12 December 2008

A special kind of hypocrisy?

Is this what was meant by an ethical foreign policy?
A plane deporting 49 rejected asylum seekers was forced to return to Britain when it was refused permission to land in Kurdistan.
Two passengers on the charter flight from Stansted had been removed before take-off after wounding themselves in their seats, the Guardian has learned.
The drama comes after reports that a 19-year-old deported to Kurdistan on November 27 killed himself soon after landing.

Or this:
Home Secretary Jacqui Smith has warned the cabinet of a possible mass influx of Zimbabweans to the UK amid the country's cholera outbreak.
She said some people were obtaining fake passports from neighbouring countries where, unlike Zimbabwe, citizens do not need UK entry visas.

Or this:
Britain is refusing to take part in a proposed European armed intervention in eastern Congo despite a growing clamour for an EU force to help avoid a bigger humanitarian disaster.
At a summit of European leaders in Brussels last night, foreign ministers from the 27 countries discussed proposals to dispatch a force of up to 1,500 to North Kivu in eastern Congo.

But never mind. Our world-saving Prime Minister is still permitted to offer this kind of self-serving crap:
"Freedom, if it means anything, means the supremacy of human rights everywhere and we must not waver in our support for those across the world whose human rights are threatened or denied," Brown said in his speech.
Addressing the oppressed, including the "women and girls of Kivu", the prime minister said: "The world will not abandon you. We must not, and will not, turn our backs and walk away."

Pass me the sick-bag.

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