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David Hicks, PM Blair and the Law Lord

With the news that the English Court of Appeal has dismissed the Government's appeal from the decision of a single judge to grant David Hicks UK citizenship, just today this news report in The Age from The Guardian:

"Prime Minister Tony Blair's refusal to condemn Guantanamo Bay detention centre is "shaming for our country", a former British law lord says.

Lord Steyn, who retired last year from Britain's highest court, said: "Unfortunately, our Prime Minister is not prepared to go further than to say that Guantanamo Bay is an understandable anomaly. In its feebleness, this response to a flagrant breach of the rule of law, reminiscent of the worst actions of totalitarian states, is shaming for our country."

Read the full article here.

This morning Major Mori, David Hicks' US attorney, was interviewed on the ABC's Radio National's Breakfast program. He asserted that Hicks was back in solitary confinement and only allowed out of his cell 30 minutes a day. Mori also said that the Australian Government claimed that Hicks was not in solitary confinement but in a "single occupancy cell". Semantics at work again, Mr Ruddock! Yet another example of a Minister not suitable to occupy the office he does.

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