Blair under pressure to offer ‘torture’ apology
Tony Blair was under pressure to apologise last night after Theresa May admitted that the Government – led by him – was in part responsible for the rendition and torture of a Libyan man and his wife. MPS demanded he apologise to Abdel Hakim Belhaj and Fatima Boudchar.
TONY BLAIR was under pressure to apologise last night after Theresa May admitted the UK Government – led by him at the time – was in part responsible for the rendition and torture of a Libyan man and his pregnant wife.
MPS in the House of Commons demanded the former Labour leader offer a personal apology to Abdel Hakim Belhaj and Fatima Boudchar after Theresa May said sorry for the “appalling treatment” they suffered.
Furious MPS hit out at Mr Blair, who has not commented on the conclusion of a landmark case which led to the Government paying £500,000 in com- pensation to Ms Boudchar and issue formal apologies to the couple.
It came as Jack Straw, the former foreign secretary, admitted to signing the order which led to the rendition of the pair, who were held and tortured in an airport jail in Thailand in 2004 when Ms Boudchar was heavily pregnant.
A letter from around the time of the rendition, sent to Muammar Gaddafi, then the Libyan leader, by Sir Mark Allen, an MI6 boss, appeared to acknowledge the UK did play a role in Mr Belhaj’s removal to Libya.
Sir Edward Leigh, a Tory MP, said: “The minister says he can’t criticise or shouldn’t criticise the Blair government, but we can. Has any apology been given this morning from Mr Blair for rendering the opponent of a murderous regime into the hands of that regime?”
Jeremy Wright, the Attorney General, said: “We’ve spent a good deal of time over the previous decade or so criticising the Blair government, but my purpose today is to resolve the individual case.” He said it was worth defending the principle that the Government as an institution should take responsibility.
Philip Hollobone, a Tory MP, added: “If there was a failure of the intelligence services under the Tony Blair government then an apology should be made. But my constituents will be stunned by the scale of the compensation.”
After a High Court case that was settled, Mrs May wrote to the couple accepting that “the UK Government’s actions contributed to your detention, rendition and suffering”.
Ms Boudchar, who watched the apology from the public gallery in the Commons, was paid £500,000 in damages. Mr Belhaj, now a military commander in Libya but a member of the dissident Libyan Islamic Fighting Group at the time, did not request compensation.
The cases against Mr Straw and Sir Mark have been dropped. Mr Straw said yesterday: “As I have said on many occasions I sought to act at all times in a manner which was fully consistent with my legal duties, and with national and international law.” He said he had “limited” recollection of the events, but had ascertained that on March 1 2004, he gave oral approval for “some information to be shared with international partners”.
“In every case where my approval was sought I assumed, and was entitled to assume, that the actions for which my approval was sought were lawful,” he said.