Wednesday, 26 August, 1998 Yesterday's announcement of new repressive legislation by British premier Tony Blair, in line with the "draconian" measures announced last week by his counterpart in Dublin, Taoiseach Bertie Ahern, has been greeted with stark warnings about the potential abuse of human and civil rights from nationalist politicians and human rights organisation from across the world. The measures announced by Blair mean that people can be arrested and convicted for membership of an outlawed organisation on the 'evidence' of a senior RUC member. Increased restrictions on the right to silence mean that failure to answer, mention or co-operate with the RUC during interrogation or a 'relevant' inquiry will be taken as corroborating the RUC's 'evidence' and inference of guilt. Ahead of next Wednesday, when both the Dail in Dublin and the British Houses' of Parliament in London will be recalled to enact the legislation, Blair also proposed looking at changing the rules on admissable evidence to include transcripts of phone tapping, an idea originating from RUC chief constable Ronnie Flanagan. Also included will be a new offence of 'conspiring to commit a terrorist offence outside the UK', possibly aimed at the Muslim community in Britain. Martin O'Brien of the Committee for the Administration on Justice (CAJ) said, "to convict someone solely on the word of a police officer and the accused's own silence is in breach of the right to a fair trial." He added that in the Six-counties, "the extensive use of emergency powers have allowed the RUC to effectively intern suspects by remand, the consequence of allowing the RUC the choice of who to convict is even starker." Sinn Fein's chief negotiator Martin McGuinness MP called the new measures "retrograde" and said they were "internment under another guise". Sinn Fein TD, Caoimhghin O Caolain calling the new measures "a major mistake" said, "the priority must be to strengthen the peace process." In a joint statement from, Amnesty International, the ICCL, the CAJ, British-Irish Rights Watch and the New York based Human Rights Watch said, "[this] response is not in conformity with internationally protected human rights." British Labour MP Jeremy Corbyn called the measure "counter-productive" and said, they could "create further injustices." The disastrous impact of repressive legislation, on the British statute books for over 76 years, was highlighted in an annual lecture in Belfast recently. West Belfast solicitor Bara McGrory said the current justice system "utterly fails" on the benchmark issues of "equality, fairness and inclusiveness". He emphasised the "wholescale distortion and corruption" of the current system and that laws create the framework for the crown forces and the judiciary operate. The measures will only apply to people charged for 'acts' committed after the Good Friday document was signed on April 10 -- and if convicted they will be denied political status -- but the potential for systematic abuse is collosal. PAST MISTAKES McGuinness underlined the dangers. "The RUC in the eyes of many nationalists is the most discedited police force in Western Europe," he said. "To give [them] these powers when their whole future is in question as a result of the Good Friday document is crazy." "Repressive legislation, like that previously introduced is wrong and only succeeds in creating the conditions for a litany of miscarriages of justice" -- the Birmingham Six, Guildford Four, Beechmount Five, Casement Accused, Sallinins Four, Maguire Seven and Judith Ward. "Over the last thirty years we have had internment, non-jury Diplock courts, PTA, Torture centres from Ballykelly to Castlereagh, supergrass trials -- the result has been the routine violation of human and civil rights and the resulting injustice." McGuinness pointed out that this kind of legislation is what the sections of the Good Friday Agreement dealing with justice issues were meant to remove. Quoting from the agreement, he said they were designed to "deliver a fair and impartial system of justice to the community". "This is what the people voted for and that is where the two governments and all the political parties who signed up to the agreement should be directing all their energies." A spokesperson for British-Irish Rights Watch said previous legislation had been enacted with "little pause for thought". "For example" she added, "after the Birmingham and Guildford bombs came the Prevention of Terrorism Act (PTA) resulting in the wrong people being arrested and spending years in prison for a crime they didn't commit." Reactive legislation is deemed so dangerous in America that the US Congress enacted the Bill of Attainder that prohibits legislation aimed at securing convictions in a specific case. The RUC has for many years been an integral part of the six-county conflict and the action of RUC chief constable Ronnie Flanagan must be remembered. Following the murder of Harry Duggan earlier in the year, three young men from west Belfast known as 'the Twinbrook Three' were arrested and on the word Flanagan Sinn Fein were ejected from the talks process at a pivotal moment. Five months later the three were released without charge and are now in the process of suing the RUC. The CAJ's Paul Mageean and Martin O'Brien pointed out the risks in "affording power to an unrepresentative police force that has been found to have engaged in human rights violations". They said the main effect would be to "convict and imprison the innocent and undermine the rule of law." O'Brien said, "there is no evidence to suggest that the restriction of the right to silence has been successful. Indeed our experience has been that the use of emergency powers has perpetuated rather than resolved the conflict." The CAJ stressed that "[the] often indiscriminate application of legislation to one community has only furthered its' alienation." They added, "the Good Friday document, in its' commitment to human rights recognised that human rights abuses have been part of the problem. It is too precious a prize to risk by repeating the mistakes of the past."