BRITAIN: Detention without charge legalised

On March 12, the House of Lords passed new terror laws that allow for the imposition of house arrest, electronic tagging and curfews on people who have not been charged with any crime. In its first draft, which was massively defeated on March 5 by the Tories, the Liberals and 21 rebel Labour peers, the bill would have allowed the home secretary to impose such control orders on terror suspects, but it was modified to ensure only the judiciary could impose the orders. The new laws were motivated by a December Law Lords decision that the indefinite imprisonment without trial of 11 foreign terror suspects was illegal. Although the Tories had initially wanted the orders to be based on "a reasonable balance of probabilities" that the suspect was involved in terrorist activity and a one-year sunset clause, they accepted a review in a year's time, and that the orders could be based on mere suspicion of involvement in terrorist activity.

From Green Left Weekly, March 16, 2005.

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From GLW issue 619