NationStates Jolt Archive

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/opinion/main.jhtml?xml=/opinion/2006/08/20/do2006.xml&sSheet=/opinion/2006/08/20/ixopinion.html

It would appear that torture worked in this case. Contrary to the opinions of the so-called "experts" on this forum.

It would also appear that the Law Lords in the UK approve of this use of torture to obtain information.

It's fine with me. I'm wondering what the reaction of the UK people on NS General is to this policy.

If the allegation that the Pakistanis tortured Rashid Rauf turns out to be true, should we be grateful? Rauf is claimed to be one of the ring-leaders in the alleged plot to blow up at least five passenger jets over the Atlantic.

The information he is reported to have given to the Pakistan police was passed on to the authorities here, and is said to have been critical to the British police raids of 10 days ago. But Asma Jehangir, of the Pakistan Human Rights Commission, says "there is simply no doubt… no doubt at all" that Rauf was tortured to persuade him to reveal the information. No torture might have meant no information: and maybe five or more planes brought down.

A curious ambivalence runs through official, and non-official, reactions to torture. Everyone is relieved if a terrorist plot is foiled, and most people think it would be wrong if the Government refused to act on life-saving information, even if the intelligence might have been obtained by torture.

The Law Lords gave sanction to that reaction last December, when they ruled that the Government and its agents are entitled to use intelligence obtained by inflicting pain to frustrate terrorist attacks. One of their lordships summed it up succinctly: the Government "cannot be expected to close its eyes to information [obtained by torture] at the price of endangering the lives of its own citizens. Moral repugnance at torture does not require this".

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/opinion/main.jhtml?xml=/opinion/2006/08/20/do2006.xml&sSheet=/opinion/2006/08/20/ixopinion.html

It would appear that torture worked in this case. Contrary to the opinions of the so-called "experts" on this forum.

It would also appear that the Law Lords in the UK approve of this use of torture to obtain information.

It's fine with me. I'm wondering what the reaction of the UK people on NS General is to this policy.*sits back and waits... *
http://www.world-of-smilies.com/html/images/smilies/sonstige/popc.gif

There is already considerable doubt being cast on the information gained from Mr. Rauf. So, this isn't really a good example for you pro-torture folks to draw from.

1. Torturing has been proven to be scientifically useless. A person being tortured is highly likely to admit to what they have been accused of so that the torture will stop, even if they have not done it. If they are being tortured for information about a criminal (such as a terrorist), they are likely to give false, useless, and potentially very dangerous inforamtion in order to stop the torture.

2. If you lower yourself to someone's level, you are as bad as them.

3. Two wrongs don't make a right.

There is already considerable doubt being cast on the information gained from Mr. Rauf. So, this isn't really a good example for you pro-torture folks to draw from.
Yep. And what's more important is that even if torture worked in this one case--a subject still very open to debate--that doesn't make it any more moral, regardless of what the House of Lords says about it.

I'm disappointed by the lack of graphic details on the methods used. *Hannibal Lecter-stare*

It would appear that torture worked in this case.
You get that from this:


If the allegation that the Pakistanis tortured Rashid Rauf turns out to be true, should we be grateful? Rauf is claimed to be one of the ring-leaders in the alleged plot to blow up at least five passenger jets over the Atlantic.

The information he is reported to have given to the Pakistan police was passed on to the authorities here, and is said to have been critical to the British police raids of 10 days ago. But Asma Jehangir, of the Pakistan Human Rights Commission, says "there is simply no doubt… no doubt at all" that Rauf was tortured to persuade him to reveal the information. No torture might have meant no information: and maybe five or more planes brought down.....

Real concrete case there.

Oh, and by the way, it has never been beyond the British authorities to use false confessions, forced confessions or just invented evidence to back up their terrorist assertions.

See the Birmingham Six, Guilford Four, Maguire Seven cases.

The House of Lords is a dead judicial authority.

Incidently, do you have a BBC link for this judgement?

They're (apart from Channel 4 news) the only vaguely acceptable, and believeble, news organisation in the UK.

I would also be pleased to see a direct link to the HoL ruling.

Frankly, I cannot believe, without evidence, that a group of judges who disallowed indefinite imprisonment of suspects would allow the use of torture.

"UK law does not, under any interpretation, allow torture or people to be transported to places where they will be tortured. The Law Lords, in the same judgment in which they said the Government could use the fruits of torture to prevent mass murder, insisted that no evidence obtained by it could be admissible in a British court."

I hardly call that "approving of torture." Deep Kimchi, please, learn to read, or at least realise that the rest of us aren't illiterate. In any case, the ECHR has been very clear on torture: It is banned.

wow I've travelled back to 1605 "get those pesky catholic terrorists especially that Guy Fawkes who been evading arrest".....:eek: history repeats itself!

"UK law does not, under any interpretation, allow torture or people to be transported to places where they will be tortured. The Law Lords, in the same judgment in which they said the Government could use the fruits of torture to prevent mass murder, insisted that no evidence obtained by it could be admissible in a British court."

I hardly call that "approving of torture." Deep Kimchi, please, learn to read. In any case, the ECHR has been very clear on torture: It is banned.

In fact, I would say with 100% certainty that the Lords who wrote that entirely despise torture and feel it has no place in a civilised legal system, purely based on that quote.

Wake up Kimchi, and learn to read.

What they've said is basically 'use torrture all you want if you think it will help, but don't expect it to get you anywhere"

Fucking trolls.

I hardly call that "approving of torture." Deep Kimchi, please, learn to read, or at least realise that the rest of us aren't illiterate.

Wake up Kimchi, and learn to read.
Kimchi knows how to read. He counts on people not doing so and simply accepting his version of events. That's why he's easily the most dishonest poster around here.

Is there another link? It doesn't work for me. From what was posted though it is simply one guy's opinion that torture was used. They don't know anything.

What they've said is basically 'use torrture all you want if you think it will help, but don't expect it to get you anywhere"

Fucking trolls.

What the Lords basically said was "there are countries out there who torture - the UK is still strictly banned from it - and sometimes in a blue moon something gleaned from it could help foil a plot; the government is not banned from acting on that information to foil the plot, but the government may basically not use that information for anything else, and that includes use it as evidence or basis for warrants, and may not in any form be complicit in the torture having occurred."

"Approve of torture" my ass.

What the Lords basically said was "there are countries out there who torture - the UK is still strictly banned from it - and sometimes in a blue moon something gleaned from it could help foil a plot; the government is not banned from acting on that information to foil the plot, but the government may basically not use that information for anything else, and that includes use it as evidence or basis for warrants, and may not in any form be complicit in the torture having occurred."

"Approve of torture" my ass.

Exactly.