Britain is leading the charge against basic human rights

[viper37]

However, who gets to decide if a certain situation involves genocide, war crimes, or crimes against humanity? 

Forensinc anthropologist, once the war is over and they can safely examine mass grave sites and determine the proper cause of death.

Or the usual: international/NATO/UN observers make a report on a situation and call it war crimes or crimes against humanity, but generally refrain from calling it genocide.  The stuff that usually leads to a Security council vote on actions to be taken, really.  Same as now, but with a provision to restrain from using veto instead of US/China/Russia blocking any intervention outside of the French or British sphere of influence.

[CountDeMoney]

Forensinc anthropologist, once the war is over and they can safely examine mass grave sites and determine the proper cause of death.

Buddy of mine did that in the former Yugorapistan, back in the late '90s.

[Neil]

The global report also condemns world leaders for failing to intervene in conflicts such as Syria, Gaza and Ukraine, in what it calls a "catastrophic year" for millions of people caught up in violence.

Amnesty called on the UN Security Council to renounce its veto power – wielded solely by the five permanent members, Britain, China, France, Russia and the US – to make it easier for peacekeeping forces to be deployed to prevent genocide or mass atrocities.

You know what each of those situations needed?  NATO airstrikes and UN peacekeepers.  That never fails.

Having US planes smashing Russian armour would definitely de-escalate the situation, right?

At any rate, without a US veto, the Security Council has no legitimacy.

[dps]

At any rate, without a US veto, the Security Council has no legitimacy.

OTOH, I have no problem with the idea of Britian, France, China, and Russia give up their vetoes.

[Neil]

At any rate, without a US veto, the Security Council has no legitimacy.

OTOH, I have no problem with the idea of Britian, France, China, and Russia give up their vetoes.

Clearly.  The Britain and the Russian state are irrelevancies, China has never been a global power and France is useful, but limited.

[Ed Anger]

Everybody knows Ameica is the real threat to world peace, with it's hetreonormative CIS gendered white male power structure.

[CountDeMoney]

Everybody knows Ameica is the real threat to world peace, with it's hetreonormative CIS gendered white male power structure.

The fuck does Mark Harmon have to do with anything?

[Ed Anger]

I laughed

[Admiral Yi]

I laughed

That's because you're so fucking jolly.

[Syt]

With the threatened withdrawal from the ECHR by the UK I'm not overly worried that Britain will descend into an oppressive dictatorship overnight. I'm worried about the precedent this will create for countries that have in the past been unhappy with the rulings of the European Human Rights Courts, like Russia or Turkey, if a nation who was instrumental in creating the system abandons it. It will significantly lower the threshold for them to say that their definition of human rights is not represented by the ECHR and therefore they withdraw, because they refuse to have alien (decadent) values imposed on their countries.

[Sheilbh]

Exactly.

Why is that so terrible?

Well it's not clear.

There's no transparency. The MoU between the Saudis and the MoJ hasn't been released because it's 'commercially sensitive' (let's not forget we dropped an investigation into corruption into arms sales to the Saudis our of national security sensitivities), add in the flag at half mast when Abdullah died and there's a difference between being an ally which is probably justifiable and being supine. And isn't there a question of a conflict of interest if the MoJ is a commercial client of the Saudi state if, for example, another corruption investigation into British-Saudi links were to proceed?

Because of the lack of transparency we're not sure what they'll be doing. AI have rightly asked whether they'll be able to challenge any problems or abuses they may find? Let's assume that there's a possibility that this MoJ team possibly find what we'd consider malpractice in the Saudi punishment system. Are they able to challenge that or to try to prevent abuse and what is their own position in terms of human rights safeguards?

The MoJ is also probably the worst affected by the government cuts of the last 5 years and Chris Grayling a shockingly incompetent minister. I'm not convinced on principle that we should be selling the services of our civil service to try and get them to make money by providing services to other countries. But I think in the most stretched government department it's a particularly bad idea. It's worth pointing out that this 'company' doesn't have a separate profit and loss accounts and isn't trading under relevant law - it's a part of the MoJ but apparently 'commercial sensitivity' in current and future negotiations mean it's not subject to freedom of information requests.

Ultimately doesn't this also lend legitimacy to the whole system of Saudi punishment. 'We've had training in best practice from the British government'.

The whole thing stinks in my opinion and is symptomatic of many of the problems with this government

[Gups]

So what is it that Britain is doing that goes beyond this sort of thing?

I'd guess attempting to withdraw from the European Human Rights Convention and the European Court of Human Rights and replace it with a homegrown British Human Rights act taking local sensibilities into account and avoiding pesky oversight by someone not answerable to Her Majesty's Government.

The report by Amnesty International mentions that, as it happens.

UK Judges are not answerable to the Government. 99% of the beef with the ECHR revolves around extradition of terrorists (alleged or convicted).

[Sheilbh]

And the other 1% is votes for prisoners.

[Martinus]

With the threatened withdrawal from the ECHR by the UK I'm not overly worried that Britain will descend into an oppressive dictatorship overnight.

[Syt]

I expected you to go with