The price of life is falling in value
WHAT PRICE a single human life up against state and commercial interests? I read the news with a growing sense of depression and alarm that the price is spiralling downwards.
And if you or I were to find ourselves wrongly accused of a crime, imprisoned for life abroad, sentenced to brutal lashings or just plain murdered inside a foreign consulate, we might find ourselves feeling very lonely. Or subject to bungling diplomatic or political intervention that only makes things worse.
I’m thinking of course about the plight of Durham University academic Matthew Hedges, 31, who was convicted of being a spy and given a life sentence in a secret hearing lasting just five minutes in the United Arab Emirates.
While UAE officials claim they have “compelling evidence” against him and that they treated him fairly, it is widely accepted here in the UK that he is entirely innocent. And, by the way, he wasn’t even allowed a lawyer.
Theresa May has called the case “deeply disappointing”. Foreign Secretary Jeremy Hunt is said to have made things worse by going to Abu Dhabi to discuss Matthew’s case but then also lecturing them on human rights – criticism that did not go down at all well.
Matthew’s distraught wife, Daniela, was damning in her conclusion about the UK Government’s attitude.
She said: “I was under the impression they were putting their interests with the UAE above a British citizen’s rightful freedom and his welfare.
“They just disregarded my requests, they said it wasn’t part of their job, it wasn’t part of their duty. On one occasion one of the case workers said the Foreign Office did not have a duty of care so weren’t obliged to make such representations.”
The UK, of course, has huge trading deals with UAE, which our politicians want to protect, but at what cost when a British citizen is endangered?
Matthew Hedges, whose mental health is increasingly frail, was doing research for his PhD on Middle Eastern issues. His family are adamant that in no way was he spying for any government in any way at all. Yet the UAE ambassador to the UK, while hinting that they may consider pleas for clemency, said “we live in a dangerous neighbourhood”.
A reminder perhaps that they are acutely suspicious of people who poke around asking too many questions.
Then there’s the case of Nazanin Zaghari-Ratcliffe, the British-Iranian charity worker jailed in Iran for “spying”.
We’re told Jeremy Hunt has made her case a priority since becoming Foreign Secretary in July. The other day he met with her four-year-old daughter Gabriella from whom she has been cruelly separated for two years.
He brought her a touching gift from his own daughter, who is also four. It made a pretty picture – but is it enough?
While her case is different from Matthew’s, and in a different country with an entirely different relationship with the UK, there was also a hint of bungling diplo- macy when then-foreign secretary Boris Johnson was accused of making her situation worse when he suggested that she was in Iran to teach journalism.
DON’T WE all deserve better than this? We Britons have always had such faith in our diplomatic services. When we travel abroad, most of us – if we think about it at all – feel comfortable and protected if the country we’re visiting has a little bit of Britain in it, in the shape of an embassy or consulate.
If we get into trouble, rightly or even wrongly, we feel the cavalry would come and rescue us.
But recent cases do make you wonder whether, up against political and commercial interests worth billions of pounds, dealing with countries that have appalling attitudes on human rights act- ually imperils our own. Perhaps Donald Trump spelled it out last week – not just for the US government but for others, too. And with his arrogance and understanding of what his supporters like to hear, he spoke an uncomfortable truth.
He admitted that he would be taking absolutely no action against Saudi Arabia after the murder of Jamal Khashoggi, the Saudi journalist and a columnist for the Washington Post.
And this came only days after the CIA concluded that the crown prince had authorised the killing.
The President said: “It could very well be that the crown prince had knowledge of this tragic event – maybe he did and maybe he didn’t. We may never know all of the facts. In any case, our relationship is with the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia.”
Punishing Saudi Arabia, Mr Trump said, would put at risk $110billion in military sales to Boeing, Lockheed Martin, Raytheon and other military contractors, as well as $340billion in other investments. (A wild exaggeration, according to commentators.)
“They have truly been a spectacular ally in terms of jobs and economic development. You know, I’m president; I have to take a lot of things into consideration. I put America first.”
And so you can only conclude that a terrible killing, in a foreign consulate which should have been a safe place, has become a test of America’s willingness to overlook the crimes of a strategically valuable ally.
I don’t think any British politician or diplomat would ever say such a thing out loud. But do they think it? And is this going to become more obvious as more and more cases of injustice result in innocent British citizens wasting away behind bars in countries which have appalling track records on truth, justice and human rights?
Conservative MP and former soldier Johnny Mercer has said it would be “absolutely disgraceful” if we were indeed putting state and commercial interests before the rights of an individual, adding: “We have no interests with the UAE that outweigh the rights and freedoms of our citizens abroad.
“Consequences must be immediate until he is released.”
I predict no “consequences” at all. But let’s all hope that the pleas for clemency work.