Chapter 11
THE LEGAL APPARATUS OF TOTALITARIANISM
11.1 Integration
11.2 UK Mental Health Laws
11.3 Abolition of Juries and Arbitrary Detention
11.4 Expanding the Definition of 'Terrorism'
11.5 Surveillance Legislation
11.6 The Ruling Class Above the Law
'war hysteria is continuous and universal in all countries, and such
acts as raping, looting, the slaughter of children, the reduction of
whole populations to slavery, and reprisals against prisoners which
extend even to boiling and burying alive, are looked upon as normal,
and, when they are committed by one's own side and not by the enemy,
meritorious.' -George Orwell,
1984, part 2, chapter 9
The War on Terror is the chosen pretext for the global integration
of police, intelligence and military functions. Since 9/11, there
has been a global attack on civil liberties and a race to set up the
international technological infrastructure for a high-tech feudal
society. Governments across the world are promoting the idea that
society must militarize itself in order to be free from terror, i.e.
abandon moral convictions, sweep aside distinctions between foreign
and domestic threats, and even the distinction between terrorism and
ordinary crime.
When a country is at war, their is no atrocity it
will not justify in the name of victory. Once the legal and
technological apparatus of totalitarianism is established, there
exists the very real prospect of a permanent planetary dictatorship
where human existence is micro-managed from cloud cuckoo land by a
tiny ruling elite who are themselves above the law.
11.1 INTEGRATION
The European globalists seized upon the Madrid train bombing of 11
March 2004 to push forward key areas of E.U. judicial and security
integration. Brussels responded with a 'counter-terrorism summit'
which drafted 57 proposals on criminal justice, security, and
terrorism. Britain had hitherto been reluctant to surrender judicial
powers to Brussels, but following the summit, Whitehall signaled
that the Government was preparing to drop its veto over important
areas of judicial cooperation. (1)
These included many proposals
which were
already on the table in Brussels:
-
The establishment of an E.U.
intelligence agency and E.U. security coordinator
-
an E.U. database
of forensic material; the logging of all telecommunications
-
tracking all air travel in and out and within the E.U. (effectively
an E.U. version of the U.S.'s controversial PNR, CAPPS II and
US-VISIT plans)
-
the fingerprinting of nearly everyone in the E.U.
by the introduction of biometric passports and ID cards for citizens
and the same for resident third country nationals
-
the development
of the Schengen Information System (SIS) and Visa Information
Systems (VIS) to store the new identification and visa data
-
simplification of procedures for exchange of information - including
personal information such as DNA, fingerprints and visa data -
between intelligence and law enforcement agencies.(2)
An analysis by StateWatch of London, concluded that 27 of the 57
proposals had little or nothing to do with tackling terrorism.
11.2 MENTAL HEALTH LAWS
The U.K. Government is moving to expand the use of mental health
laws to control the wider population. The draft Mental health Bill
published in June 2002, included plans to force mentally ill people
living in the community to take their medication and proposals to
detain dangerous people with severe personality disorders even if
they have not committed a crime.(3) 'Serious personality disorder'
has no medical diagnosis.
The Joint House of Commons and House of
Lords Committee on Human Rights have serious reservations about some
aspects of the draft:
1)The compulsory detention of people for the
protection of others when the people detained have never been
charged with any criminal offence;
2) the breadth of circumstances
in which a patient could be subjected to compulsory, non consensual
treatment;
3) that part of current laws which prevents detention 'by
reason of promiscuity or other immoral conduct, sexual deviancy or
dependence on drugs or alcohol' has been omitted from the Bill.
The
committee warned that Nazi Germany and the U.S.S.R. were probably
not the only countries in which socially or politically unacceptable
behaviour was regarded as a manifestation of a 'disorder of the
mind'. (4)
In the U.S., Missouri dentist Charles Sell has waited in a federal
prison for more than four years for trial on charges of Medicaid
fraud. The delay is attributed to the Government's persistent
argument that Sell is not mentally competent to stand trial unless
he is forcibly drugged. He is, they say, suffering from delusions
because he thought there was a Government effort to cover up his
personal knowledge of the its culpability in the 1993 deaths at the
Branch Davidian land near Waco, Texas. The state has diagnosed Sell
as having what it calls a 'delusional disorder'.
As an Army
Reservist called up to serve as an expert in forensic dentistry, Dr.
Sell was on the scene the day of the tragic fire. Other issues
include accusations of Dr. Sell using politically incorrect swear
words. The Government wants to make him competent by forcefully
giving him powerful medicine. Dr. Sell doesn't want to be medicated
since he's had bad reactions to similar drugs in the past. Also, one
of the medicines that the Government might want to use on him is an
experimental medicine that could kill him.(5)(6)
The twentieth century's most tyrannical regimes pioneered the use of
psychiatric 'treatment' against political dissidents. Vladimir Bukovsky spent 12 years in Soviet prisons and psychiatric hospitals
due to his outspoken opposition to communism.(7)
Wherever manifestations of dissidence couldn't be explained
away as a legacy of the past, they were viewed as mental illness.
One leading psychiatrist had incarcerated thousands of sane men in
lunatic asylums on orders from the KGB. Drugs were administered as
punishment for anti-social behavior. These are not only painful but
can have lasting side effects.
Bukovsky said that a few of the
doctors called the psychiatric hospital in which he was interned,
'our little Auschwitz.'(8)
11.3 ABOLITION OF JURIES AND ARBITRARY DETENTION
UK
The 2003 Criminal Justice Act contains three areas of serious
concern: 1) Removal of the right to trial by jury in complex fraud
cases or where the judge and prosecution believe their is a risk of
jury tampering 2) abolishing the double jeopardy makes all
acquittals conditional; 3) the admissibility of previous
convictions, acquittals and hearsay evidence.(9)(10)This is moving
British justice towards a European style inquisitorial system, away
from the traditional adversarial system. These measures are designed
to harmonize the U.K. with the
E.U. Corpus Juris proposal put forward in April 1997. CJ will set up
a European Public Prosecutor on the continental inquisitorial model,
who will have over-riding jurisdiction throughout Europe to instruct
national judges to issue arrest warrants against suspects and have
them held in custody for nine months pending investigation (or
transported to other countries in Europe) with no obligation to
produce prosecution evidence and no right to a public hearing during
this time.
The cases are then to be tried by special courts,
consisting of professional judges and excluding simple jurors and
lay magistrates. The E.U. public prosecutor is responsible for both
investigation and prosecution of the crimes. Our rights of habeas
corpus established in 1679 and trial by jury established by Magna
Carta in 1215 are to be nullified. Furthermore, the European Arrest
Warrant removes the need for any formal extradition procedures for
32 crimes, some of which are not even crimes in U.K. law.
These
include xenophobia and racism which encompass criticism of the E.U..
The Corpus Juris manual itself, (Sous la direction de Mireille
Delmas-Marty, ISBN 2-7178-3344-7, p40, para 3), informs us that:
"[Corpus Juris is] designed to ensure, in a largely unified European
legal area, a fairer, simpler and more efficient system of
repression."(11)(12)(13)(14)(15)
Under the Anti-Terrorism, Crime and Security Act 2001, the Home
Secretary could order that a foreign national be detained
indefinitely on suspicion that he was either a terrorist or a threat
to national security. However, in December 2004, the law lords ruled
that these powers contravened the European Convention on Human
Rights and ordered the release of twelve foreign nationals who could
otherwise have been detained in prison indefinitely.
In response,
the Government introduced the Prevention of Terrorism Bill, which
gives the Home Secretary power to impose 'control orders' on both
British and foreign terror suspects. Instead of holding suspects in
prison, the control orders could: Impose house arrest or other
restrictions on movements, including electronic tagging; restrict
association and communication with specified people; restrict use of
telephones and the internet. This overturns 800 years of British
legal history by taking away both habeus corpus and trial by jury,
and giving judicial powers to the Home Secretary! Unsurprisingly it
faces a stormy passage through both Houses of Parliament. (16)
On 31 March 2003, Home Secretary David Blunkett, signed an
extradition
treaty on behalf of the U.K. with his U.S. counterpart, Attorney
General John Ashcroft. This ostensibly brings the U.S. into line
with procedures between European countries. Parliament was not
consulted at all and the text was not available until the end of
May. Like the European Arrest Warrant, it removes the requirement on
the U.S. to provide prima facie evidence when requesting the
extradition of people from the U.K., although that requirement
remains when the
U.K. makes the request of the U.S..(17)
USA
Section 412 of the U.S.A. Patriot Act allows for the indefinite
detention of non-citizens. The Attorney General has unprecedented
new power to order their detention based on a certification that he
has reasonable grounds to believe a non-citizen endangers national
security. Worse still, if no other country will accept them, they
can be detained indefinitely in the U.S. without trial. In January
2003, a decision by the 4th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in
Richmond, Va. on the case of Yaser Esam Hamdi, affirmed the
Government's authority to detain indefinitely American citizens
captured in foreign battles or those who participate in terrorist
attacks against U.S. interests abroad.(18)
The court did not address
questions about U.S. citizens arrested as enemy combatants in the
U.S. Furthermore, in June 2003, a U.S Federal Court ruled that the
Government can keep secret the names of the hundreds of foreigners
detained since 9/11.(19)The Government has classified as an 'enemy
combatant', Jose Padilla of Chicago, who was arrested at O'Hare
Airport on suspicion of plotting domestic terrorism after returning
from Pakistan. This unconstitutional detention still awaits judicial
review
(20)
Judicial Review of Padilla's case will be void if Ashcroft's
'Patriot Act II' is passed because it gives him power to designate
U.S. citizens 'enemy combatants' for terrorist activity carried out
in the U.S.. Section 501 (Expatriation of Terrorists) expands the
'enemy combatant' definition to all American citizens who 'may' have
violated any provision of section 802 of the first Patriot Act.
Section 101 will also designate individual American terrorists as
'foreign powers' and again strip them of all rights under the 'enemy
combatant' designation.
Under section 802 of Patriot Act I, the term
`domestic terrorism' means activities that,
(A) involve acts
dangerous to human life that are a violation of the criminal laws of
the United States or of any State;
(B) appear to be intended,
(i)
to intimidate or coerce a civilian population
(ii) to influence
the policy of a government by intimidation or coercion
(iii) to
affect the conduct of a government by mass destruction,
assassination, or kidnapping
(C) occur primarily within the
territorial jurisdiction of the United States.(21)
Not only has the
Justice Department stated they can infer from conduct that someone
is not a
U.S. citizen but also under section 201 of 'Patriot Act II', it is a
criminal act for any member of the Government or any citizen to
release any information concerning the incarceration or whereabouts
of detainees. It also states that law enforcement does not even have
to tell the press who they have arrested and they never have to
release their names. Therefore section 501 of 'Patriot Act II' means
that a U.S. citizen engaging in lawful activities can be grabbed off
the street and thrown into a van never to be seen with absolutely no
right of appeal!
(22)(23)
Section 322 of ' Patriot Act II' removes Congress from the
extradition process and allows officers of the Homeland Security
complex to extradite American
citizens anywhere they wish. It also allows Homeland Security to
secretly take individuals out of foreign countries.
A draft of the bill was leaked to Washington D.C. watchdog, The
Center For Public Integrity, in January 2003. It caused such a
furore that the bill was immediately shelved. However there are
three ways the Government might use to get it passed:
1) After the
next major terror attack, it will be rushed into law by panicked
legislators in the same way Patriot Act I was passed in the
immediate aftermath of 9/11
2) the Government will declare martial
law and impose the legislation without authority from Congress
3)
the bill will be broken down into pieces and tacked onto other
legislation
On 12 June 2003 the The Guardian newspaper reported that U.S.
military officials are making preparations for the trial and
possible execution of captives held in Guantanamo Bay, including the
construction of a death chamber. A building at the detention camp in
Cuba for suspected Al-Qaida members is being renovated to serve as a
courtroom for military tribunals, signaling that the U.S. is moving
towards bringing charges against some of the prisoners.(24)
According to The Mail on Sunday:
American law professor Jonathan Turley, who has led U.S. civil
rights group protests against the military tribunals planned to hear
cases at Guantanamo Bay, said:
"It is not surprising the authorities
are building a death row because they have said they plan to try
capital cases before these tribunals. This camp was created to
execute people. The administration has no interest in long-term
prison sentences for people it regards as hard-core terrorists."(25)
In June 2004, The Washington Post published on its web site an
internal White House memo from 1st August 2002, signed by then
Assistant Attorney General Jay S. Bybee, which argued darkly that
torturing al-Qaida captives "may be justified" and that
international laws against torture may be unconstitutional if
applied to interrogations" conducted under President Bush.
The memo
then continued for 50 pages to make the case for the use of torture.
The Bybee memo was clearly the basis for the working-group report on
detainee interrogations presented to Defense Secretary Donald H.
Rumsfeld a year later.(26)(27)
The torture techniques being practiced on teenage goat-herders from
Afghanistan(28) are a first step towards using torture on U.S.
citizens who are deemed 'enemy combatants' i.e. anybody at all.
Pictures of prisoners shackled, bound and with bags over their
heads, serves to de-sensitize the public, police and military to the
most disgusting but necessary instrument of dictatorship. The notion
that torture is acceptable is also being heavily promoted in the
mainstream American media.
11.4 EXPANDING THE DEFINITION OF 'TERRORISM'
The purpose of creating crimes of 'domestic terrorism', is to
abolish civil rights and to dramatically increase the power of
government. This this was foreseen in a report published by the U.S.
Army War College in July 1994, entitled Revolution in Military
Affairs and Conflicts Short of War:
American leaders popularized a new, more inclusive concept of
national security. No distinction--legal or otherwise--was drawn
between internal and external threats. In the interdependent 21st
century world, such a differentiation was dangerously
nostalgic. The new concept of security also included ecological,
public health,
electronic, psychological, and economic threats.
Illegal immigrants
carrying resistant
strains of disease were considered every bit as dangerous as enemy
soldiers. Actions
which damaged the global ecology, even if they occurred outside the
nominal borders
of the United States, were seen as security threats which should be
stopped by force
if necessary. Computer hackers were enemies.(29)
THE UK DEFINITION:
The U.K. 2000 Terrorism Act expands the definition of terrorism to
include serious damage to property or computer systems, designed to
intimidate a section of the public, and which is carried out for
political, religious or ideological reasons. This could include
animal rights activism, tree protesters and even some kinds of
industrial action.
The Home Secretary is afforded powers to
designate and proscribe 'terrorist' organizations. This is a very
significant power because of the severe penalties imposed for anyone
involved or associated with these groups. Amnesty International have
pointed out the potential for repressive foreign governments to
press for their political enemies to be so designated. Membership of
a proscribed organization carries a ten year prison sentence.
Organizing or addressing a meeting which includes members of a
proscribed group is an offence under section 12.
This even
criminalizes independent third parties such as journalists who
arrange private meetings which include a member of proscribed group.
Section 56 criminalizes any level of activity within a proscribed
group even if it has nothing to do with terrorism. It carries a
maximum sentence of life imprisonment. Section 57 imposes ten years
imprisonment for possessing something which could be construed as
being intended for use in terrorist activities.
Section 44 of the Terrorism Act allows police limited power to stop
and search people for articles 'of a kind which could be used in
connection with terrorism'. The important issues are that the police
do not have to demonstrate any grounds for reasonable suspicion
whereas The Police and Criminal Evidence Act (PACE) allows a
constable stop and search authority if they are acting on reasonable
grounds.
Secondly if the constable does find the items in question,
and if there is reasonable suspicion that they will be used for
terrorist purposes, they may be seized and retained.(30) Section 44
notices have been used by police to stop and search protesters at
RAF Fairford during the Iraq war and more recently against
protesters at an international arms fair in London.(31)
THE EU DEFINITION
Article 1 of the Framework Decision on Combating Terrorism December
2001 reads:
[offences] which are intentionally committed by an individual or a
group against one or more countries, their institutions or people
with the aim of intimidating them and seriously altering or
destroying the political, economic or social structures of those
countries will be punishable as terrorist offences.
Article 4 extends the definition to include 'instigating, aiding,
abetting or attempting to commit a terrorist offence' and Article
5m., 'Promoting of, supporting of or participation in a terrorist
group.' Explanatory notes state that
Article 3., defining terrorist offences 'could include, for
instance, urban violence'.
The inclusion in Article 3f. of the
'unlawful seizure of or damage to state or government facilities,
means of public transport, infrastructure facilities, places of
public use, and property' (property covers public and private) could
embrace a wide range of demonstration and protests, ranging from the
non-violent Greenham Common protests against a U.S. cruise missile
base in the U.K., to the anti-globalization protests in Genoa. The
phrase in Article 3h.,'endangering people, property, animals or the
environment', could refer, for example, to animal right
protests.(32)
Under Article 5. the prison sentences imposed are long: 5l.,
Directing a terrorist group 15 years; and 5m., promoting of,
supporting of or participation in a terrorist group, 7 years.
Terrorists will also lose their right to vote.
The E.U. anti-terrorism laws are being directed against protesters
at E.U. summits and other international conferences. Following the
arrest and shooting of protesters at the E.U. summit in Gothenberg
14-16 June 2001, a Police Cooperation Working Party met in Brussels
on 4 July. This was quickly followed by a series of meetings by the
E.U. Council's Justice and Home Affairs committee who requested that
member states participate in,
i) surveillance of protest groups
ii)
the plan to create a new database on the Schengen Information System
(SIS) on protestors;
iii) the plan agreed to bring together para-military police units (eg: carabinieri, CRS, Tactical Support
Groups for EU Summits and international meetings.(33)
THE AMERICAN DEFINITION
Under section 802. of the Patriot Act , the term 'domestic
terrorism' means activities that, `(A) involve acts dangerous to
human life that are a violation of the criminal laws of the United
States or of any State; `(B) appear to be intended, `(i) to
intimidate or coerce a civilian population; `(ii) to influence the
policy of a government by intimidation or coercion; or `(iii) to
affect the conduct of a government by mass destruction,
assassination, or kidnapping; and '(C) occur primarily within the
territorial jurisdiction of the United States.'
Also under section 802, the U.S. Government can bankrupt political
organizations it asserts are involved in domestic terrorism. The
government can seize and/or freeze the assets on the mere assertion
that there is probable cause to believe that the assets were
involved in domestic terrorism. The assets are seized before a
person is given a hearing, and often without notice. In order to
permanently forfeit the assets, the Government must go before a
court, but at a civil hearing, and it is only required to prove that
the assets were involved in terrorism by a preponderance of the
evidence. Section 806 is so broadly defined that it could include
anyone who supported a terrorist group in any way.(34)
Section 301-306 of 'Patriot Act II' (Terrorist Identification
Database) authorizes a national database of suspected terrorists and
radically expands the database to include anyone associated with
suspected terrorist groups and anyone involved in crimes or having
supported any group designated as terrorist.
These sections also set
up a national DNA database for anyone on probation or who has been
on probation for any crime, and orders State governments to collect
the DNA for the Federal government.(28) Section 402 is titled
"Providing Material Support to Terrorism." The section reads that
there is no requirement to show that the individual even had the
intent to aid terrorists.
Section 411 expands crimes that are
punishable by death. Again, they point to Section 802 of
the first Patriot Act and state that any terrorist act or support of
terrorist act can result in the death penalty. Section 421 increases
penalties for terrorist financing. This section states that any type
of financial activity connected to terrorism will result to time in
prison and $10-50,000 fines per violation.(35)(36)
A flyer created by the Phoenix FBI suggests that police officers
contact the Joint Terrorism Task Force if they encounter any of the
following persons (a partial list):
-
Right Wing Extremists: Defenders of U.S. Constitution against
federal government and the U.N. (Super Patriots),
-
Left Wing Terrorism: Political motivation is usually
Marxist/Leninist philosophy
-
Common Law Movement Proponents: make numerous references to the
U.S. constitution, attempt to police the police.
-
Single Issue Terrorist: Animal Rights, Eco-terrorism, Lone
individuals, Cyber penetration, violent anti-abortion extremism
-
Hate Groups: Black separatists, Christian Identity.(37)
This is not an isolated incident. Alex Jones' film 911:The Road To
Tyranny, shows Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) teaching a
class of police officers that terrorists include the Founding
Fathers of America, gun owners, Christians and home schoolers.(38)
The New York Times announced on 17 September 2003 that there is to
be a database of 100,000 suspected terrorists. It will be run
jointly by the CIA, FBI, State Dept. and Dept. Homeland Security.
Justice Dept. officials said they expected the centre to be
operating by December. It will track not only suspected foreign
terrorists but also Americans tied to domestic events like violence
at abortion clinics.(39)
11.5 SURVEILLANCE LAWS
UK
The 2001 Anti-Terrorism, Crime and Security Act enables the police
and security services to go through personal information held by
'public authorities',
e.g. medical records, bank statements, school records, Inland
Revenue files, even though no crime (let alone terrorist offence)
has been committed or even suspected. No judicial oversight is
required and indeed the information can be volunteered by the public
bodies on a spontaneous basis.(40) 'Public authority ' is defined by
the 1998 Human Rights Act (6)(3) as (a) a court or tribunal, and (b)
any person whose functions are of a public nature. (41)
Section 19 of the 2000 Terrorism Act makes it a criminal offence
punishable by up to five years in prison, not to disclose to the
police information that creates suspicion of terrorist activity when
discovered in the course of one's ' trade, profession, business or
employment'.(42)
On 24 November 2004, the Government introduced the Serious Organised
Crime and Police Bill, which sets up a an FBI-style Serious
Organized Crimes Agency (SOCA). This Bill is still being debated,
but the Fourth Report of the Joint Committee on Human Rights raises
serious concerns over surveillance powers granted to the Agency.
It
confers broad powers to SOCA to gather, store and analyse
information relating to crime generally not just serious crime. It
also
confers broad powers over the kinds of information SOCA gathers, and
the disclosure of that information both to the Agency, and by the
Agency to other Government departments.
These laws reflects a shift in philosophy towards the E.U. Corpus
Juris model, in which one is presumed guilty until proven innocent
and therefore deserving of continuous surveillance.(43)
USA
Section 358 of the Patriot Act requires that, in addition to law
enforcement, intelligence agencies such as the CIA also receive
suspicious activity reports from financial institutions. These
reports are usually about wholly domestic transactions of people in
the United States, and do not relate to foreign intelligence
information. In addition, Section 358 allows law enforcement and
intelligence agencies to get easy access to individual credit
reports in secret. There is to be no judicial review and no notice
to the person to whom the records relate.(44)
Section 215 allows the FBI to force anyone at all - including
doctors, libraries, bookstores, universities, and internet service
providers - to turn over records on their clients or customers. The
FBI does not even have to show a reasonable suspicion to a judge
that the records are related to criminal activity, much less the
requirement for 'probable cause' that is listed in the Fourth
Amendment to the Constitution. Judicial oversight of these new
powers is essentially non-existent.
All the Government needs to do
is make the broad assertion that the request is related to an
ongoing terrorism or foreign intelligence investigation. A person or
organization forced to turn over records is prohibited from
disclosing the search to anyone. As a result of this gag order, the
subjects of surveillance never even find out that their personal
records have been examined by the government. Section 213 expands
the Government's ability to search private property with a warrant
but without notice to the owner.
This means that law enforcement
agents can enter a house, apartment or office with a search warrant
when the occupants are away, search through their property, take
photographs, download files off their computer and in some cases
even seize property and not tell them until later. The Patriot Act
also changes the law to allow wiretaps and searches without showing
probable cause when 'a significant purpose' is intelligence
gathering for regular domestic criminal cases. It also expands the
use of warrantless wiretaps to include lists of websites visited and
email headers.(45)
Section 106 of 'Patriot Act II' states that Government agents must
be given immunity for carrying out warrantless searches of private
property. This section throws out the entire Fourth Amendment
against unreasonable searches and seizures. Section 123 restates
that the Government no longer needs warrants and that the
investigations can be a giant dragnet-style sweep.
Section 126
grants the Government the right to mine the entire spectrum of
public and private sector information from bank records to
educational and medical records. This is the enacting law to allow
computers to break down all walls of privacy. The Government states
that they must look at everything to 'determine' if individuals or
groups might have a connection to terrorist groups. From cradle to
grave, all Americans will be guilty and never proven innocent.
Section 301-306 sets up national databases of suspected terrorists
complete with DNA samples.
The database will also be used to 'stop
other unlawful activities'. It will share the information with
state, local and foreign agencies for the same purposes. Section
313 provides liability protection for businesses, especially big
businesses that spy on their customers for Homeland Security,
violating their privacy agreements.(46)
The Intelligence Authorization Act for Fiscal Year 2004 became
Public Law No: 108-177 on 13 December 2003.(47) It achieved one of
the objectives of 'Patriot Act II' by removing the need of the FBI
to obtain a warrant before conducting searches of third party
information. Congressman Ron Paul made a speech against the bill in
November:
I am referring to the stealth addition of language drastically
expanding FBI powers to secretly and without court order snoop into
the business and financial transactions of American citizens. These
expanded internal police powers will enable the FBI to demand
transaction records from businesses, including auto dealers, travel
agents, pawnbrokers and more, without the approval or knowledge of a
judge or grand jury.
This was written into the bill at the 11th hour
over the objections of members of the Senate Judiciary Committee,
which would normally have jurisdiction over the FBI. The Judiciary
Committee was frozen out of the process. It appears we are
witnessing a stealth enactment of the enormously unpopular "Patriot
II" legislation that was first leaked several months ago. Perhaps
the national outcry when a draft of the Patriot II act was leaked
has led its supporters to enact it one piece at a time in secret.
Whatever the case, this is outrageous and unacceptable.(48)
11.6 THE RULING CLASS ABOVE THE LAW
USA
Section 312 of 'Patriot Act II' gives immunity to law enforcement
engaging in spying operations against the American people and would
place substantial restrictions on court injunctions against Federal
violations of civil rights across the board. Section 205 allows top
Federal officials to keep all their financial dealings secret, and
anyone investigating them can be considered a terrorist.(49)
Section 304 of The Homeland Security Act removes liability from
anyone involved in administering the smallpox vaccine and other
bioterrorist countermeasures: Manufacturers and distributors of
countermeasures, hospitals, clinics, and other healthcare entities
under whose auspices the countermeasures are administered, and
licensed health care professionals or other individuals authorized
to administer the countermeasures under state law ("qualified
persons").(50)
A study by the Defense Dept.'s Inspector General found that the
Pentagon couldn't properly account for more than a trillion dollars
in monies spent in year 2000.(51)
EU
Article 1, chapter 1 of Protocol on the Privileges and Immunities of
the E.U. states that '...premises and buildings of the Communities
shall be exempt from search, requisition, confiscation or
expropriation, and their archives shall be inviolable'. Article 12
of Chapter 5 states, 'In the territory of each member state and
whatever their nationality, officials and other servants of the
Communities shall.... be immune from legal proceedings in respect of
acts performed by them
in their official capacity, including their words (spoken or
written).
They shall continue to enjoy this immunity after they have
ceased to hold office'. Thus no buildings or offices, filing
cabinets, archives or bottom drawers belonging to the E.U., wherever
they are located, can be snooped, searched or inspected EVER. These
two exemptions alone place the staff and premises of the E.U., in
their official capacities, completely above the law.(52)
The European police force, Europol, is included in this legal
exemption. Their officials are immune from prosecution and its files
cannot be subpoenaed by any court. It is based in the old fortified
Gestapo building in The Hague. Article 8 of the Treaty of Amsterdam,
signed into law via British Statutory Instrument 2973:1997,
concerning Europol officers, declares that, 'such persons shall enjoy
immunity from suit and legal process in respect of acts, including
words written or spoken, done by them in the exercise of their
official functions…' (53)(54)
The proof of these incredible statements came in 1999, when the
entire E.U. Commission resigned, having been exposed for fraud, yet
nobody was prosecuted. The E.U. has been unable to sign off its
accounts for the last ten years and an estimated 5-8% of its £63
billion budget disappears in fraud and mismanagement every
year.(55)(56) Over 90% of the budget cannot be properly accounted
for.(57)
British MEP Theresa Villiers reports that the problem with the
Commission's accounts was highlighted by the decision in 2002 by its
Chief Accountant, Marta Andreasen, to go public about the total
absence of genuine accounting procedures. The Commission was not
even using the most basic double entry bookkeeping - in widespread
use in Europe since the Renaissance - and used by virtually every
company from British Petroleum to the local sweetshop. Andreasen
uncovered these facts within weeks of arriving at her post at the
European Commission.
She quickly approached her bosses, pointing out
the very serious problems which she had found and asked for change.
She was told that it was her job to sign off on the accounts and if
she did not do so, she would be sacked. When she refused to be
silenced, the European Commission suspended her and subjected her to
a petty campaign of persecution. And who was the man leading this
campaign ?
None other than former British Labour Party leader, Neil
Kinnock, a member of the disgraced Santer Commission which was
forced to resign in 1999, and who was subsequently re-appointed as
Commissioner in charge of tackling E.U. fraud.(58)(59)
UK
In February 2005, Amnesty International put out a press release
concerning the pending enquiry into the murder of human rights
lawyer, Patrick Finucane, in which the British Government is alleged
to have collaborated as part of its anti-terrorism strategy in
Northern Ireland :
The UK government has reneged on its promise to act on the
recommendation of Justice Cory, a former Canadian Supreme Court
judge, that a public inquiry be held in the case of Patrick
Finucane. Instead it has stated that Patrick Finucane's case would
be the subject of an inquiry under the new Inquiries Bill now going
through parliament. The government has also stated that the Bill
aims to take account of "the requirements of national security"
...Under the Inquiries Bill:
-
the inquiry and its terms of reference would be decided by the
executive; no independent parliamentary scrutiny of these decisions
would be allowed
-
the chair of the inquiry would be appointed by the executive and the
executive would have the discretion to sack any member of the
inquiry
-
the decision on whether the inquiry, or any individual hearings,
would be held in public or private would be taken by the executive
-
the decision to issue restrictive notices to block disclosure of
evidence would be taken by the executive
-
the final report of the inquiry would be published at the
executive's discretion and crucial evidence could be omitted at the
executive's discretion, "in the public interest". (60)
Chapter 11 End Notes
-
Richard Norton-Taylor, EU set to agree sweeping counter-terror
policies, The Guardian,25 March 2004.See
http://www.guardian.co.uk/eu/story/0,7369,1177349,00.html?=rss
-
StateWatch, Scoreboard on post-Madrid counter-terrorism plans, 23
March 2004. See
http://www.statewatch.org/news/2004/mar/swscoreboard.pdf
-
Milburn promises Mental Health Bill, BBC, London, 14 Nov. 2002. See
http://www.propagandamatrix.com/milburn_promises_mental_health_bill
-
Mental health rights fears, BBC, London, 11 Nov. 2002. See
http://www.propagandamatrix.com/mental_health_rights_fears
-
Robert B. Bluey, Forced Drugging Case Headed to Supreme Court,
CNSNews.com, 29Nov. 2002. See
http://www.propagandamatrix.com/forced_drugging_case_headed_to_supreme_court
-
Michael Arnold Glueck, M.D. and Robert J. Cihak M.D., American
Conscience: The Saga of Dr. Charles Sell, Newsmax, 26 March 2003.
See http://www.newsmax.com/archives/articles/2003/3/25/192512.shtml
-
Edmund Conway, Don't pay TV licence fee, campaigners urge viewers,
The Daily Telegraph, London, 08 Nov. 2002. See
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/main.jhtml?xml=/news/2002/11/08/nfee08.xml
-
Vladimir Bukovsky, To Build A Castle: My life as a Dissenter, 1978,
p.196. See http://www.roca.org/OA/5/5e.htm
-
Criminal Justice: Battle Against the Bill, Liberty. See
http://www.liberty-human-rights.org.uk/issues/
criminal-justice-battle-against-the-bill.shtml
-
Criminal Justice Act, 2003, Part 7. See
http://www.legislation.hmso.gov.uk/acts/acts2003/30044--h.htm#43
-
Phillip Day, Are You Furious and Paddling Yet? The Campaign For
Truth in Europe. See
http://www.campaignfortruth.com/Eclub/250303/CTEleadarticle.htm
-
Commentary, Corpus Juris (a euro-sceptic website), 01 Jan. 1999 See
http://www.euroscep.dircon.co.uk/corpus3.htm#Top
-
Philip Johnston, Britons face extradition for 'thought crime' on
net, The Daily Telegraph, 18 Feb. 2003. See
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/main.jhtml?xml=/news/2003/02/18/nxeno18.xml&sSheet=/news/2003/02/18/ixnewstop.html
-
Philip Johnston, Blair accused of treason over Europe, The Daily
Telegraph, London, 21 Sept. 2000. See
http://news.telegraph.co.uk/news/main.jhtml?xml=%2Fnews%2F2000%2F09%2F21%2Fnblur221.xml&secureRefresh=true&_requested=56786
-
Petrina Holdsworth, Bye Bye British legal System, UK Independence
Party website. See
http://www.independence.org.uk/html/body_comment_info_0.html
-
Restrictions that UK suspects may face, BBC News online, 27 Feb
2005. See
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk/4212431.stm
-
New UK-US Extradition Treaty, Statewatch website, analysis no 18.
2003. See
http://www.statewatch.org/news/2003/jul/25ukus.htm
-
U.S. Can Hold Citizens as Combatants, Fox News website, 08 Jan.
2003. See
http://www.prisonplanet.com/news_alert_010803_combatants.html
-
US terror arrests to remain secret, BBC, London, 17 June 2003. See
http://www.propagandamatrix.com/us_terror_arrests_to_remain_secret
-
Charles Lane, In Terror War, 2nd Track for Suspects Those Designated
'Combatants' Lose Legal Protections, Washington Post, 1 Dec. 2002.
See
http://www.propagandamatrix.com/in_terror_war_2nd_track_for_suspects
-
How the USA PATRIOT Act redefines "Domestic Terrorism"
American Civil Liberties Union website, 6 Dec 2002
http://www.aclu.org/NationalSecurity/NationalSecurity.cfm?ID=11437&c=111
-
Alex Jones, A Brief Analysis of the Domestic Security Enhancement
Act 2003, Also Known as Patriot Act II, 10 Feb 2003. See
http://www.infowars.com/alexjones.html
-
Patriot Act II, draft version leaked to the Center for Public
Integrity on 9 Jan. 2003. Available to download in full at:
http://www.publicintegrity.org/dtaweb/report.asp?ReportID=502&L1=10&L2=10&L3=0&L4=0&L5=0
-
David Teather, US plans for executions at Guantanamo, The Guardian,
London, 12
June 2003,
http://www.prisonplanet.com/us_plans_for_executions_at_guantanamo.htm
-
US plans death camp, news.com.au, 26 May 03. See
http://www.prisonplanet.com/us_plans_death_camp.htm
-
Robert Scheer, Conservatives put Bush above law, polkonline.com, 17
June 2004
http://www.polkonline.com/stories/061704/opi_law.shtml
-
Mark Sherman, White House Won't Release Gonzales Papers, The
Guardian, 6 January 2005
http://www.guardian.co.uk/worldlatest/story/0,1280,-4715334,00.html
-
Duncan Campbell, Afghan prisoners beaten to death at US military
interrogation base The Guardian, London, 7 March 2003. See
http://www.guardian.co.uk/international/story/0,3604,909164,00.html
-
Revolution in Military Affairs and Conflict Short of War . p12, July
1994, U.S. Army War College. See
http://www.carlisle.army.mil/ssi/pdffiles/00233.pdf
-
Anti-Terrorism Legislation in The United Kingdom, Liberty, 2003. See
http://www.liberty-human-rights.org.uk/resources/publications/pdf-documents/anti-terrornew.pdf
-
Police questioned over terror act use, BBC, London, 10 Sept. 2003
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/england/london/3097150.stm
-
EU to adopt new laws on terrorism, Statewatch, 2003. See
http://www.statewatch.org/news/2001/sep/14eulaws.htm
-
Conclusions adopted by the Council (Justice and Home Affairs) and
the representatives of the member states on 13 July 2001 on security
at meetings of the European Council and other comparable events, doc
no 10916/01,16.7.01; also Draft Conclusions on security at meetings
of the European Council and other comparable events, doc no 10731/01
and Rev 1, 10 & 11.7.01. See Statewatch article: The "enemy
within": EU plans the surveillance of protestors and the
criminalization of protests
http://www.statewatch.org/news/2001/aug/protest.pdf
Also: Initiative by the Kingdom of Spain for the adoption of a
Council Recommendation on the introduction of a standard form for
exchanging information on terrorists, Brussels, 29 May 2002
5712/6/02 REV 6.
See http://www.statewatch.org/news/2003/apr/spainterr.pdf
-
ACLU, op cit. see
http://www.aclu.org/NationalSecurity/NationalSecurity.cfm?ID=11437&c=111
-
Charles Lewis and Adam Mayle, Special Report, Justice Dept. Drafts
Sweeping Expansion of Anti-Terrorism Act Center Publishes Secret
Draft of `Patriot II' Legislation,
The Center for Public Integrity, January 2003. See
http://www.publicintegrity.org/dtaweb/report.asp?ReportID=502&L1=10&L2=10&L3=0&L4=0&L5=0
-
Alex Jones, op cit.
-
This FBI Flyer is available to view at:
http://www.keepandbeararms.com/images/FBI-MCSOTerroristFlyer-Back.jpg
http://www.keepandbeararms.com/images/FBI-MCSOTerroristFlyer-front.jpg
-
911: The Road To Tyranny, a documentary film by Alex Jones. See
http://www.infowars.com/tyranny.htm
-
Eric Lichtblau, Administration Creates Center for Master Terror
'Watch List', New York Times, 16 Sept 2003. See
http://www.propagandamatrix.com/administration_creates_center_for_master_terror_watchlist
-
Liberty, op cit.
-
U.K. Human Rights Act 1998, Chapter 42.
See at http://www.hmso.gov.uk/acts/acts1998/80042--a.htm
-
Liberty op cit., p.13
-
Fourth Report of the Joint Committee on Human Rights, Serious
Organised Crime and Police Bill, 12 January 2005. See
http://www.publications.parliament.uk/pa/jt200405/jtselect/jtrights/26/2604.htm
-
How the Anti-Terrorism Bill Puts Financial Privacy at Risk, ACLU
website 23 October 2001. See
http://www.aclu.org/NationalSecurity/NationalSecurity.cfm?ID=9147&c=111
-
Surveillance Under the USA PATRIOT Act, ACLU website. See
http://www.aclu.org/SafeandFree/SafeandFree.cfm?ID=12263&c=206
-
Alex Jones, op cit.
-
Intelligence Authorization Act for Fiscal Year 2004, H.R.2417, 108th
Congress. See
http://thomas.loc.gov/cgi-bin/query/z?c108:H.R.2417
-
Ron Paul, Congressman for Texas, speech in the House of
Representatives, 20 Nov. 2003. See
http://www.fas.org/irp/congress/2003_cr/h112203.html
-
Alex Jones, op cit.
-
Guidance for the Healthcare Community Concerning Section 304 of the
Homeland Security Act, CDC website. See
http://www.bt.cdc.gov/agent/smallpox/vaccination/healthcare-304-guidance.asp
-
Tom Abate, Military Waste Under Fire, $1 Trillion Missing - Bush
targets Pentagon Accounting, San Francisco Chronicle, 18 May 2003.
See
http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?file=/c/a/2003/05/18/MN251738.DTL
-
Philip Day, op cit.
-
Ibid.
-
Ambrose Evans-Pritchard, EU police force could be a repressive
monster, says report, The Daily Telegraph, 31 Jan. 2001.
See http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/
main.jhtml?xml=%2Fnews%2F2001%2F01%2F31%2Fweup01.xml
-
Theresa Villiers MEP, Tackling Fraud And Mismanagement In The EU, 28
April 2003. See
http://villiers.politicos.ws/record.jsp?type=news&ID=138 Also, Top
financial watchdog slams EU accounts system, The EU Observer.com.
See http://www.independence.org.uk/html/eu_news.html
-
EU Accounts - A decade of failure, theconservatives.com, 15 November
2004 http://www.conservatives.com/tile.do?def=news.story.page&obj_id=117282
-
EU accounts fail to pass muster, BBC News on-line, 18 November 2003.
See http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/europe/3279675.stm
-
Theresa Villiers MEP, Cleaning Up The Commission. See
http://www.theresa-villiers.com/record.jsp?type=issue&ID=8
-
Ambrose Evans-Pritchard, Tory MEPs urge Kinnock to resign, The Daily
Telegraph,
London,15 March 2003. See
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/main.jhtml?xml=%2Fnews%2F2003%2F03%2F15%2Fwfile15.xml
-
Amnesty International Press Release, AI Index: EUR 45/003/2005
(Public), News Service No: 034,11 February 2005
http://web.amnesty.org/library/index/engEUR450032005?open&of=eng-gbr
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