Catholic Herald refuses to publish torture victim's article
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Version 0 of 1. In early August, the Catholic Herald published an article by Sir Mark Allen, “The saints’ answer to terrorism”. Written in the wake of the murder on 26 July of the French priest, Jacques Hamel, it was a sensitive response to the crime. “Such people” wrote Allen, “are witnesses, martyrs, to the truths for which they have died.” He continued: “They teach us that beyond our human estimations of value, our Darwinian approval of conflict and survival (if not winning), there lies a greater order, dimly perceived by the eye of faith, but reaching out further and wider, deeper and more secretly than we can understand, known in mystery only to God, the order of Love.” The magazine, a weekly, did not provide a biography of Allen, so its readers would have been ignorant of the fact that he was once the head of MI6’s counter-terrorism unit. Nor would they have known of his having been implicated in the arrest in Thailand in 2004 of an anti-Gaddafi Libyan politician, Abdel Hakim Belhaj*, and his subsequent rendition to Libya, where he was tortured by Gaddafi’s regime in Tripoli. Similarly, they would not have been aware of Allen’s self-congratulatory note to Moussa Koussa, the then head of the Libyan intelligence agency, after Belhaj’s arrest saying: “This was the least we could do for you and for Libya to demonstrate the remarkable relationship we have built over recent years.” That communication was discovered in Koussa’s office following the fall of Gaddafi’s regime and led to a police investigation into Allen’s activities. But, in June, Allen was informed by the Crown Prosecution Service that there was insufficient evidence to charge him over the rendition and torture of Belhaj and another Libyan, Sami al-Saadi. Belhaj, who was abducted along with his wife, Fatima Bouchar, felt it only fair for Catholic Herald readers to know more about Allen. So he wrote an open letter, which was offered to the Herald for publication. It was rejected by the Herald’s editor, Luke Coppen, on the grounds that the magazine has a policy not to publish open letters. Belhaj’s letter was then amended into a straightforward opinion piece and resubmitted. It was not published and Coppen has not responded to requests asking why. In the letter, Belhaj said of Allen’s article that it was “staggering to read such sentiments” and that “it seems fair to ask how you reconcile your actions towards me, and my family, with your faith in God.” It continued: Have a dozen years passed since that first summer in Tajoura prison? To me, it feels like moments ago. Surely it cannot have been 12 years since I was hung strappado in Gaddafi’s cells... Surely less time since my wife, heavy with child, was turned out of her cell to give birth. Moments since our son, born early, with no more heft than a loaf of bread, clung to his tiny life in the dictator’s shadow. You write of sacrifice and I wonder whose sacrifice you meant. Belhaj referred to there being “moments in a cell when you are alone, truly alone, with God” and asked Allen: “How can you speak of strength through faith when you never acknowledge or atone for the violence you helped do to others?” Even so, he concluded, “Fatima and I are ready to forgive. Our offer of forgiveness has always been, and remains, sincere. “But you must be prepared to look on us as humans, no different from yourself, and say, honestly, what happened and apologise. We trust in your faith to guide you. We are ready. Are you?” Cori Crider, a US lawyer who works for the human rights organisation, Reprieve, said of the Catholic Herald’s refusal to publish Belhaj’s reponse to Allen: “I query how a Christian paper can, in good faith, run articles from Sir Mark about ‘the greater order of Love’ while batting away the views of his victims. “Confession and repentance are key tenets of Catholicism. All Abdel Hakim and Fatima ask is an apology. The offer is still there.” Emails sent 24 hours ago to Sir Mark for comment about Belhaj via his solicitor, via BP, where he is a special adviser, and to St Antony’s College, Oxford, where he is a honorary fellow, have elicited no replies. And there was no reply to an email sent to Luke Coppen asking why he has refused to publish the amended article by Belhaj. NB: Abdel Hakim Belhaj’s name is sometimes transliterated as Abdul-Hakim Belhaj or Belhadj. |