Getting away with murder

Over at Harry’s Place, Brett is troubled:

I’m starting to get the uncomfortable feeling that the Government is increasingly making up the law as it goes along, without any thought for establishing a coherent whole.

Funny how some of us noticed this trait ten years ago, but better late than never. Brett is, moreover, right to be concerned. The source of his discomfiture is this proposed change to the homicide law to replace the partial defence of provocation that currently exists with two new defences:

These would be if someone killed over fears about serious violence, or if they could show they were “seriously wronged” by the victim’s actions.

The law changes would apply to England, Wales and Northern Ireland.

Attorney General Baroness Scotland said they would bring the law “up to date”.

Under the plans, the partial defence of diminished responsibility would also be abolished and replaced with a new defence based on “recognised medical conditions”.

The partial defence of “fear of serious violence” could be used by long-term domestic abuse victims, arguing they were forced to kill their abuser.

And in “exceptional circumstances” a defendant could successfully claim they killed in response to words or conduct that left them feeling “seriously wronged”.

The Ministry of Justice said someone could not claim to be “seriously wronged” if they found out their partner was having an affair, whereas adultery can count under the current provocation defence.

A spokeswoman said the existing law “is designed to cater for anger killing, but it is not significantly well tailored for killings that are a response to fear.

While many would agree that women (or for that matter, men) who kill in fear of a violent partner should have some sort of recourse to a defence against a murder charge (which carries a mandatory life sentence under English law), it is more than doubtful that this is a helpful or necessary change.

The government has itself pointed out that the current arrangements involve judges tailoring a defence designed to deal with crimes of anger to deal with crimes of fear. While this is hardly ideal, it is unclear how the government’s latest proposal is an improvement. The proposed “fear of serious violence” defence sounds reasonable on the face of it - but in a society where domestic violence has been brought well and truly into the open, and where the opportunities for victims of domestic violence to escape and seek support are extensive, is this really a necessary move? Would it not be better to place further emphasis on countering abuse and supporting its victims, rather than offer a free pass on murder as an option? Shouldn’t the point rather be to reduce violence?

More worrying by far is the “seriously wronged” defence. While the Ministry of Justice seems to think it knows what this means, can we be sure that all judges will in all cases agree? Why should anyone who feels themselves “seriously wronged” be allowed to get away from murder? Haven’t we been trying to wean certain sections of society away from this concept? No doubt the so-called “honour killers” who have slaughtered young female relatives for the sake of respect for their family name will feel themselves vindicated by this news. The Ministry of Justice has elected to tread a very dangerous path.

Actions speak louder

Robert Mugabe’s personal attachment to “hard power” seems to have borne fruit at last. Having spent weeks bludgeoning the people of Zimbabwe into submission following the presidential election in March, the opposition Movement for Democratic Change and its leader Morgan Tsvangirai have finally agreed to enter talks with the Mugabe regime.

Amidst much fanfare Mugabe and Tsvangirai shook hands on an agreement to negotiate a settlement to the nation’s “constitutional crisis”. We are all expected to cheer an end to the violence and admire the mature way in which these two individuals and their respective parties will resolve their differences around a table.

The reality is rather different. At best, the MDC has surrendered. At worst, Morgan Tsvangirai may have been bought off. It is unreasonable to criticise the opposition leader too strongly, however. He and his followers have displayed considerable courage thus far, in a campaign for democracy which has been paid for with much blood. In order to succeed the Zimbabwean opposition needed the support of the international community, and in the end this support has not been forthcoming.

The veto by China and Russia on a motion condemning the Mugabe regime at the U.N. Security Council will have been a significant factor in the MDC’s thinking. The failure of the African Union to bring real pressure to bear will have been another. The pedestrian mediation efforts of South Africa’s President Thabo Mbeki will have been a third. When push came to shove, there was no shove. Tsvangirai has no more cards to play and he knows it.

If this is an example of an “African solution”, then it is no solution at all. Recent indications from Kenya and now Zimbabwe are that Africa has a peculiar understanding of democracy. First of all there is an election. Then there is an extended period of violence. Then there is some kind of negotiated settlement which may or may not pay heed to the will of the people democratically expressed.

It won’t do and it has to stop.

We stop it firstly by declining to pay for it. It is time for western aid to be conditional on certain minimal standards of governance. This may not mean perfect democratic elections in all cases, but it certainly has to mean respect for human rights and the rule of law.

We stop it secondly by making clear that we take the “responsibility to protect” seriously. There is little point in the International Criminal Court bringing genocide charges against the President of Sudan if the Arab League chooses to support Sudan in defying the ICC.

Time to put aside the post-colonial guilt. The West is not responsible for atrocities in Darfur, or in Zimbabwe, or in Burma. The West needs to be clear that it will not be complicit in these crimes by subsidising the perpetrators of by failing to take preventative action. Where hard power is needed, we must be ready to use it. As Robert Mugabe well knows, actions speak louder than words.

Hard Power

Three weeks ago, after six years of captivity in horrendous conditions at the hands of the FARC guerilla group, the French-Colombian politician Ingrid Betancourt was finally freed along with fourteen fellow hostages as a result of a magnificently effective and successful operation by the Colombian military, security and intelligence services. Six years of European diplomatic and moral “pressure”, pointless parliamentary resolutions and “demands” for her release having failed, the Colombian President Alvaro Uribe settled the matter once and for all. Charles Krauthammer comments:

This in foreign policy establishment circles is called “hard power.” In the Bush years, hard power is terribly out of fashion, seen as a mere obsession of cowboys and neocons. Both in Europe and America, the sophisticates worship at the altar of “soft power” — the use of diplomatic and moral resources to achieve one’s ends.

Europe luxuriates in soft power, nowhere more than in l’affaire Betancourt in which Europe’s repeated gestures of solidarity hovered somewhere between the fatuous and the destructive. Europe had been pressing the Colombian government to negotiate for the hostages. Venezuela’s Hugo Chavez offered to mediate.

Of course, we know from documents captured in a daring Colombian army raid into Ecuador in March — your standard hard-power operation duly denounced by that perfect repository of soft power, the Organization of American States — that Chavez had been secretly funding and pulling the strings of the FARC.

It’s a story we now know only too well, and yet the lesson is not learned. As Krauthammer points out, “hard power” is out of fashion these days on both sides of the Atlantic. Barack Obama was widely criticised for declaring his willingness to negotiate with the Iranian government (and in principle with anyone else) “without preconditions”. Yet the force of the criticism was rather dulled by the talks which the American government has itself recently held with Iran. The behaviour of Robert Mugabe and his gangster regime in Zimbabwe is roundly condemned far and wide - but to what effect? A letter to the Times from the Director of Amnesty International in the UK opines:

Military intervention is not the solution to the crisis unfolding in Zimbabwe.

Hundreds of thousands of people are suffering from intimidation, harassment and torture; millions have been deprived of food after the Government suspended NGO operations, and those who dare to speak out are arrested or arbitrarily detained.

Surely it is reckless to deploy an international military force into this already vulnerable state?

Rather, the regional powers in southern Africa should use their influence to pressure the Government of Zimbabwe to restore peace. An emergency summit should be convened by the South African Development Community at which it can set out concrete measures to stem the tide of abuse.

As if a man who will happily wreak terrible vengeance on his own people for their impertinence at failing to vote for him would be swayed by constructive criticism from his neighbours. And still the people of Darfur continue to suffer, no matter how many tears are shed, speeches made, conferences held. At last the President of Sudan is to be indicted on charges of crimes against humanity, but who is there to deliver him to the Hague for trial? Charles Krauthammer gets to the nub of the matter:

What is done to free these people? Nothing. Everyone knows it will take the hardest of hard power to remove the oppressors in Zimbabwe, Burma, Sudan and other godforsaken places where the bad guys have the guns and use them. Indeed, as the Zimbabwean opposition leader suggested (before quickly retracting) from his hideout in the Dutch embassy — Europe specializes in providing haven for those fleeing the evil that Europe does nothing about — the only solution is foreign intervention.

And who’s going to intervene? The only country that could is the country that in the last two decades led coalitions that liberated Kuwait, Bosnia, Kosovo and Afghanistan. Having sacrificed much blood and treasure in its latest endeavor — the liberation of 25 million Iraqis from the most barbarous tyranny of all, and its replacement with what is beginning to emerge as the Arab world’s first democracy — and having earned near-universal condemnation for its pains, America has absolutely no appetite for such missions.

Of course in Iraq, as in Afghanistan, the United States has not shouldered the burden alone. But both the U.K. and U.S. governments, and more generally, the political establishment in both countries, are showing signs of exhaustion. This is a dangerous and dispiriting state of affairs. The cause of freedom and democracy depends above all on those who will arise to defend them.