4 2GM Saturday December 18 2021 | the times
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Ben Wallace has said it is “highly
unlikely” that Britain or its allies will
send troops to defend Ukraine if Russia
invades.
The defence secretary appeared to
row back from previous comments
when he said that the UK could deploy
“defence capabilities” to see off a threat
from Russia.
Wallace said that Ukraine was not a
member of Nato and so the concept of
collective defence did not apply. He told
The Spectator magazine: “It is not a
member of Nato so it is highly unlikely
that anyone is going to send troops into
Ukraine to challenge Russia. We
shouldn’t kid people we would. The
Ukrainians are aware of that.”
Asked if that meant Ukraine was on
its own, he said: “We can all help with
capacity building but to some extent
Ukraine is not in Nato and that is why
we are doing the best diplomatically to
say to Putin don’t do this.” He said deep
Dominic Raab has admitted that his
reforms to human rights laws will not
prevent soldiers being hounded in the
courts over historic cases despite suc-
cessive Conservative governments
promising to stop the practice.
At the last general election Boris
Johnson pledged to end the “inappro-
priate application” of the Human
Rights Act to war zones and to events
that took place before the law was intro-
duced in 1998, such as the Northern
New domestic law won’t stop soldier prosecutions
Ireland Troubles. The former prime
ministers David Cameron and Theresa
May also stood on pledges to “rip up”
human rights laws to protect soldiers.
A series of court judgments has ex-
tended the jurisdiction of the European
Convention on Human Rights, which
was brought into UK law by the Human
Rights Act, to encompass acts during
combat and in territory that is not
covered by the convention, such as
Iraq. Veterans of the armed forces who
served in Northern Ireland have also
been pursued over claims for killingsthat happened before 1998. Despite
pledges to prevent the extra-territorial
and historical application of the con-
vention, the government’s plans to re-
form the act, published this week by
Raab, the justice secretary, stated that
there is “no unilateral domestic legis-
lative solution to this issue”.
A consultation document said that
adding restrictions to the application of
the convention’s territorial basis to the
government’s new Bill of Rights would
“not resolve the issue at the inter-
national level” as claimants could stillsue the armed forces and individual sol-
diers by taking a case to the European
Court of Human Rights in Strasbourg.
Raab’s department said the govern-
ment would work with the Strasbourg
court to find a solution.
The consultation said the convention
was also leading to hundreds of serious
criminals being given police protection.
Raab said: “It’s staggering that, in the
name of the Human Rights Act,
precious police resources have to be di-
verted from other operational priorities
to protect gangsters from each other.”Matt Dathan Home Affairs Editor
Raising the tone Sue Kreitzman, a member of the Colour Tribe, an east London artists’ group, and Florent Bidois, set off on the London Colour Walk, now in its sixth year
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accuses of emitting noxious gases.
Rebecca Currie, of Silverdale,
Staffordshire, sued the
Environment Agency on behalf
of her son Mathew, five, who has
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A previously unheard acetate
single recorded by David Bowie
when he was still a teenager and
performing under his real name
has sold for £14,440 at an auction
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Davy Jones and the Lower Third
was recorded in 1965 and
described as a “full-on, Who-style
assault with slashing guitars and
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Wayne Couzens, the police officer
who murdered Sarah Everard,
has been given permission to
appeal against his whole-life
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is expected to take place in April
or May before three judges and
follows a decision by Alix Beldam,
the registrar of criminal appeals.
The assessment was made on
documents, not oral submissions.100 more cross Channel
About 100 migrants crossed
the Channel from France and
Border Force officers expect
more this weekend because of
calm weather. Until Wednesday
there had been no crossings
for a week in the bad weather.
About 30 people were rescued in
windy conditions by a lifeboat
crew and brought ashore at
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A serial sex offender attacked six
lone women within days of being
released from prison. Joshua
Victorin, 25, was jailed for life
yesterday after attacks committed
in south London between
December 23 last year and
January 4 when he was living in a
probation hostel. At Inner
London crown court, Victorin,
who has seven previous
convictions, admitted sexual
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was given a minimum term of
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Cryptic clues every day onlineJEFF MOOREBritain unlikely to send troops
to help Ukraine, says Wallace
and serious economic sanctions with
long-lasting implications were being
threatened against Russia instead.
British and European officials do not
believe President Putin has yet decided
whether to invade. Russia has con-
tinued to build up its forces in the past
few weeks despite warnings by the US
of harsh economic penalties.
“The Russian military build up is for
a purpose,” Wallace said. “We aren’t
sure that he [Putin] has made a decision
but nevertheless his actions and his
military preparations indicate that way... I think we should all be worried.”
The defence secretary said that there
was a debate among western nations as
to whether Putin would invade and
how quickly he could seize territory.
In the latest development, Russia has
demanded that Nato withdraw all mili-
tary bases and troops from central and
eastern European countries, including
those within the EU.
The Russian foreign ministry pub-
lished its demands to Nato on “security
guarantees” in return for withdrawing
troops on Ukraine’s border. Russia’s
publication of two draft legal treaties is
highly unusual in international diplo-
macy and is regarded as an ultimatum
that threatens the existence of the west-
ern alliance.
The draft treaties call on Nato and
Washington to halt any enlargement of
the alliance eastwards and “not to
deploy weapons and forces” where it
“would be perceived by the other side as
a threat to national security”.
Demands include the call for all
troop deployments in eastern Europe to
be rolled back to the levels before 1997,
effectively removing Nato protection
from countries that have joined since.
Poland, Hungary and the Czech Re-
public joined Nato in 1999, followed in
2004 by Bulgaria, Romania, Slovakia,
Slovenia and the former Soviet repub-
lics of Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania.
“Putin is demanding that President
Biden abolish Nato,” an Eastern Euro-
pean diplomat said. “If the West blinks
then the alliance that stopped Soviet
aggression and protected the peace is
dead.” The demands are not considered
to be a credible starting point from theEuropean perspective and have been
viewed in the UK as part of a pattern of
disinformation aimed at creating a pre-
text for a Russian attack.
A European diplomat said: “Putin is
living in the USSR past. If he wants to be
taken seriously he must engage with
the reality of the present which is that
Nato has enlarged.”
Sergei Ryabkov, Russia’s deputy for-
eign minister, said that relations with
Nato and the West were at a “dangerous
point”. He called for crisis talks with the
US in Geneva today. “We are ready to
immediately go for talks,” he said.
Nato said in a statement that the alli-
ance was “aware of Russia’s European
security proposals”. A spokesman
added: “We are seriously assessing the
implications for alliance security of the
current situation.”
Andrei Kortunov, head of the Rus-
sian International Affairs Council, a
Kremlin-linked think tank said: “This is
likely an opening gambit. The Kremlin
does not seriously believe the US will
agree to such terms but is hoping to
force some partial concessions.”Bruno Waterfield Brussels
Larisa Brown Defence Editor
Felix Post Moscow