You have fewer rights than foreign criminals
DID you know that it is easier to forcibly extradite a British citizen to a European country that wishes to prosecute him than it is to deport a foreign criminal back to his country of origin?
The European Convention on Human Rights means that even the most monstrous characters from the Third World can usually find ways to evade deportation.
This week Robert Mugabe’s former henchman Phillip Machemedze won the right to live in Britain even though he has committed acts of torture on behalf of the Zimbabwean despot.
Despite Mr Justice David Archer confirming that Machemedze had been “deeply involved in savage acts of extreme violence”, he said sending him back to Zimbabwe would probably lead to his torture and execution without trial as he had fallen out with Mugabe.
So Machemedze gets to stay in Britain on human rights grounds and receive expensive, tax payer funded NHS treatment for being HIV positive.
But under the European Arrest Warrant, no Briton is likely to be able to resist extradition on such grounds because all EU member states are deemed to uphold fundamental human rights despite the judicial processes in many EU countries leaving a lot to be desired.
So African mobsters can come to Britain to escape accountability for their crimes while Britons of previous good character can be forcibly transported to countries such as Italy which frequently hold people in prison for many months before putting them on trial. I don’t know about you but I think that is a scandal.