5.From Terrorism to Extremism and Radicalism

The “war against terror” is a conscious strategy of the EU and the United States against every resistance directed at neo-liberal capitalism. This is further made evident from the fact that since 2004, in one breath, “extremism and radicalism” are put in the same category with terrorism. Naturally, the excessive profits of the multinationals in, for example, the bank or petroleum sector, are not meant here. The struggle against extremism is being peddled as a struggle against the fundamentalist and radical tendencies in the Muslim world and especially among Muslim migrants in Europe.

But this flag does not cover the entire cargo. Under extremism is envisioned all individuals and organizations who in one way or another question the existing society, even environmental activists like Greenpeace. A striking example of this is the secret list of the police service in Antwerp (a port city in Belgium with 420.000 residents) which was exposed in 2005. In the list of “terrorist and extremist” organizations of the city were more than 200 names of persons and organizations, 99 percent of whom undertake legal and open social and political activities. These were migrant organizations, printing presses, humanitarian organizations, protectors of animal rights, and progressive lawyers. In this way, under the cover of the fight against terrorism, the most flagrant violations of the basic rights become “normal” practice.

The existence of such a list means that persons and organizations will be followed, their privacy violated, their right to free organization and freedom of speech curtailed. In this way, the understanding of terrorism is expanded to all forms of protest and resistance in the political, trade union and social fields.

6. Restrictions on fundamental rights

I’ll give you one very concrete and recent example that indicates how far fundamental rights are damaged. At the end of September 2006 the American Senate approved the “Military Commissions Act”. Military interrogators can now use unorthodox interrogation techniques to enforce suspects of terror to make “confessions”, such as keeping suspects awake, keeping them upright in stressful positions, exposing them to heat, water and cold. Torture, forbidden by international treaties, becomes in that way legalized. These barbaric methods mean the end of the rule of law. Universal citizens rights which must protect us against possible arbitrariness of the state, the army and the police force are lost. The same “Military Commissions Act” presents further military commissions for all persons qualified by the president of the U.S. as “Unlawful Enemy Combatant”. These military commissions are composed only of military judges, the suspects are only defended by military lawyers or by civil lawyers that must be screened and must acquire a special admission, they work with secret information and proves which cannot be communicated by the lawyer to its costumer, a large number of the indictable offenses can be sanctioned with the death penalty. Also fundamental Right of the Habeas Corpus (that nobody can be deprived of freedom without a command of a judge and without right of objection at a judge) is simply abolished. It is clear that this legislation means the end of the rule of law.

Kellogg Brown & Root, a subsidiary of Cheney’s (U.S. vice president) Halliburton, is constructing a huge facility at an undisclosed location to hold tens of thousands of undesirables.

The “war on terror” of the EU infringes on other fields. The framework decision on the European extradition order has a consequence that within the EU, extradition also of those politically suspected or convicted happens almost automatically. A country used to be able to refuse the extradition of the person in question if he was a citizen of the country, if he was a political refugee, if it was a political crime, or if there was threat that the person would be persecuted because of his religion, nationality or political beliefs. All of these fundamental guarantees, which were achievements in international law in the 19th century, are, with one blow, abolished.

Another phenomenon is that the exception laws like the anti-terror laws lead to exceptional procedures and to strategies to avoid guarantees of due process. In this way the classic principles of criminal law are eroded. More and more, there is work on secret documents which the defense has no right to see. Special judges, special solicitors and even appointed lawyers (so that the free choice of a lawyer disappears are being implemented.

A shift has been established from the repression through criminal law to the repression via administrative law, where even less guarantees exist for the defense than in criminal law. A typical, but very terrible example is the “control orders” in the UK. With one control order, a person can be subjected for months to all sorts of control regulations (for example, house arrest, forbidden to exchange letters, telephone and visits from friends) can happen through a decision of the minister of internal affairs on the basis of a secret dossier without any judicial review.

This example illustrates a more general tendency in the EU: the increasingly bigger hold of the executive authority (to the detriment of the legislative and judicial authority power). The executive authority, (EU Council of Ministers, EU commission, national governments, police, info and security services, solicitors) determine more and more which laws will be passed (they dictate these to the parliaments of the different EU countries and to the European Parliament) and they decide more and more practice of the repression. The control orders but also the EU list of the so-called terrorists are the most typical examples of this. It is very important that in most of the EU countries, during the last few years, laws have been made allowing the police, secret and info services of the country entrance to use extraordinary investigation methods. These extraordinary investigation methods (tapping, infiltration, surveillance) are almost without judicial controls and so broad that every individual that is under suspicion to have the intention to commit a crime, can be the subject of this.

7. What is still in the Pipeline?

The G8 wants to sharpen the repression in two areas.

First, they want the anti-terror laws in all the countries to be even more broad so that the “apology” (the justification) of a terrorist act, will be punishable. This is a very dangerous tendency because this can lead to suppression of press freedom. Which journalist will now dare give news about, for example, liberation movement in the Third World if he himself will risk being accused of being a terrorist?

Secondly, they want that the information that security services collect by using secret investigation procedures can be used in criminal cases. The problem here is that this secret information, even during the court hearing, in large measure, must remain secret, which, naturally, leads to the giving of secret criminal dossiers and to special judges and specified lawyers who must guarantee this secrecy.

Increasing Resistance

There is worldwide a growing resistance against this “war on terror” which has degenerated into war against fundamental rights and especially to the criminalizing of every political and social movement that dares to questions the exploitation of capital with the scandalous profits and enrichment of a fraction of the population.

Jo Stevens, Chairperson of the Orde van Vlaamse Balies, (Order of Flemish Associations in Belgium), and which represents more than 8,000 lawyers in Belgium, expressed it in his New Year speech as follows: “Because a gentleman in America has declared the war on terror, we have become lawyers in the time of war. The rights and freedom that Europe through the centuries centimeter by centimeter has fought for are now being reversed. The fundamentalists of prevention and repression threaten our rule of law more than the religious fundamentalists.”

This standpoint I can adopt wholeheartedly. It is also a call to the progressive lawyers, together with the broad social and trade union movement to defend the fundamental rights, especially the right to social improvement.

Program

– Stop extra-judicial killings, independent investigation of the killings, punishment of the responsible persons;

– Campaign for the repeal of the exceptional anti-terrorist laws;

– Oppose any measures which could criminalize mere association with a political organization, or which involve detention without charge, or restrictions on freedom of speech, association or publication;

– Defend the democratic freedom of dissent and to resist oppression, nationally and internationally; respect for the right to oppose tyranny and state-oppression.

Posted by (Bulatlat.com)

*Presented before the Public Forum of the IAPL 3rd Congress, Oct. 14, 2006, Davao City, Philippines

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