The British Government's practice of placing foreign terror suspects under house arrest for 18 hours has been ruled too severe by Britain's senior judges.
More on this allied Government out of (Cheney's) control, below the fold.
The UK's Telegraph reported:
The Government's terror strategy was dealt a blow . . . when law lords ruled that the controversial control order regime must be watered down. Britain's most senior judges ruled that the most draconian power - an 18-hour home curfew - was in breach of the human right to liberty. They held that a 12-hour curfew was acceptable. . .
Indefinite control orders, imposed on foreign terror suspects by the Home Secretary, are one of the Government's key anti-terror measures. Control orders impose restrictions currently including curfews and bans on internet access and unauthorised visitors.
Indefinite-control orders were introduced two years ago, after the previous system for dealing with foreign suspects - keeping them detained in prison until deportation - was held to be in breach of their human rights. The Law Lords found that the orders violated the rights to liberty and a fair trial.
The lords also held that control orders must be subject to "civil fair trial procedure", which has been breached in some cases by the "special advocate procedure". This procedure allows the Government to release sensitive information to terror suspects' security-screened lawyers, on the condition that this information is not passed on to the suspect.
Apparently the Brits didn't get Cheney's memos. In Britain today, the Government either has to use the traditional criminal process against a terror suspect, with the assistance of counsel, and the right to confront the evidence, or in weak or questionable cases, use the limited control-order system. Yet in the U.S., the solution is you get "disappeared" to Guantanamo, indefinitely. How can our oldest, closest ally have such a radically different approach to the "war on terror"? Either they're letting a bunch more Richard Reid shoe-bomber types slip through their fingers, or there's something wrong with the approach taken on this side of the Pond.