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Nick Baker - 'Blair must act'
July 16, 2003 12:00 AM
Ahead of Tony Blair's visit to Japan this week, and in her third letter to No. 10, Baroness Sarah Ludford MEP has requested a "firm assurance" from the Prime Minister that he will personally raise Nick Baker's case with his Japanese counterpart Prime Minister Koizumi.
Nick Baker was convicted of drug smuggling in June and sentenced to 14 years imprisonment with hard labour. In her July 14th letter to the Prime Minister Sarah Ludford again raises serious concerns about Nick Baker's treatment (eg solitary confinement, interrogation with no lawyer, no taping and no proper interpretation) and fair trial breaches (eg refusal to admit evidence likely to support his claims of innocence).
Said Sarah:
"I am yet to receive a satisfactory response from Tony Blair on these issues despite now having written to him three times. I am seeking a personal assurance that he will raise this case with Prime Minister Koizumi".
"I will not accept an argument that suggests the British government cannot intervene in other countries' judicial procedures. There exist many precedents of government ministers and indeed the Prime Minister himself intervening in individual cases with foreign governments."
"It is time for Tony Blair to tell us - not least Nick's mother who over recent weeks has written to the Prime Minister numerous times - whether or not Nick's case will be on his agenda in Japan."
Examples of cases where the government has raised concerns with foreign governments include:
- Peter Bleach: arrested in December 1995 and subsequently jailed for life in India for arms smuggling. After diplomatic pressure from the Russian President Vladimir Putin, 5 Latvians who were arrested and convicted with Mr Bleach were released in July 2000. Tony Blair is reported to have raised the matter directly with India's Deputy Prime Minister Lal Krishna Advani in June.
- Ian Stillman: himself deaf, worked as a charity worker for the deaf in India for 27 years. He was sentenced to 10 years imprisonment in June 2001 after being arrested when the police claimed to have found drugs in a public taxi in which he was travelling. Mr Stillman's appeal was rejected and the Supreme Court refused leave to appeal in May 2002. A plea for a Presidential Pardon followed and Tony Blair and Jack Straw raised the case with the Indian Government. Ian Stillman was subsequently released and arrived back in the UK in December 2002.
- Ian Nisbet, Reza Pankhurst and Maajid Nawaz: concerns raised with the Egyptian authorities about their trial and treatment, including confessions and the time it is taking for their trial to be heard. Arrested in April 2002, they were accused of promoting an Islamic group banned in Egypt.
- Richard Mechan: has now spent three years in prison in Bahrain having been convicted of manslaughter. The Foreign Secretary has written to the Bahrain Government following serious concerns that his trial was not fair in accordance with international standards.
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