The suspects in question were arrested in Operation Pathway last year, which was described as stopping a “very big terrorist plot” by then prime minister Gordon Brown. No evidence was found to be able to prosecute any of the eleven people arrested though.
This has led to legal limbo where the state still sees these men as a threat. Pressure is being put on the new Tory and Lib Dem government to continue Labour’s control order regime, effectively placing the two remaining suspects who have not been successfully deported to Pakistan under permanent house arrest, even though they opposed it in opposition.
Ming Campbell QC MP was on Question Time praising the “integrity of the process” which had led to the conclusion whereby the men could not be deported. “Integrity” was a strange word to use about a process coming after the normal legal avenues of evidence, charges and trial have been exhausted. The Special Immigration Appeals Commission is a secret court hearing secret evidence which the accused does not have access to.
Labour’s justificication of the control order regime is that it is a necessary measure for people who cannot be prosecuted. I feel very uncomfortable hearing words like this. Placing people under house arrest because the state does not have evidence to put someone on trial and get a conviction doesn't sound fair. Ironically, this "evidence" may include material gained from torture in places like Pakistan.
Furthermore, given the wideranging anti-terrorism offences that have been brought in over the last few years, the government have to explain how after you have trawled through the home, workplace, computers, emails, phone records and reading materials of an “Al-Qaeda operative”, that there’s nothing you can prosecute over.
There has been very little comment on the Islamic Republic of Pakistan torturing its own people. In the same week the state banned Facebook because of people organising a “Draw Muhammad Day” on it. A better way or honouring the Prophet would surely be to uphold basic human dignity. Disappointingly, there doesn't seem appetite amongst the Pakistani diaspora to take this issue up.






