UK to continue providing services to Saudi detention centres

The British government confirmed yesterday that, following a review, it is to close Just Solutions International, a state run programme under which public sector justice services were sold to foreign governments, including to governments with appalling human rights records. This announcement follows a legal challenge to the most controversial bid made by the programme, an offer to sell services to the Saudi Arabian detention centres. However, despite the closure of JSi and the ongoing legal proceedings brought by the Gulf Centre for Human Rights (GCHR), the Ministry of Justice has said the JSi-Saudi’s bid will continue.

JSi, which the Ministry of Justice labelled its “commercial arm”, was the subject of international outcry when news broke in January this year of ongoing negotiations to provide prison and probation services to Saudi despite the widespread human rights abuses reported in the country. Routine use of arbitrary detention and torture, surgical paralysis as “eye for an eye” punishment, and a sharp increase in the use of the death penalty, have all been listed as abuses used by the state.

Outwardly, the British government has appeared unconcerned by the charges of hypocrisy levelled at it by critics, who accuse it of outrageous double standards in championing human rights and freedom of speech on one hand, and of apparently assisting and legitimising abuses and repression by doing business with the Saudi detention service on the other.

UK Human Rights Minister Baroness Anelay even sought to defend the actions of the Saudi government in sentencing blogger Raif Badawi to 10 years imprisonment and 1,000 lashes, stating: “We have to recognise that the actions of the Saudi government in these respects have the support of the vast majority of the Saudi population.”

The government’s announcement yesterday made no reference to the controversy over the Saudi bid, stating that JSi’s closure was due to the need “to focus departmental resources on domestic priorities”. It was said that the JSi-Saudi bid would continue because “financial penalties” would be incurred were the bid to be withdrawn.

The review of JSi’s activities was announced after GCHR filed its legal grounds, and the decision to close JSi comes shortly before a preliminary ruling from the High Court is expected on whether the case should proceed to a full trial. GCHR are arguing that the British government has acted ultra vires, a legal principle which prevents governments from exceeding the powers they have been given for the purposes of governing. GCHR say that these powers do not include the power to sell public services abroad for a profit. If this argument is found to be correct, then it could mean that, not only is the JSi-Saudi bid unlawful, but all of JSi’s other dealings with foreign states are as well.

Melanie Gingell, spokeswoman for GCHR, said: “We welcome the government’s announcement, but we are concerned that the Saudi bid continues, and we are concerned at what has been left unsaid; will other existing projects such as JSi’s work in Oman also continue? It is hypocritical of the government to publicly condemn barbarity such as is meted out to Raif Badawi, while at the same time implicitly condoning such activities by bidding to provide services on a commercial basis to those who perpetrate these abuses.”

Adam Hundt, GCHR’s solicitor, said: “The case continues because it is important for the legality of the government’s actions in relation to Saudi Arabia and Oman – and other similar projects the government may decide to pursue – to be determined. The legal challenge to the JSi-Saudi bid concerns a lot more than a mere technicality.”

“The limits imposed on the government’s powers are there for a very good reason: to stop the abuse of those powers. If the UK is to sell its public services to regimes that behead people for sorcery, stone women to death and flog people for expressing pro-democracy views, then one would expect parliament to be consulted and given the opportunity to impose appropriate parameters on such activities.”

GCHR are looking to cover the costs of the case by crowdfunding, and have set up a webpage through which donations can be made. Any additional money not needed for the case will be donated to the Free Raif Badawi Campaign.

You can also follow the case on Twitter.