I wrote this as an after thought to my article on Corbyn’s letter to May on Labour’s new Red Lines because it fascinates me; the European Arrest warrant is only available to full members of the EU, and in order to join or use it, it is necessary to comply with the CJEU and the Charter of Fundamental Rights to have access to it. Frankly the Good Friday Agreement needs that too. This would seem to be a trojan horse to put the Court and Charter of Rights back on the table. I wonder if they realise? … …
Crime & Brexit
As I said, earlier this week I attended a session of the House of Commons Home Affairs Committee. This was called to take evidence on the impact of Brexit as it impacted Europol and the European Arrest Warrant.
I have published a link to the video recording of the event but I took some notes and wanted to share them with you. They interviewed Sir Robert Wainright, a former Head of Europol and Claude Moraes MEP, Chair of the European Parliament’s Committee on Civil Liberties, Justice and Home Affairs (LIBE) and Camino Mortera-Martinez, Research Fellow and Brussels Representative, Centre for European Reform. If we leave, we are unlikely to get a better agreement than Denmark which has withdrawn from Europol and unless we accept the Court of Justice of the European Union, we will be excluded from the European Arrest Warrant. Moraes made the point that the UK’s Investigatory Powers Act may inhibit a data sharing adequacy finding which may lead to a restrivtion on access to Europol’s databases. … …
How not to extradite…
So earlier today, UK Human Rights blog reported that the UK courts stated that Sweden’s application for the extradition of Julian Assange was valid and that he should be returned in custody to Sweden. I thought and hoped the case would hinge upon the fact that the Swedish prosecutors had not charged Assange and as such the UK would reject the extradition. The European Arrest Warrant should not be allowed, and I understood wasn’t permitted unless there is a case to answer in court. It seemed to me that it had been issued by the Prosecutor’s office in order to “help them with their inquiries”.
The UK’s ancient “Habeas Corpus” rights today ensure that people can only be held for a very short period of time before being charged, unless the courts permit longer due to terrorism concerns, the result of a shameful piece of legislation by the last Government.
I am not sure we should extradite anyone to permit questioning, i.e. we shouldn’t allow foreign police to go trawling for evidence in a way that we deny our own police.
So advice to Mark Stephens, “Stop fannying around about fitness for office, look at the case; are they ready to prosecute or not?”
I am afraid if they are, games up! …