UK+government+credibility+is+under+threat,+City+Press

City Press, Johannesburg, 12/08/2006 19:08 - (SA)
=UK government's credibility is under threat=


 * CAMERON DUODU**

THURSDAY August 10, was one of the worst days in the history of world aviation.

Police arrested 21 people suspected of plotting to bomb aeroplanes taking off from British airports for the USA.

A strict new system of checking baggage was instituted. No one was allowed to take hand luggage on board, except for a few necessary items, and these were to be placed inside a transparent plastic bag.

These measures resulted in all the terminals at airports across the UK becoming overcrowded to the point of almost unmanageable chaos. Hundreds of flights were cancelled and scores of passengers were put through hell.

Of course, the British authorities could not ignore whatever intelligence led them to their actions. What has been agitating intelligent members of the public is that this is not the first time such a massive disruption of life has occurred in Britain on the basis of "intelligence" reports.

In February 2003, British army units, some in tanks, were deployed around Heathrow to avert a "threat". But no evidence was ever produced to back up the "intelligence."

Again, in June this year, hundreds of policemen raided homes in an area of London called Forest Gate to arrest plotters said to be manufacturing deadly chemicals to attack the British populace. One person was shot and injured. However, nothing was found and those arrested were released without charge.

The February 2003 deployment of tanks came very close to the invasion of Iraq. So some Britons wonder whether it might have been organised to prepare the British public to accept that Britain was in danger from al-Qaeda terrorists and that Britain would therefore be justified in joining the US to attack Iraq.

Similarly, one of the questions being asked after the latest Heathrow alert is whether the operation was mounted to drive bad news from the TV screens.

You see, the continuous pounding of Lebanon by Israel is beginning to alienate the British public from the stance of their government. British Prime Minister Tony Blair says he wants the killing to stop. Yet he joined the US in rejecting the call for an immediate ceasefire.

It is such considerations that made one commentator, Dan Plesch, point out in London's //The Guardian// of August 11 that current attitudes to safety alerts are marred by the fact that the British government's past actions "have been marked by misinformation and false scares", such as "the supposed ricin poison plot" and the Forest Gate raid.

Certainly, the British government's past spinning is undermining its credibility. This is despite the fact that 52 people died in the bomb explosions in London on July 7 last year. If the British security agencies had been engaged in real public safety work, instead of spinning, might they have been able to avert the 7/7 bombings which took them completely by surprise?

Whatever the answer, Blair's close identification with US policy in the Middle East - especially with regard to Iraq and Lebanon - has exposed Britain to the hatred of militant groups of people who sympathise with the suffering of the people. Blair says, however, that it is wrong to link his foreign policy with terrorist attacks at home.

He does not appear to have read a document marked "restricted" but published in //The// //Guardian// on the anniversary of the 7/7 attack, in which senior officers from Scotland Yard, revealed that Iraq and Palestine were cited many times in interviews with detained extremists as "justification" for their resort to violence.

//Duodu is the former editor of the Ghana edition of// Drum. //He is a novelist and playwright and is now based in London//


 * From:** [|**http://www.news24.com/City_Press/Columnists/0,,186-1695_1981777,00.html**]

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