A Tunisian male suspected of planning an assassination of Kurt Westergaard (the artist that drew the infamous picture showing Muhammed with a bomb in his turban) was recently discovered to live virtually next door to Westergaard's home.
This caused understandable uproar; someone suspected of planning an assassination should be arrested.
But the case is alarming for quite different reasons.
Some years ago, following the 9/11 attack, the Danish right-wing government passed an anti-terror legislation, which included the use of so-called "administrative expulsions." They are more severe than they may sound, as they enable the Danish police intelligence agency to state which non-Danish citizens should be expelled from the country without trial based on mere suspicion that they pose a danger to the nation.
This is what happened to the Tunisian male. After suspecting him of planning the assassination of Westergaard, the police intelligence agency assigned him for expulsion from Denmark, referring to the new administrative expulsion option. However, Tunisia is known for its use of torture, and it would be illegal to return the Tunisian male to his home country. The Tunisian male was therefore released from custody and has been able to travel freely, and will never be charged of the crime that he allegedly had planned.
This is evidently absurd, but it gets worse.
The Danish right-wing government had first attempted to expel the Tunisian male to Tunisia nonetheless based on so-called "diplomatic guarantees," a simple, official Tunisian statement that the Tunisian male would not be subjected to torture—obviously a worthless guarantee that earned the Danish government heavy criticism from Amnesty International, the UN Human Rights Commitee, and several other human rights organizations. The Danish government responded to the criticism by postponing its decision to use diplomatic guarantees, and instead ventured further down the path of absurdity:
Not intending to let the assassination suspect go, a resolution was hurried through parliament proposing that the Tunisian male and others living as so-called "tolerated residents" must be sent to the Sandholm camp (a Danish refugee camp whose role in the Danish treatment of refugees has been criticized by human rights organizations) or alternatively be imprisoned until it becomes possible to return them to their home countries.
This all means that in practice the Danish government has proposed that detainees whose case was never tried in court, who never saw the evidence of their crime, and who were thus unable to defend themselves against the accusations, can be imprisoned indefinitely.
Unfortunately, this sounds all too familiar: the US has kept suspects imprisoned for years without trial in Guantánamo. It seems the Danish government was not only more than willing to follow the US into a war in Iraq that has cost countless civilian lives and made life miserable for even more. It now also attempts to implement the US model of Guantánamo on Danish soil.
On the upside, Denmark is part of the European Union and must obey the European Human Rights Convention, which prohibits such imprisonment of suspects without trial. If the Danish government succeeds in passing its new legislation, it will have to answer to the European Human Rights Convention.
This caused understandable uproar; someone suspected of planning an assassination should be arrested.
But the case is alarming for quite different reasons.
Some years ago, following the 9/11 attack, the Danish right-wing government passed an anti-terror legislation, which included the use of so-called "administrative expulsions." They are more severe than they may sound, as they enable the Danish police intelligence agency to state which non-Danish citizens should be expelled from the country without trial based on mere suspicion that they pose a danger to the nation.
This is what happened to the Tunisian male. After suspecting him of planning the assassination of Westergaard, the police intelligence agency assigned him for expulsion from Denmark, referring to the new administrative expulsion option. However, Tunisia is known for its use of torture, and it would be illegal to return the Tunisian male to his home country. The Tunisian male was therefore released from custody and has been able to travel freely, and will never be charged of the crime that he allegedly had planned.
This is evidently absurd, but it gets worse.
The Danish right-wing government had first attempted to expel the Tunisian male to Tunisia nonetheless based on so-called "diplomatic guarantees," a simple, official Tunisian statement that the Tunisian male would not be subjected to torture—obviously a worthless guarantee that earned the Danish government heavy criticism from Amnesty International, the UN Human Rights Commitee, and several other human rights organizations. The Danish government responded to the criticism by postponing its decision to use diplomatic guarantees, and instead ventured further down the path of absurdity:
Not intending to let the assassination suspect go, a resolution was hurried through parliament proposing that the Tunisian male and others living as so-called "tolerated residents" must be sent to the Sandholm camp (a Danish refugee camp whose role in the Danish treatment of refugees has been criticized by human rights organizations) or alternatively be imprisoned until it becomes possible to return them to their home countries.
This all means that in practice the Danish government has proposed that detainees whose case was never tried in court, who never saw the evidence of their crime, and who were thus unable to defend themselves against the accusations, can be imprisoned indefinitely.
Unfortunately, this sounds all too familiar: the US has kept suspects imprisoned for years without trial in Guantánamo. It seems the Danish government was not only more than willing to follow the US into a war in Iraq that has cost countless civilian lives and made life miserable for even more. It now also attempts to implement the US model of Guantánamo on Danish soil.
On the upside, Denmark is part of the European Union and must obey the European Human Rights Convention, which prohibits such imprisonment of suspects without trial. If the Danish government succeeds in passing its new legislation, it will have to answer to the European Human Rights Convention.
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