Finally, justice for our hounded troops
THE ruthless hounding of hundreds of innocent soldiers over false allegations of atrocities and abuses supposedly committed in Iraq has been one of the most shameful chapters in the annals of British justice.
Cheered on by the sanctimonious human rights lobby, a group of unscrupulous lawyers led by the infamous Phil Shiner pursued a staggering 3,600 compensation cases against our troops – almost all spurious – ranging from minor rough treatment to murder.
For years, the Mail has been the main voice campaigning for an end to this grotesque witch-hunt. We have done so in the face of sneering opposition from the legal establishment and liberal commentators, who were only too happy to champion Shiner (once named Law Society solicitor of the year) and vilify both the soldiers and this newspaper.
It’s therefore with a huge sense of pride we report today that Defence Secretary Michael Fallon is bringing down the curtain on this travesty by winding up the Iraq Historic Allegations Team (Ihat) – created to look into the abuse claims. More than 600 cases relating to Afghanistan are also being discontinued.
Writing in this paper, Sir Michael says it’s time to put an end to ‘the poisonous lies which have plagued our armed forces’ and pledges to ensure British soldiers won’t be subject to similar damages claims in future by derogating from the European Court of Human Rights during military conflicts.
We wholeheartedly applaud him and are only sorry his predecessors weren’t so decisive. This should have happened years ago, before so many lives were cruelly blighted.
That Shiner was an amoral rogue should have been clear from the start as he employed a network of agents, who persuaded thousands of Iraqis to claim they had been abused by British soldiers with the lure of handsome pay-outs.
The MoD couldn’t cope with the sheer volume of cases so Ihat was set up to look into them, employing 145 investigators – mainly ex-police officers – at a cost to the taxpayer so far of £36.3million.
Indeed it’s been a nice little earner for everyone concerned – lawyers, agents, Iraqi civilians who received compensation settlements, and of course the Ihat investigators themselves.
Meanwhile, brave soldiers who risked their lives for their country had their reputations smeared, and their lives and those of their families have been in a Kafkaesque limbo for years.
So the real question is, why did it take so long for Shiner to be exposed? It had long been clear his clients were overwhelmingly bogus and the charges trumped-up. After all, in nearly seven years they didn’t produce one conviction.
Yet it was only last week that he was finally struck off by the Solicitors Disciplinary Tribunal following an inquiry launched by Sir Michael. The truth is that because he masqueraded as a champion of human rights, he was feted by the liberal Left and the subject of admiring profiles in the Guardian newspaper. for nearly a decade no one dared challenge him. fuelled by legal aid and assisted by pusillanimous politicians and gutless civil servants, this parasite was able to make his false allegations with impunity.
And the sorry saga is not over yet. Although Shiner is disgraced, the suffering of another group of veterans continues. While IRA killers are free to walk the streets of Ulster unmolested, police are investigating 300 killings by British soldiers during the Troubles – some more than 45 years ago.
It’s another politically-motivated witchhunt against troops who, let’s not forget, were simply trying to keep the peace between two vicious warring factions.