Pacific Views

Never Mind the Hutton Whitewash

Here comes the Fairford Five:

...Five peace activists charged with criminal damage at RAF Fairford are pleading - like Katharine Gun, the former GCHQ translator whose prosecution under the Official Secrets Act for leaking a memo was thrown out last week - that they acted to prevent an illegal war.

If Mr Justice Grigson agrees that they can invoke the two defences of necessity and prevention of crime, Tony Blair could face the embarrassing prospect of an ordinary jury of 12 citizens deciding whether or not the defendants had reasonable grounds for believing that the war was legal under international law.

...A QC unconnected with the case said the events of the past two days, since the Gun case collapsed, had been "extremely helpful" to the Fairford Five. He said the only possible interpretation of the attorney general's statement that the prosecution had concluded in the Gun case that it could not rebut the defence of necessity was that "in all the uncertainty surrounding the legality of the war in Iraq, it was impossible to prove Ms Gun did not reasonably believe she was acting to prevent an illegal war".

If the judge rules in favor of the defendants, it will be an acceptance of the defense that they acted to prevent a crime. Which would have the Iraq war on public record, for apparently the second time now in a UK court, as being of suspect legality.