02 December 2010

Breaking all the rules

None of the media, particularly including the BBC, seems to have made much of this story - which, to me, seems utterly disgraceful:

British and American officials colluded in a plan to hoodwink parliament over a proposed ban on cluster bombs, the Guardian can disclose.

According to leaked US embassy dispatches, David Miliband, who was Britain's foreign secretary under Labour, approved the use of a loophole to manoeuvre around the ban and allow the US to keep the munitions on British territory.

Unlike Britain, the US had refused to sign up to an international convention that bans the weapons because of the widespread injury they cause to civilians.

The US military asserted that cluster bombs were "legitimate weapons that provide a vital military capability" and wanted to carry on using British bases regardless of the ban.

Whitehall officials proposed that a specially created loophole to grant the US a free hand should be concealed from parliament in case it "complicated or muddied" the MPs' debate.

Did Miliband D think that he would not be found out? Just as well that he did not become Labour leader.

And it's about time the MoD/FCO woke up to the fact that secret arms deals are no longer the flavour of the month.

1 comment:

Richard T said...

Did you also, see presumably under Mr David Milliband's approval, that the UK Government would make sure that the USA would not be embarassed by any documents going to the Chilcott enquiry? I'd dance at the demise of the Labour Government if I wasn't so certain that the Tories under wee Willie Hague will be worse in kissing the Americans' arse. Indeed the wikileaks extracts prove it.