Britain finalised a new plan on Wednesday to help deport or bar Islamic radicals who promote terrorism in the wake of last month’s London bombings and said it will be implemented within days.
Home Secretary Charles Clarke said the list of so-called ”unacceptable behaviours” will counter the ”real and significant” threat of terrorism.
But Muslim groups and human rights experts criticised the move as too vague and said it might affect legitimate struggles against human rights abuses.
They are also worried about a plan by the British government to deport hard-line Islamists to countries where they may face torture or even execution.
Clarke said the plan will take effect ”very quickly. The next few days.”
The authorities are already considering a number of names of people engaged in unacceptable activities, he told the BBC in Norwich, eastern England.
”All our foreign posts throughout the world are looking at their particular country … and, of course, we have got the names that are widely in the public domain at the moment,” Clarke said.
He said he has an obligation ”to stop people coming into this country to get young people, in particular, to behave in the appalling way we saw in July”.
The list is part of a wide-ranging government crackdown on Islamic extremist and other groups in the wake of the July 7 suicide bombings, which killed 56 people, and attempted copycat attacks on July 21.
British Prime Minister Tony Blair warned earlier this month ”the rules of the game are changing”.
The British Home Office plan — compiled after a two-week consultation with Muslim groups and other organisations — applies both to non-British citizens already in the country and those who want to go there. It will be used as a basis for Clarke to ban or deport people from Britain.
The so-called ”unacceptable behaviours” include those that:
- foment, justify or glorify terrorist violence;
- seek to provoke others to terrorist acts;
- foment other serious criminal activity or seek to provoke others to commit serious criminal acts; or
- foster hatred that might lead to inter-community violence in Britain.
The list is shorter than a draft proposed by Clarke three weeks ago, but the Home Office said the final version is ”indicative rather than exhaustive”.
The banned views could be aired by writing, producing or distributing material, public speaking or over an internet site.
They could also be delivered by someone in a position of responsibility, such as a teacher or a community leader.
Those given a deportation order in Britain have the right to appeal, while anyone banned from entering the country can seek a judicial review.
Dismissing fears of an infringement on free speech, Clarke said: ”These powers are not intended to stifle free speech or legitimate debate about religions or other issues.”
Inayat Bunglawala, a spokesperson for the Muslim Council of Britain, disagreed, arguing the criteria are too vague.
”We are especially concerned that senior Islamic scholars will be barred from the United Kingdom purely on the basis of media witch-hunts orchestrated by pro-Israeli elements,” Bunglawala said.
In addition, the United Nations’s special rapporteur on torture, Manfred Nowak, said Britain’s plan to deport firebrand Islamists to countries with poor human rights records will expose them to ”a real risk” of the death penalty.
But Clarke responded angrily, saying the UN should pay more attention to the rights of the victims.
”The human rights of those people who were blown up on the Tube in London on July 7 are, to be quite frank, more important than the human rights of the people who committed those acts,” he told the ITV News Channel.
”It is a balance, of course, and I acknowledge that there are real issues that have to be addressed, but I wish the UN would look at human rights in the round rather than simply focusing all the time on the terrorist.”
The British government is compiling bilateral agreements with mainly Arab countries — Jordan was the first to sign — to deport undesirables from one nation to the other without fear of torture. — Sapa-AFP