Downing Street Says » Natwest Three

In response to the suggestion that a former US ambassador had said that extraditing the Natwest three was a political decision by the government, as the treaty had not yet been ratified by the US senate, the PMOS said, without commenting on the specific details of the case, that was based on a misconception. This misconception was that we had in some way given a unilateral concession to the United States. That was not true. In the past the US had actually faced a higher threshold of evidence when it had sought to extradite people from the UK when compared to the threshold other countries had to cross, or indeed the threshold the UK had to cross when extraditing people from US to the UK.

The threshold in the past for the US had been "prima facie" evidence, whereas for other countries, and for UK extradition from US, it only needed to be "probable cause". What we had done in 2003 had been very simply to put the US on the same level playing field as everybody else. In other words we had made the standard of evidence that the US needed to produce for UK extradition the same as for Europe and UK extradition from the US. We extradited people from the US on "probable cause" and not "prima facie" evidence. Therefore the extradition threshold was now uniformally "probable cause" not "prima facie" evidence. This brought the US into line with some 50 other countries. The US was not being more favoured that any other country, it was simply now on a level playing field. Therefore the criticism of the US for a change of threshold would have implications for the 50 other countries with that same threshold, not to mention the UK’s own extradition requirements in the US.

Put that the US was not meeting their end of the bargain, the PMOS said that to suggest that was not taking on board the argument he had just outlined. It had in the past been more difficult for the US to extradite someone from the UK that it had been for the UK to extradite someone from the US back to the UK. All we had done was level the playing field. So it terms of reciprocity it was us who had stopped being unfair.

In response to the suggestion that there was no need for the US to ratify the treaty, the PMOS that in fact the UK had yet to ratify the treaty. We had introduced domestic legislation to level the playing field. The ratification of the treaty would streamline the process and extend the range of offences. Ratification was not relevant in this situation as it was about the equality of evidence required by both sides. Of course we wanted ratification to occur and it would be ratified here when it was ratified in the US.

8 Comments »

The controversy about the extradition of the so called NatWest Three to Mr Bush\x92s United States neglects a fundamental issue. Whether they are guilty or not has no bearing on this fundamental issue, of the extent to which British citizens, including those who have never been to the United States, are subject to American law and can be extradited to the United States on the whim of an FBI officer.
Comment by Dr B J Jameson — 9 Jul 2006 on 7:30 am | Link
I am appalled that this government is willing to give away any rights of British Citizens to the US, virtually on demand,without any valid reciprocal agreement.
Furthermore I have read no valid justification for the trial not being held in Britain or evenan alternative of agreed bail and reasonable timetable for a trial in the US.
Comment by M Dugdale — 11 Jul 2006 on 10:53 am | Link
I am appalled that this government is willing to give away any rights of British Citizens to the US, virtually on demand,without any valid reciprocal agreement.
Furthermore I have read no valid justification for the trial not being held in Britain or evenan alternative of agreed bail and reasonable timetable for a trial in the US.
Comment by M Dugdale — 11 Jul 2006 on 10:53 am | Link
this explanation of extradition to the usa of uk citizens is as confusing as it gets. having read it three times the conclusion one comes to is "everything is ok, we are at fault what are you moaning about" so why bother to ratify ? another conclusion is we are all stupid and will believe anything if it is tied up in convoluted language. during the IRA attacks we could not extradite known IRA terrorists from the usa using "probable cause" or "prima facie" or even preavail upon the usa to stop their money collecting operations for the IRA. it was only a short time back when a UK citizen was wrongfully detained in a SA jail for three weeks on the call of the FBI. the uk sat on its hands for that one as well. then there was the atrocious affair of the usa airforce plane slicing through a cable car cable in the italian alps causing the deaths of 20 people what happened to the extradition of the perpatrators as reported then nothing, and they were exonerated in a usa court.
Comment by peter — 11 Jul 2006 on 12:07 pm | Link
this explanation of extradition to the usa of uk citizens is as confusing as it gets. having read it three times the conclusion one comes to is "everything is ok, we are at fault what are you moaning about" so why bother to ratify ? another conclusion is we are all stupid and will believe anything if it is tied up in convoluted language. during the IRA attacks we could not extradite known IRA terrorists from the usa using "probable cause" or "prima facie" or even preavail upon the usa to stop their money collecting operations for the IRA. it was only a short time back when a UK citizen was wrongfully detained in a SA jail for three weeks on the call of the FBI. the uk sat on its hands for that one as well. then there was the atrocious affair of the usa airforce plane slicing through a cable car cable in the italian alps causing the deaths of 20 people what happened to the extradition of the perpatrators as reported then nothing, and they were exonerated in a usa court.
Comment by peter — 11 Jul 2006 on 12:08 pm | Link
this explanation of extradition to the usa of uk citizens is as confusing as it gets. having read it three times the conclusion one comes to is "everything is ok, we are at fault what are you moaning about" so why bother to ratify ? another conclusion is we are all stupid and will believe anything if it is tied up in convoluted language. during the IRA attacks we could not extradite known IRA terrorists from the usa using "probable cause" or "prima facie" or even preavail upon the usa to stop their money collecting operations for the IRA. it was only a short time back when a UK citizen was wrongfully detained in a SA jail for three weeks on the call of the FBI. the uk sat on its hands for that one as well. then there was the atrocious affair of the usa airforce plane slicing through a cable car cable in the italian alps causing the deaths of 20 people what happened to the extradition of the perpatrators as reported then nothing, and they were exonerated in a usa court.
Comment by peter — 11 Jul 2006 on 12:13 pm | Link
As the alleged crime was committed in the UK and UK authorities do not consider a crime has been committed there is no case for extradition.
Comment by John May — 12 Jul 2006 on 4:42 pm | Link
I cannot believe that Tony Blair has allowed this to happen. I was going to go to the States for the summer break now – I will stay in Europe cos I feel so disgusted.
When these 3 come home and their book comes out Mr Blair and the rest of his cronies will wince – or by then will they have bought a peerage?
Comment by Ben Kaye — 14 Jul 2006 on 4:09 pm | Link

RSS feed for comments on this post.

Post a public comment

Name (required)
E-mail (required)
(You must give an email address, but it will not be displayed to the public.)
Website
(You may give your website, and it will be displayed to the public.)

Comments:

This is not a way of contacting the Prime Minister. If you would like to contact the Prime Minister, go to the 10 Downing Street official site.

Privacy note: Shortly after posting, your name and comment will be displayed on the site. This means that people searching for your name on the Internet will be able to find and read your comment.

Original PMOS briefings are © Crown Copyright. Crown Copyright material is reproduced with the permission of the Controller of HMSO and the Queen's Printer for Scotland. Click-use licence number C02W0004089. Material is reproduced from the original 10 Downing Street source, but may not be the most up-to-date version of the briefings, which might be revised at the original source. Users should check with the original source in case of revisions. Comments are © Copyright contributors. Everything else is © Copyright Downing Street Says.

» Wednesday, July 5, 2006

Natwest Three

8 Comments »

Post a public comment

Search

Supported by

Recent Briefings

Archives

Links

Syndicate (RSS/XML)

Credits

Enquiries