have been tried in our courts and acquitted are forcibly returned to their countries of origin. Nobody cares. All Muslims are, these days, assumed to have anti-western toxins coursing in their hot blood.
On the day the ship came back from Brazil, two Pakistani men studying in Britain went back home to face an uncertain future. They were among the 12 students arrested in Liverpool and Manchester by the security services who claimed the men were planning an al-Qai’da bombing spree in the UK. It was a spectacular round-up which delivered no convictions. Not one of the men arrested was charged. The evidence presented against them was laughably flimsy, except no one is laughing. Instead of being released, however, they were returned to the cells and told they would be sent packing. Why? "Visa irregularities," apparently. Some tried to appeal against the decision, but most have given up the battle. Held without charge for over 140 days so far, they have to agree to leave or forcibly be put on planes.
Honourable chaps like David Miliband, Jack Straw and Gordon Brown make stirring speeches on the rule of law and ethical conduct. Unofficially, the policy of D&D – detain and deport– is now used as a matter of course to rid the country of targeted Muslims whether guilty or patently innocent. (You could even say that the return of al-Megrahi to Libya has stopped a public inquiry and the mess that might have spilled out.) I have no problems with the removal of proven villains. The notorious Omar Bakri was packed off to the Lebanon and is thankfully no longer inciting hatred here, and the Law Lords have ruled that Abu Qatada, another firebrand cleric, can be sent back to Jordan which has been seeking his extradition. But when D&D is used as a matter of course by politicians and our security agencies against those they cannot nail, it is both vindictive and immoral.
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