Craig Murray's Blog

The Scottish judicial review of the proscription of Palestine Action – funded so far by readers of this blog – has been simply shelved by delay tactics that plainly break the Scottish legal system’s own rules.

Our case was ruled competent for us to serve the petition on the UK government. They replied in the last hour of their two-week deadline. The court itself then had a two-week deadline to grant a judicial review, or to call a hearing on whether to grant it.

Instead the judge has simply sat on it, preventing a judicial review by administrative delay.

This is the absolutely plain rule the court is breaking:

 

The permission stage

58.7.—(1) Within 14 days from the end of the period for lodging answers the Lord Ordinary must—

(a) decide whether to—

(i) grant permission (including permission subject to conditions or only on particular grounds);

(ii) grant an extension to the time limit under section 27A of the 1988 Act; or
(b) order an oral hearing (for the purpose of making those decisions) to take place within 14 days.

 

The emphasis is mine but the word “must” is obviously very important here!

The extraordinary thing is that our legal team is struggling to come up with actions we can take to force the court to act. The judges can freeze this out for a very long time.

The absurd proscription of Palestine Action as a terrorist organisation, and the appalling legal consequences on freedom of expression and in criminalising thousands of highly respectable citizens as terrorists, has faced the state with a dilemma which, at least in Scotland, it prefers not to resolve head on.

In Scotland, the prosecuting authorities have therefore written to over 20 activists charged for wearing T-shirts with the slogan

“Genocide in Palestine, Time to take Action”

offering to drop charges if they accept a prosecutorial warning.

In Scotland, this warning does not involve an acknowledgement of guilt (unlike a police caution), but sits on your record for two years and can be used against you in future court cases. All twenty-plus individuals we know of who have been offered the warning have responded by saying they will not accept the warning. The state’s attempt to dodge the court cases is therefore not working.

I am also hearing of activists charged for holding the Defend Our Juries signs saying

“I oppose Genocide, I support Palestine Action”

being offered deals on non-custodial outcomes in Scotland if they accept guilt, but as such prosecution deals are dubiously legal I have not yet fully managed to stand this story up.

But what is plain to me is that the authorities in Scotland are determined to keep both the judicial review of the proscription, and individual terrorist cases from the proscription, out of court.

The reason for this is that there is no confidence the Scottish judiciary, let alone Scottish juries, will uphold the proscription. The whole farce is falling apart on the basis of societal resistance to this draconian governmental overreach. This resistance runs vertically through the classes in Scotland.

I am currently in England for the judicial review of the proscription in the High Court of England and Wales. Here a different approach is being taken. They have simply switched the judges at the last minute to load the dice for Israel.

Judge Chamberlain granted the judicial review, a decision which was upheld by the Court of Appeal. As I have previously reported, he has a reputation for independence from the state, having even called MI5 out for producing dishonest evidence. I found his manner in court rather overbearing, but that self-confidence is perhaps needed to take anti-Establishment positions as a High Court judge.

Chamberlain plainly was expecting to hear the case. He has handled it all the way through, it was scheduled according to his diary, and just eight days ago he was still corresponding with counsel as the judge in the case. He has been replaced by a horror show of top Zionists. Judge Swift is the poster boy of security-service controlled judges, with a history of pro-government decisions in the Assange and Rwanda cases. He was a lawyer for the security services for many years and stated in interview that they were his favourite clients.

Swift was forced to recuse himself in the Graham Phillips case, when it was discovered he had been secretly meeting to discuss the case with the Foreign Commonwealth and Development Office, one of the parties, without informing the defence. That is judicial behaviour so bad I cannot begin to describe the magnitude of it.

Here is what I wrote about Swift on 21 February 2024:

The blocking of Assange’s appeal was done by Judge Swift, a judge who used to represent the security services, and said they were his favourite clients. In the subsequent Graham Phillips case, where Mr Phillips was suing the Foreign Commonwealth and Development Office (FCDO) for sanctions being imposed upon him without any legal case made against him, Swift actually met FCDO officials – one of the parties to the case – and discussed matters relating to it privately with them before giving judgment. He did not tell the defence he had done this. They found out, and Swift was forced to recuse himself.

Personally I am surprised Swift is not in jail, let alone still a High Court judge. But then what do I know of justice?

Another of the new panel for the Palestine Action case is Judge Karen Steyn, who ruled that UK export of F35 parts was legal even though they may end up being used in Israeli attacks on Gaza. Steyn ruled that such decisions were political and a matter for ministers and not for the courts – an attitude which the government are evidently confident she will continue in the Palestine Action case.

Dame Victoria Sharp, who will chair the judicial review, is a puzzle. Completely integrated in the top Tory Establishment, her twin brother Richard gave a large personal loan to Boris Johnson and shortly thereafter, and doubtless by total coincidence, was appointed by Johnson as chairman of the BBC.

Richard Sharp has long been associated with Zionist super-donor Trevor Chinn. They served together as advisors to Boris Johnson while he was Mayor of London. Victoria Sharp moves in an entirely Zionist and high-Tory milieu, but I must say that I was struck by her honesty and good sense in the Assange hearings. Perhaps, from the Establishment point of view, Israel is a subject on which she will be “safer”.

I have no doubt whatsoever that the last-minute change of judging panel is a panicked effort by the government and its deep-state controllers, to seize control of the narrative, following the carefully timed and illegal public release of highly edited and confused police footage of the Filton action.

It may prevail with this immediate panel, but will not prevail in London in the longer term. Meanwhile, we have in Scotland to continue to press the courts to stop hiding and to face the burning questions highlighted by this crazed authoritarianism in the name of Israel.

 

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The post Judicial Malfeasance and Palestine Action appeared first on Craig Murray.

In fascist lockstep, the entire British media, broadcast and print, corporate and state, is leading with a Ministry of Defence press release about a “Russian spy ship” inside “British waters”.

No British media appears to have been able to speak to anybody who knows the first thing about the Law of the Sea.

Here are the facts:

The Exclusive Economic Zone extends 200 miles from the coastal baselines. The Continental Shelf can extend still further, as a fact of geology, not an imposed maximum.

On the Continental Shelf the coastal state is entitled to the mineral resources. In the Exclusive Economic Zone the coastal state is entitled to the fisheries and mineral resources.

For purposes of navigation, both the Continental Shelf and Exclusive Economic Zone are part of the High Seas. There is freedom of navigation on the High Seas. Foreign ships. including foreign military ships, may come and go as they please. Nor is there any ban on “spying” – exactly as there is no restriction on spying from satellites.

The Territorial Waters of a state extend out to just twelve miles. These are subject to the internal legislation of the coastal state. There is freedom for foreign vessels, including military vessels, to pass through them but only subject to the rule of “innocent passage” – which specifically rules out spying and reconnaisance. In the territorial sea, vessels have to be genuinely just passing through on their way somewhere, otherwise they may need coastal state permission for their activity.

The Exclusive Economic Zone is subject to the rules of the coastal state only in relation to the reserved economic activities to which the state is entitled. Scientific research is specifically free for all states within the Exclusive Economic Zone.

The Russian ship Yantar has been just outside the UK territorial waters. It is therefore under “freedom of navigation” and not under “innocent passage”. It is free to do scientific reaearch.

I don’t doubt it is really gathering intelligence on military, energy and communications facilities. That is what states do. The UK does it to Russia all the time, on the Black Sea, the Barents Sea, the Baltic, and elsewhere. Not to mention 24/7 satellite surveillance.

It is perfectly legal for the Yantar to do this. Personally I wish the entire world would stop such activity, but to blame the Russians given the massive levels of surveillance and encirclement they suffer from NATO assets is simply ludicrous.

Not to mention the ultimate hypocrisy that the UK has been flying intelligence missions over Gaza every single day and feeding targeting information to aid the Gaza genocide.

The UK’s allies blew up Russia’s Nordstream pipeline. The UK is now accusing the Yantar precisely of scouting this same kind of attack – which we endorsed when the pipeline was Russian.

For example HMS Sutherland, accompanied by Royal Fleet Auxiliary Tidespring, and two other NATO warships penetrated 160 miles into Russia’s Exclusve Economic Zone and lingered 40 miles from Russia’s Severomosk naval base. There was no pretence they were doing anything other than gathering intelligence and sounding out defences.

In armed forces media the UK boasted it was an assertion of freedom of navigation. Yet we harass the Russian vessel equally on the High Seas for exercising its freedom of navigation.

That was also perfectly legal. The idea that the same activity is worthy when we do it, but a pretext for war if the Russians do it, is so childish as to be beyond ridicule. But there is not one single mainstream journalist willing to call it out.

As this photo of HMS Somerset illegally threatening the Yantar on the High Seas shows, forcing it into dangerous moves, the aggression is not from the Russians. That British jets illegally buzzing the Yantar have been met with lasers designed to disrupt attacks. That is not the Russian aggression John Healy claims. The nonsense about dazzling pilots’ eyes is sheer invention.

Unless the plane is extremely, extremely low or a very long way away it is a physical impossibility to shine a laser into a pilot’s eyes in a modern warplane, from below in a ship. The pilot won’t be looking at the ship out of the window, but will be looking at his screens and the image from the cameras under the plane. These might be disrupted by the lasers – and a perfectly valid and sensible defensive measure that is too.

This is the Eurofighter Typhoon.

Imagine it in the skies way above you and look at its body, particularly the front end – how would you get line of sight on the pilot? You couldn’t. Lasers only go in straight lines.

Most sinister of all is the universal state control of media that gets every single mainstream outlet booming out the propaganda narrative, all entirely without question.

This war talk is of course the normal refuge of extremely unpopular governments. But it is part of a wider tightening of the grip of the military industrial complex on the state. Starmer is committed to increasing military expenditure by tens of billions of pounds a year, while imposing austerity on the rest of the economy. In Scotland, we are told that the closure of major industrial sites like Grangemouth and Mossmorran will be compensated by opening new weapons factories.

Beating ploughshares into swords.

The rise of domestic racism and authoritarianism is accompanied by the increase in militarism and the desire to portray Russia and China as enemy states with whom we are already in a state of proto-war. The state has a mainstream media which is showing itself willing to pump out even the most thin propaganda to this end with no interrogation whatosever.

Western democracy has already died. Not everybody has yet noticed.

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The post The Beat of the War Drums appeared first on Craig Murray.

Scottish Independence is an extremely attractive prospect to states at the United Nations, and for reasons that you might not expect.

Every state knows that the current UN structure is outdated and indefensible, with five states – US, China, Russia, UK and France – having a permanent seat and a total veto on the Security Council.

US abuse of the veto directly to continue the Gaza genocide has been flagrant and caused outrage.

Africa and South America have no permanent representation or veto. The prominence of the Imperial powers of the UK and France is anachronistic.

The difficulty is, that any change to the veto is subject to veto. So there has been stalemate, and during the genocide in Gaza the UN itself has been outraged, maligned, abused and practically useless.

States, and particularly the entire developing world, are desperate for a lever to crack open the P5.

Scottish Independence is that lever.

There is an entirely false assumption that England and Wales (assuming the Welsh have not also escaped occupation) would be the successor state and automatically take the UN P5 seat. That is absolutely wrong. It is in fact extremely unlikely that England would retain its P5 status.

Here are some of the reasons why:

1) Russia assumed all of the national debt and all other obligations of the former Soviet Union. This was a fundamental requirement for successor state status.

In the 2014 referendum and since, the UK government has made it crystal clear England would not do this and would seek to offload debt onto Scotland.

2) Russia left its nuclear and chemical weapons facilities in situ in the other CIS states. The nuclear weapons in Ukraine and the chemical weapons in Uzbekistan were then dismantled under international supervision.

There is no indication London would leave Trident in Scotland to be dismantled under international supervision.

3) The other CIS states all specifically agreed, under the Vienna Convention on Successor States, that Russia would be the successor state and specifically agreed that Russia would take the P5 seat.

There is no requirement for Scotland to do this – and indeed international recognition of Scotland may depend on not doing it, because the large majority of states want a lever for P5 reform.

4) Russia taking over the P5 seat was subject to a “no objections” mechanism in a letter to all General Assembly states from the Secretary General, enclosing Yeltsin’s letter of claim. There were no objections.

There would certainly be objections to England.

5) Russia had huge international sympathy, as the Soviet Union split amidst hopes for a new era of world peace.

By contrast the UK is extremely unpopular. It is viewed by the large majority of states in the world as complicit in Genocide. The attacks on Iraq, Afghanistan and Libya are not forgotten.

Do not underestimate the resentment caused by the massive cut in UK aid budgets under austerity. Starmer’s echoes of racist rhetoric have not gone unnoticed. The EU no longer can be counted on for automatic support.

Any attempt by England to take over the P5 seat would, after objections to the Secretary General’s letter and at the UN Credentials Committee, have to go to the UN General Assembly. There England would lose the vote. Even if it did succeed, the change would need to be approved by the Security Council – and, with the most delicious irony, would be subject to Chinese or Russian veto.

If England were not accepted as the successor state, the P5 reform question would perforce be blown wide open. How it would be shut again is unpredictable. Most conservative would be to substitute a new P5 member – such as India, Brazil or South Africa. A regional grouping may be used as a replacement, such as the African Union. Or best of all the entire system would be shaken up.

I have been thrice this year to the UN discussing why Scottish Independence is important with various national delegations. All of the above ramifications scan instantly through the mind of diplomats as soon as I mention Scottish Independence and P5 status. Which is why I can put my hand on my heart and tell you I am yet to encounter a single negative reaction.

It is vital to understand that, though states operate within a framework of international law, in introducing Scottish Independence to the decolonisation committee as a concept, this is a political question amongst states and not in any sense a judicial process. That is a fundamental misunderstanding.

I have never heard anybody contend that Scottish Independence can be achieved through the United Nations without support for it in Scotland. That is a ludicrous Aunt Sally that is used to denigrate what I am doing at the UN in combination with Liberation Scotland and Salvo.

But once Scottish Independence is declared in Scotland, we are going to need the support of the international community. I have never believed that London will willingly relinquish Scotland’s resources, and I still do not believe it. Independence will have to be achieved in the teeth of London opposition, through robust assertion and control at home and recognition abroad.

Here the work at the UN is vital.

At the UN Security Council, the UK permanent seat was already on a shoogly peg. Scottish Independence gives it a tug. The world is cheering.

 

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My reporting and advocacy work has no source of finance at all other than your contributions to keep us going. We get nothing from any state nor any billionaire.

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The post UN Reform and Scottish Independence appeared first on Craig Murray.

As Godfather to Prince William, heir to the British throne, Prince Charles chose his close friend and adviser Laurens van der Post. A paedophile.

Van der Post raped a 14 year old girl who had been given into his care for the sea voyage from South Africa to London. He then installed her in a flat in London as his mistress, but abandoned her when she became pregnant age 15 (though he sent a monthly payment). She was not the only one. The victim later stated that van der Post was “sick” and “he knew how to pick his victims”.

In a sycophantic authorised biography of then-Prince Charles written thirty years ago, Jonathan Dimbleby wrote that “for Prince Charles there was a missing dimension”, that he felt his life lacked a spiritual awareness. At age 25 Charles sought out Van der Post after reading his books, and Van der Post became his spiritual Guru. Charles continually sought his advice and absorbed his mystic teachings. Not only is Van der Post William’s Godfather, he gave marriage counselling to Charles and Diana and was a frequent guest at Highgrove, Sandringham and Balmoral. On his death Charles initiated the Van der Post Memorial Lectures, held inside St James’s Palace.

There is a question which will run throughout this article, which is how much did people know? In the 1970s and 1980s it was not public knowledge that Van der Post was a paedophile. But then Charles was not the public. Then, as now, if somebody becomes very close to the heir to the throne with frequent access to Royal palaces, they are going to be under close investigation by the security services.

I find it wildly improbable that the security services did not find out about Van der Post’s predilection for young girls and that he had been paying the expenses of an illegitimate daughter originally fathered on a young teenage mother. There is also the question of Van der Post’s wider lies. It is possibly neither here nor there that in fact Van der Post had only ever spent a fortnight with The Bushmen of the Kalahari when he penned his famous book, full of lies and plagiarism.

But that he was actually a Lieutenant (and at times acting Captain) rather than a Lieutenant Colonel as he claimed, would have been instantly discovered. It is worth noting here that Van der Post’s famous military memoir, which became the film Merry Christmas, Mr Lawrence starring David Bowie, was massively embellished, not just in terms of his rank.

The Royalist defence of Charles’ associations rests, rather peculiarly, on the claim that any huckster and paedophile can just get entry to the Palace inner circle without any checks. That is just not true. What appears to be true is that paedophilia was treated as a peccadillo.

Before Van der Post, the man credited by all biographers as the greatest influence in shaping Charles’ character was his great uncle, Lord Louis Mountbatten. Born in Austria as Prince Louis of Battenberg, Charles can hardly be blamed for Mountbatten, who was thrust upon him as a child.

I hope not too literally.

Mountbatten was a paedophile, which was an open secret in upper class society – including the diplomatic service – long before his death. He benefited from the lifetime protection of the inner Royal circle, which was absolute in his lifetime. It has only become mainstream acknowledged in the past very few years.

That is deliberately phrased as “acknowledged”, not “knowledge” – there was not a Fleet Street Editor in 50 years who did not know; they just did not publish it. Mountbatten’s paedophilia was fuelled by his access to underprivileged children, from New Delhi to Rabat to Kincora Boy’s Home.

Mountbatten spent more time with Charles in his childhood and early adulthood than Charles’ own parents did, including encouraging and coaching him to have as much sex with as many “non-marriageable” girls as possible, and providing a venue for it in his homes. After he died Charles said, “Life will never be the same now that he is gone”. It is not a stretch to think that Van der Post – whom he first met four years before Mountbatten’s death – filled the emotional void.

A 1944 FBI dossier described Mountbatten as “a homosexual with a perversion for small boys”. This was two years before his appointment as Viceroy of India, where the open debauchery of the Mountbattens was an open secret in high-level Indian society.

It is worth noting that in this period his military aide-de-camp was one Willie McRae. I have always believed that the murder of McRae by the British state was related to his knowledge of Mountbatten and elite paedophile rings: in this context McRae’s ties with Irish Nationalists may be relevant, as they assassinated Mountbatten over the abuse at Kincora.

In Mountbatten’s case there is no doubt at all that the security services knew all about his paedophile, and covered for him.

So at the death of van der Post in 1996, Charles had lost two men he viewed, exclusively, as guides and spiritual mentors, and from whom he took the most intimate personal device. There is nobody else who fits this description. Both were extremely vicious and calculating paedophiles, shielded by class privilege from the consequences. So, in 1996, to whom did Charles turn as his new “mentor”?

Jimmy Savile was introduced to a 17-year-old Charles in 1966 by Mountbatten, who vouched for him. The official story is that Mountbatten had met Savile through military veteran fundraising.

You can believe that was the primary shared interest of two prolific paedophiles, if you so please.

Savile cultivated the relationship long-term, and by the 1980s was corresponding assiduously with Charles, which continued for over 20 years. Savile was yet another person to whom Charles turned for marriage counselling. In scores of letters, it is always Charles seeking Savile’s advice and adulating him. There is no record of Charles using the word “mentor” to describe his relationship with Savile, but Diana literally stated that Savile was a “sort of mentor” to Charles.

I presume I do not have to explain that Savile was throughout this period one of the most prolific paedophiles in British history. It is widely believed the royal cachet helped to protect him from prosecution. A huge amount was known to the police, to BBC managers and to various other branches of the British establishment, but Savile was untouchable.

In 2000 Charles constructed a chapel at his home at Highgrove, and a stained glass window in it commemorates Laurens van der Post. Before that window, Charles kneeled for long prayer vigils with his new spiritual guide, Bishop Peter Ball – who was also a friend of Jimmy Savile. It was Savile who introduced Ball to Charles.

Rather like Epstein, Ball was a known paedophile who had got off the first time without incarceration. He had, in 1993, accepted a police caution for a ceremony in which he had forced a 17-year-old novitiate, Neil Todd, to kneel naked in the snow for hours, whipped him, and then forced him to perform a sex act. The police also investigated at that time numerous other allegations, including two very similar ones.

The decision to caution was taken on the advice of the Crown Prosecution Service. As the Independent Inquiry into Child Abuse Report 2022 primly noted (p.378):

The first report on the Anglican Church investigation – The Anglican Church Case Studies 1. The Diocese of Chichester 2. The Response to Allegations Against Peter Ball Investigation Report – was published in May 2019. It considered the Diocese of Chichester, where there were multiple allegations of child sexual abuse, and whether there were inappropriate attempts by people of prominence to interfere in the criminal justice process after Bishop Peter Ball was first accused of child sexual offences.

I cannot, though, identify the passage referred to of the Diocese of Chichester Report.

Yet immediately after this, and for the next 17 years, Charles provided Ball with rather splendid rent-free accommodation on Charles’ estate. Ball was suspended by the Church of England as a priest and, astonishingly, Charles asked him to officiate at services and perform the Eucharist at his personal chapel in Highgrove, as reported in the Church Times. Ball was frequently in his company and was a personal guest at Charles’ 2005 wedding to Camilla.

In 2015, Charles gifted Ball £20,000. This was said to be simply a friendly gesture – exactly why is unclear. Charles is very definitely not known for personal generosity.

In 2015, Bishop Ball was finally convicted of 12 horrific instances of sexual abuse of boys and young men, all under the guise of religious ritual. Prince Charles put out a public denial that he had interfered in the 1993 decision not to prosecute. My surmise is that he had not done so directly, but rather let it be known through others. That is how it works.

The BBC actually reported that:

Ball’s court case heard that a member of the royal family – who has never been named – was among a host of public figures who supported him when he avoided charges in 1993.

The article goes on to carry this extremely over-specific and narrow denial from the Crown Prosecution Service:

The Crown Prosecution Service has publicly stated that it had neither received nor seen any correspondence from a member of the Royal Family when Ball was under investigation in 1992–93.

Note this very deliberately does not rule out a word in the ear at a function, a phone call, or – as it would be done – getting a friend known to be close to Charles to give the message.

Charles in fact in 1997, two years after his police caution, told Ball that he would directly intervene against Ball victim Neil Todd. “I will see off this horrible man if he tries anything again,” Charles wrote to Ball.

Todd did not live to see Ball ultimately convicted. He committed suicide in 2012. This was convenient for Ball, but there were plenty of other victims who testified in 2015.

I have no doubt the Royal Family will have known about Uncle Louis’s sins – he had an official entourage and was plugged in to the system. The immediate civil servants and close protection officers always know everything. I have already explained why I do not believe van der Post’s paedophilia was unknown. That goes double for Savile – about whom authorities had a huge amount of knowledge, but whose royal connections were a key part of his protection.

While there is no doubt whatsoever Charles knew about Bishop Peter Ball, Ball’s royal circle protection appears to have broken the surface.

To the best of my knowledge and belief, I do not know any paedophiles – but none of us can be absolutely certain we do not. Of one thing, however, I feel extremely confident. The four most-valued advisers in my life, the people whose advice I have most craved and to whom I have turned in times of crisis, are not all paedophiles. I should be astonished if any of them were.

You just can’t have your four closest non-official life guides as paedophiles by accident. You just can’t. It has been put to me that Charles, by nature of his role, knows vastly more people than ordinary folk. That may or may not be true (there is a counter-argument about privilege and protection). But if it were true, it does not improve things. If there is a much larger-than-normal pool from whom Charles could have chosen, it makes it even weirder he chose four prolific paedophiles.

To be clear, prolific paedophilia is extremely abnormal behaviour.

What I do not understand is why paedophilia appears so prevalent and attractive to politicians and the ruling class. People who have much more power and wealth than the rest of us, have the ability (rightly or wrongly) to get attractive adult consenting partners more easily. So why do they, apparently in disproportionate numbers, seek to prey on the young and defenceless?

It is more than time we got rid of the Medieval system of monarchy. That will not solve the corruption of corporate interests controlling the state, or redress the appalling inequality of wealth. It will not even do much to end elite class paedophilia. But as one clear demonstration of the rotten nature of British society, the tale of the King’s four paedophile mentors is extremely instructive.

 

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My reporting and advocacy work has no source of finance at all other than your contributions to keep us going. We get nothing from any state nor any billionaire.

Anybody is welcome to republish and reuse, including in translation.

Because some people wish an alternative to PayPal, I have set up new methods of payment including a Patreon account and a Substack account if you wish to subscribe that way. The content will be the same as you get on this blog. Substack has the advantage of overcoming social media suppression by emailing you direct every time I post. You can if you wish subscribe free to Substack and use the email notifications as a trigger to come for this blog and read the articles for free. I am determined to maintain free access for those who cannot afford a subscription.

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The post The Four Mentors of King Charles appeared first on Craig Murray.

The UK government – in the undistinguished shape of Baroness Smith of Cluny, Labour party hack, youngest daughter of John Smith and Advocate-General for Scotland – has responded to the court in our request for a Scottish judicial review of the proscription of Palestine Action.

The Government asks that the judicial review be denied on 6 grounds:

1) That I have no legal standing.

The Government does not accept that I previously participated in any Palestine Action activity or expressed support for Palestine Action:

“The Petitioner’s averments relating to his alleged support for Palestine Action and alleged participation in protests organized by Palestine Action are not known and not admitted.”

They evidently were not able to read these articles!

Freedom of Speech: Elbit and Fascist Policing

 

Now Protest Is a Moral Duty

2) That the Petition is unnecessary as it duplicates proceedings in England.

This is the classic unionist stance. It ignores the fact that the High Court of England and Wales is not superior to the Court of Session in Scotland and there is precedent for a judicial review in both jurisdictions coming to different decisions on the same facts and circumstances. (The Miller and Cherry cases on Boris Johnson’s prorogation of parliament).

3) The Petition has no real prospect of success.

This contradicts (2) because in the English case both the High Court and Court of Appeal specifically rejected this argument in granting a judicial review. So the UK Government is arguing both that the English case makes this case unnecessary – and that the English courts are wrong. This seems rather peculiar.

4) The Petitioner’s averments being irrelevant et separatim lacking in specification, the Petition should be dismissed.

This is effectively the same argument in 3, and again it was dismissed by the English Court of Appeal.

5) Yvette Cooper was under no duty to consult anybody at all before proscribing Palestine Action

Yet again, this is rehashing argument which the UK government spectacularly lost in the English Court of Appeal. Indeed, there judicial review was granted into three separate grounds of faulty process through failure to consult.

6) That Article X and XI of the European Convention of Human Rights (freedom of speech and freedom of assembly) are not engaged because of the exception for terrorism.

Once more, this is a ground on which they failed to block judicial review in the Court of Appeal in England, because the question of whether Palestine Action can properly be considered a terrorist group, and whether the effect on freedom of speech and assembly is disproportionate, are arguable grounds before the judicial review.

So in short I am confident at this stage. The only grounds on which they did not already lose in England are the question of my standing, and the question of whether a Scottish judicial review can be held when one is being held in England.

On my standing they have made a mistake in disputing that I had taken part in any action organised by Palestine Action or urged people to support it. But even if that were not the case, Walton vs Scottish Ministers established that a person with a genuine interest in a subject of wide public concern has standing.

As Lord Reed stated in that case: “The rule of law would not be maintained if, because everyone was equally affected by an unlawful act, no-one was able to bring proceedings to challenge it”.

On whether there can be a Scottish judicial review when one is already granted in England, it is not surprising that the government wishes to challenge this. It is an assertion of Scotland’s separate rights and jurisdiction. For decades it was simply accepted that the High Court of England and Wales was responsible for judicial review of matters which – like the proscription of Palestine Action – affected the whole of the UK.

I think I am right in saying that Boris Johnson’s prorogation of parliament was the first time an action had been separately judicially reviewed in both England and Scotland. There the English courts found for Boris Johnson (i.e. the government) and the Scottish courts found against him. I do not think it at all improbable that the Scottish review will ultimately find the proscription of Palestine Action was unlawful while the English review will find for Yvette Cooper.

Then either the UK government will have to go to the Supreme Court (whose existence is an abnegation of the Treaty of Union), or Palestine Action will be legal in Scotland and banned in England. In the prorogation case the government went to the Supreme Court and lost – it agreed with the Scottish judges.

We wait now for a court date. I am sorry to say this but we do need to ask for donations to continue this forward. It is a very expensive thing to do. One thing the government relies on is that it has unlimited resources and we do not. If we can spread the burden across enough small contributions, we can do it.

Every penny helps, but please do not cause yourself hardship.

You can donate through the link via Crowd Justice, which goes straight to the lawyers, or through this blog.

https://www.crowdjustice.com/case/scottish-challenge-to-proscription/

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The post UK Government Opposes Application for Scottish Judicial Review of Palestine Action Terrorist Proscription appeared first on Craig Murray.

The draft Your Party constitution is for a highly centralised, London-based party which echoes the Labour Party. It “devolves” – they literally use the word – power from the centre to non-autonomous entities in Scotland and Wales.

We need a Federal party – a completely different approach – where authority lies with the members, and is granted to the executives firstly of the Scottish, Welsh and English parties, and then to the Federal executive, as the members wish.

The current draft reflects the British nationalist ideal that the UK is essentially England and that Scotland and Wales are some sort of add-ons for which special provision must be made. Therefore there are supposed to be Scottish and Welsh subsidiary – not equal – parties, whereas England does not have a separate party but is presumed to be the main body of the organisation.

Scotland and Wales are treated separately as “nations” while England isn’t. It is just assumed to be identical with the party as a whole. This is typical of the unthinking Anglocentrism of the authors.

I do not see how any Scot can respectably subscribe to the party on its currently drafted constitution.

I have therefore sent my written suggestion for Amendment to a true Federal format.

This is the original:

This is the amendment which I have submitted:

The draft constitution does not include the north of Ireland at all. I do not know if the party plans to operate there. I assume the omission means not.

I would urge members – not just those in Scotland and Wales – to support this fundamental change in the way the party is structured. Unless there is a genuine federal structure, Your Party will be dead in the water in Scotland. The pledge it will not be a “branch office” needs to have concrete form.

 

———————————

My reporting and advocacy work has no source of finance at all other than your contributions to keep us going. We get nothing from any state nor any billionaire.

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Because some people wish an alternative to PayPal, I have set up new methods of payment including a Patreon account and a Substack account if you wish to subscribe that way. The content will be the same as you get on this blog. Substack has the advantage of overcoming social media suppression by emailing you direct every time I post. You can if you wish subscribe free to Substack and use the email notifications as a trigger to come for this blog and read the articles for free. I am determined to maintain free access for those who cannot afford a subscription.

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The post Urgent – We Need a Federal Your Party appeared first on Craig Murray.

I am taking the plunge into Your Party. My worries remain about its centralist tendencies and lack of democracy, but I will work against those from within.

Your Party is not a unionist party. It does not yet have a policy on Scottish Independence. I shall of course be striving for it actively to support Scottish Independence. I feel fairly confident that this will succeed.

The Left in Scotland is overwhelmingly pro-Independence, just as the Right is overwhelmingly anti-Independence. There do exist Scottish unionist socialists, but they are a small and shrinking minority. It may turn out they are disproportionately represented in Your Party, but I do not believe that is likely to be the case.

More to the point, for years opinion polls have shown that at least a third of Scottish Labour voters support Independence. There is now a major and consistent gap in opinion polls between support for Independence – averaging around 52% – and support for the SNP – averaging around 31%. 21% of Scottish voters support Independence but will not vote for the SNP. That is a significant source of potential support for a viable alternative pro-Independence Party.

It is worth recalling that ten years ago support for the SNP and support for Independence were very tightly correlated. That is now absolutely not the case, for the simple reason the SNP pays no more than lip service to Independence.

A Corbyn-linked, pro-Independence Party in Scotland would have the capacity to destroy the Scottish branch of the Labour Party – which is already in deep trouble and polling around 15%.

There have been a number of attempts to provide a home for the Independence voters disillusioned with the SNP. The Scottish Greens currently show good polling figures, but they are a rather strange party, entirely separate from the English Greens, and far more interested in gender issues than in anything else.

I was a member of the Alba Party until the leadership made very plain I was unwanted, for reasons that don’t seem any more profound than their personal ambitions. While led by Alex Salmond, Alba was the obvious vehicle for Independence support, but since his demise it has torn itself apart. There are others – including the Independence for Scotland Party and Liberate Scotland – which contain some great people, but are currently very small.

Your Party can become a vehicle for a socialism that, as part of its universal commitment to anti-Imperialism, supports Independence for Scotland and Wales and supports the reunification of Ireland. I see that as a transformative position in British politics and a truly radical response to the need for fundamental change in the British state.

I might add that I have never heard Jeremy Corbyn express any personal opposition to Scottish Independence. He supports self-determination and anti-Imperialism around the globe and supports Irish reunification. I think those who note he did not support Scottish Independence whilst leader of the Labour Party are being obtuse. It was not the position of his party. He now has a different party, and I am very confident he would follow the party position.

The rather shadowy leadership cadre of Your Party is anxious to fudge the issue by adopting a policy of “the right of the Scottish people to decide”. This is basically to say that they support a second independence referendum. That is slightly useful, but it is a peculiar abnegation of responsibility – and very easy to say in the knowledge Westminster will not agree.

Of course the Scottish people have the right to decide. That must be the starting point for any socialist party. But that is not a policy. You might as well state that the people have the right to decide whether utilities should be renationalised. Of course they do. But our policy is to renationalise utilities.

A party that just says “we believe in the will of the people – whatever that may be. We don’t actually have an opinion” is not much of a political party.

Which leads me on to the question which I think is driving Your Party’s lack of discernible structured democracy and voting process so far: Israel.

The leadership seem desperate to avoid a commitment to a single state of Palestine, from the river to the sea. The reason for this is that Jeremy is still surrounded by the same group of “soft” zionists who wrecked his leadership of the Labour Party, by continually attempting to placate the zionist lobby through apology after apology. They committed expulsion after expulsion of lifelong antiracists and socialists.

The preferred formula of proponents within Your Party of the Bantustan two-state solution is: “Let the Palestinian people decide”. Often accompanied by the plausible-sounding “it is not for us to decide for the Palestinian people”.

The problem is of course the Palestinian people have a gun to their head. Literally. They have no free will to decide anything. And of which Palestinian people are you going to take the word? Universally reviled Abbas and the Palestinian Authority? Some US-installed puppet administration under the Gaza fake Peace Plan?

No. The only solution any socialist should support is a Palestine free, from the river to the sea. Then it should indeed be for the Palestinian people to decide. Within the free, secular, democratic state of Palestine for which we should strive – and which now has more support from the people of the world than ever. If the free people of Palestine voluntarily then decide to give some land for a Jewish ethno-state, so be it.

Finally, it seems to me that Your Party needs to support massive socio-economic change.

Late-stage capitalism has resulted in inequalities of wealth which are simply staggering. These are not the natural order of things. They are a result of deliberate, state-imposed structures, including the creation of currency within the banking system, the state paying banks interest on currency of which the state itself licensed the creation, taxation structures where the burden of payment falls upon the poor, enterprise ownership structures that promote wealth accumulation, and a housing market tending to ever-greater concentration of capital and the permanent subservience of working people to a landlord class.

The economic changes required are profound. The Greens have adopted one idea I have consistently promoted: limits on CEO pay and benefits relative to the workforce. They have I think suggested 10 x the average salary in the enterprise, whereas I suggested 8 x the lowest salary in the enterprise, but it is the same policy.

Rather to my amazement there was a really good editorial in the Observer yesterday suggesting some policies that directly start to tackle a number of the problems I have outlined, not least the state borrowing its own currency from the banks.

I used to favour a modified capitalism where share ownership lay largely with workers, but as states have evolved into far more complex financial systems where huge volumes of financial transactions do not relate to the purchase of goods and services, that approach is now only a small part of the answer, and the role of the state needs to increase. I am not sure I have quite finished reconciling this with my libertarian instincts, nor yet fully integrated those parts of modern monetary theory which are self-evidently true. But I am working on it.

To return to Your Party, I profoundly distrust the “Assemble” model of meetings split up into little groups. These avoid votes or any genuine effort to actually determine the will of the meeting. Instead they give the power of divining the “consensus” to unseen central figures. I have been told this system combats patriarchalism. That is obvious nonsense – I am pretty sure you will find patriarchs behind the curtains, dictating what was “decided” by the touchy-feely groups. And if they are matriarchs, that would be no better.

The national Conference is to be on the basis of sortition. The key question is this: Who gets to be there without going through the sortition process? How many and who are they? That seems to me essential to know. I have already seen direct evidence that a very large number of the little political groups who are dictating matters behind the scenes will avoid sortition by being present as “stewards”. As though stewards could not have been forthcoming from among those selected by sortition.

There are also officially going to be “VIPs” not subject to sortition. Who chooses them? Will a list be published?

The sortition itself, according to the documents circulated to members, will be fixed to make sure groups are fairly represented. What sort of groups? Ethnic? Gender? Political? This undermines the entire basis of sortition itself.

I have the deepest possible reservations about the manipulation of “democracy” within Your Party. But there are bound to be teething troubles at the start, and while there is plainly a huge amount of plotting for control, I don’t see anything we the members – and I am now one – cannot sweep aside as we get the party going.

 

———————————

My reporting and advocacy work has no source of finance at all other than your contributions to keep us going. We get nothing from any state nor any billionaire.

Anybody is welcome to republish and reuse, including in translation.

Because some people wish an alternative to PayPal, I have set up new methods of payment including a Patreon account and a Substack account if you wish to subscribe that way. The content will be the same as you get on this blog. Substack has the advantage of overcoming social media suppression by emailing you direct every time I post. You can if you wish subscribe free to Substack and use the email notifications as a trigger to come for this blog and read the articles for free. I am determined to maintain free access for those who cannot afford a subscription.

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The post I Have Joined Your Party appeared first on Craig Murray.

This is more video of me than anybody would ever want to see, but here are three interviews I did over the weekend.

The first covers the legal action against the proscription of Palestine Action, Starmer’s summary courts for peaceful protestors charged with “terrorism”, UK and US efforts to legalise the Israeli occupation of Gaza through the UN Security Council, and French colonial occupation of New Caledonia.

The second covers the campaign to further the cause of Scottish Independence through the United Nations.

and the third covers the Gaza Trump peace plan and the future of the “ceasefire”

 

Should anyone have the time to download and clean up the YouTube transcripts I will gladly post them (they usually have a lot of errors).

Fundraising for the challenge in the Scottish courts to the proscription of Palestine Action is not going as fast as I would hope. Through all routes it is totalling £13,120, which will just get about get us to the starting line but not much further. The freedom of thousands of peaceful protestors could hang on this action, so please donate if you can, though as ever we do not want anyone to cause themselves hardship.

We now have a crowdfunder which pays money direct to the legal team. I understand that most people of goodwill have donated and donated to numerous causes in these terrible times. If you cannot donate, please help by spreading the crowdfunder.

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The post A Quick Intellectual Canter appeared first on Craig Murray.

Those charged with terrorism for supporting Palestine Action will have no jury in trials limited to 36 minutes each, with prison sentences up to six months. These are the plans for Starmer Courts for mass trials of anti-Genocide protestors.

The plans are devised by Justice Michael Snow. He is the epitome of judicial prejudice. When Julian Assange appeared before Snow in the first hearing after being dragged from the Embassy, Snow called Assange a “narcissist” even though Assange had said nothing but to confirm his name, and no evidence had been led.

Snow has now decreed that those 2,000 people charged under Section 13 of the Terrorism Act with supporting Palestine Action, will be tried in batches of five at the rate of ten people a day – giving 36 court minutes for each defendant. This is a farce, a spectacle of mass show trial. The 36 minutes includes both prosecution and defence cases and cross-examination.

At a scheduling hearing on Wednesday, one of the accused, 72 year old Deborah Wilde, objected that these trials would be far too short to present a proper defence.

Snow snapped back “I’m satisfied that the time is sufficient. I am not going to give more time. Your only remedy is the High Court”.

As I am sure Snow realises, ordinary people cannot afford to go to the High Court. The worrying thing is that the trials will be held before judges including the appalling Snow, with no jury.

Here is the relevant part of Section 13 of the Terrorism Act.

Perhaps the most astonishing thing about this draconian legislation is that arousing suspicion is actually the offence. It does not matter if the suspicion turns out to be well-grounded or not. The suspicion could be totally wrong, but if you aroused the suspicion on “reasonable grounds” in a policeman’s head, you are guilty.

It is an offence of strict liability. Your intent is not considered; you may have been most concerned to stop a Genocide, or to oppose the destruction of free speech. Judge Snow and his ilk will not care. They only want to know if some half educated cop suspected you of supporting a terrorist organisation. There is no jury to whom you can explain your actions – and which would be highly likely to sympathise.

I have seen it, as an offence of strict liability, likened to possession of Class A drugs. But actually it isn’t. The correct analogy would be a crime where the offence was arousing a suspicion you possessed Class A drugs, whether you actually had any or not.

The experience of watching 2,000 upstanding citizens, most of them elderly and many of them infirm, hustled through this slaughterhouse queue of mass justice and into prison, with little opportunity to defend themselves, will be a defining moment in the UK’s headlong slide into fascism.

The best available way to fight this ridiculously unjust process which has been directly opposed by the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights, Volker Turk, by Amnesty International and by Liberty, is through the legal challenge to an absurd and oppressive law. This is being done in both England and Scotland, which are separate jurisdictions. I am the “petitioner” in the Scottish case.

There are precedents for different decisions in the different jurisdictions. The Scottish courts found Boris Johnson’s prorogation of parliament illegal; the English courts, legal. Ultimately the Supreme Court decided in favour of the Scottish courts. It is also possible that Palestine Action should simply operate legally in one jurisdiction and not the other – the law is frequently different in the two countries. The rationale of the legal case is explained here.

We desperately need funds. We now have a crowdfunder which pays money direct to the legal team. I understand that most people of goodwill have donated and donated to numerous causes in these terrible times. If you cannot donate, please help by spreading the crowdfunder.

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The post 36 Minute Trials and No Jury – Starmer’s Fascist Mass Courts appeared first on Craig Murray.

I have started legal action in Scotland against the UK government over the proscription of Palestine Action, in coordination with Huda Ammori and her team in England. The petition has been accepted by the Court and served on the Solicitor General. They now have 16 remaining days to respond.

The rationale is well explained in this article by Gabriel McKay from The Herald newspaper:

“A former British diplomat has filed a legal challenge seeking a judicial review, under Scots law, of the decision to proscribe the group Palestine Action.

A petition has been lodged to hear a case in the Court of Session over the decision by the UK Government to make being a member of, or expressing support for, the group a terror offence.

If the court agrees to hear the case, and if it then declares the proscription unlawful, it would cease to apply in Scotland while remaining in place in England and Wales unless the High Court in London makes the same finding in a separate challenge.

Craig Murray is the former ambassador to Uzbekistan, an ex-rector of the University of Dundee and a political activist who was jailed in 2021 for contempt of court relating to the trial of Alex Salmond.

He has served notice to the Advocate General for Scotland, Baroness Smith of Cluny KC, as the law officer representing the interests of the Secretary of State for the Home Department, Shabana Mahmood, in Scotland.

In his submission, Mr Murray argues that he has standing as someone who, prior to its proscription on July 5, expressed support for Palestine Action and took part in protest activities organised by the group.

A petitioner must show “sufficient interest in the subject matter of the application”, usually interpreted as being directly personally affected or raising an issue of general public importance.

Scottish courts are generally seen as taking a liberal and pragmatic stance on the issue of standing. For example, in the 2012 case Walton v Scottish ministers, Scottish Ministers and local councils argued that environmental campaigner William Walton lacked standing for a judicial review because he was not personally affected by plans to build a new Aberdeen bypass as he did not own property near the road or suffer direct loss.

However, the Supreme Court ultimately ruled that he did have standing as it “is sufficient that the applicant has a genuine concern about the legality of the act or decision, and that the issues raised are of general public importance”.

Mr Murray’s petition for judicial review asks the Court of Session to declare the decision to proscribe Palestine Action ultra vires (beyond the legal power or authority of the home secretary) and have it reduced, i.e to have the order annulled in Scotland as it relates to the group.

It rests on three arguments: that the passing of the order was procedurally unfair; that it violates article 10 of the European Convention on Human Rights (freedom of expression); and that it violates article 11 of the ECHR (freedom of association).

On the first, the petition argues that Palestine Action was not consulted ahead of proscription, thus depriving the group of the chance to argue for proscription being unnecessary which undermines the requirement for “a high degree of procedural fairness”.

The second ground argues that Mr Murray previously expressed support for Palestine Action but is now legally prevented from doing so, interfering with his right to freedom of expression.

The petition compares the direct action tactics of the group to those of Greenpeace and Just Stop Oil, namely that it “is not an organisation engaged in acts of violence to the person” and therefore proscription is disproportionate and a violation of the right to freedom of expression.

The third ground argues that Mr Murray’s freedom of association has been infringed due to the decision to criminalise both being a member of Palestine Action and engaging in meetings with members or supporters of the organisation.

The petition points to case law which found a measure which will cause the outright dissolution of an association may only be taken “in the most serious cases”, and the court must assess whether it is “exceptionally justified” by “relevant and sufficient reasons”.

Mr Murray’s legal challenge is separate to the Judicial Review in England and Wales brought by Palestine Action co-founder Huda Ammori, which is taking place in the High Court in November 2025, at the Royal Courts of Justice in London.

If the Court of Session hears the case, and reaches a different decision, campaigners say this would provoke a ‘constitutional crisis’.

There is precedent in that area in the decision by then Prime Minister Boris Johnson to advise the Queen to prorogue parliament for five weeks in 2019.

An appeal to the High Court ruled it was not justiciable as it was a political matter, but the Court of Session found the prorogation unlawful as it prevented parliament from carrying out its constitutional functions.

That was ultimately ruled on by the Supreme Court which upheld the verdict of the Court of Session, finding that the decision to prorogue parliament exceeded the government’s constitutional limits.

While national security, including terror laws, are reserved a Scots court can still review how UK laws are applied in Scotland, for example under things like human rights compliance.

If the Court of Session agreed to hear Mr Murray’s case and found in his favour, there could arise the possibility of a territorial split in the application of a UK-wide anti-terrorism order, an inconsistency which would then have to be resolved by the Supreme Court.

He said: “It is a maxim in Scots law that the law cannot be absurd. To claim that Palestine Action is a terrorist organisation is plainly absurd.

“This proscription is a politically motivated action in support of a genocide and it is poisoning Scottish civil society. Entirely peaceful protestors are being arrested and charged as terrorists.”

A spokesperson for Defend Our Juries added: “The proscription of Palestine Action has already spectacularly backfired on the Westminster Government, with the world looking on in dismay at the sight of thousands of elderly and disabled people in Britain being dragged away by police for holding seven word cardboard signs.

“Labour’s anti-democratic crackdown on domestic direct action groups leading to international condemnation, from global human rights experts and the United Nations. Over 2,000 people have been arrested across Britain, including people in Scotland detained only for wearing t-shirts which say ‘Genocide in Palestine. Time to take action’.

“We wholeheartedly support this legal challenge and the Scottish people’s right within their legal system to seek to overturn this absurdly authoritarian ban which has been imposed by Westminster.

“With Scotland’s legal system prioritising the rights and sovereignty of the people rather than the English doctrine of the supremacy of Parliament, this legal challenge is on strong legal footing. The potential for a constitutional crisis created if Scottish and English courts reach different decisions, further demonstrates that this ban is simply not enforceable.

“Defend Our Juries will be escalating the mass defiance of the ban next month, with peaceful mass sign-holding actions taking place from 18th-29th November across Britain.

“Throughout history civil disobedience has been used to overturn unjust laws. The movement against this draconian proscription is growing day by day – there are too many thousands of people who refuse to accept this unjust law and will not stop defying it until it is lifted.”

A Home Office spokesperson said: “Palestine Action has conducted an escalating campaign involving not just sustained criminal damage, including to Britain’s national security infrastructure, but also intimidation and, more recently, alleged violence and serious injuries to individuals. That kind of activity puts the safety and security of the public at risk.

“Violence and serious criminal damage has no place in lawful protests.” ”

I thought that article was worth considering in full because it is balanced and introduced a couple of things I did not know myself, such as the Supreme Court decision on standing in Walton vs Scottish Ministers.

Yvette Cooper had a duty in law to consult before the proscription. She consulted the Israeli Embassy, Jewish groups and weapons manufacturers. She did not consult any Palestinian individual or organisation, human rights groups or consult with Palestine Action themselves.

What is more, Cooper consulted nobody in Scotland. Not the Scottish government, not Police Scotland. Nobody in Scotland.

Here is an extract, released under a Freedom of Information Act request, from the Scottish CONTEST (counter-terrorism strategy) programme board meeting of May 2025. The Scottish CONTEST programme board consists of the Scottish Government, Police Scotland, MI5, COSLA and others.

Note the wording; “has not been close to meeting”.

Crucially this assessment was made after the action at the Thales plant in Scotland and the consequent convictions. Yet although both Police Scotland and the intelligence services assert Palestine Action in Scotland has “not been close to meeting” the bar of terrorism, Yvette Cooper cited the Thales action as one of three (out of 385) events which she asserted did meet the bar of terrorism.

Following its proscription of Palestine Action, the UK government has now intimated its intention to place further restrictions on freedom of speech and assembly, notably proposing to ban “repeated” protests.

The proscription of Palestine Action has led to mass arrests. Being charged with a terrorist offence is life-changing. It leads to loss of employment, debanking with loss of savings, and travel bans. This is being visited on those engaged in non-violent protest against Genocide.

We have to fight back using whatever avenues we can exploit. This Scottish legal action is one. However legal action costs money, and I have to appeal to everybody who supports this fight to help me fund it. To date I have personally contributed £5,000 and Liberation Scotland has contributed another £5,000 to uphold the Scottish people’s historic legal rights to freedom from oppressive and arbitrary government.

The sums needed to mount a successful legal challenge to the power of the state can be eye-watering. But we are the many. Every penny helps, but please do not cause yourself hardship.

paypal.HostedButtons({ hostedButtonId: "NZDEN7BYDHVS4", }).render("#paypal-container-NZDEN7BYDHVS4")

Alternatively by bank transfer:

Account name
MURRAY CJ
Account number 3 2 1 5 0 9 6 2
Sort code 6 0 – 4 0 – 0 5
IBAN GB98NWBK60400532150962
BIC NWBKGB2L
Bank address NatWest, PO Box 414, 38 Strand, London, WC2H 5JB

Or crypto:

Bitcoin: bc1q3sdm60rshynxtvfnkhhqjn83vk3e3nyw78cjx9
Ethereum/ERC-20: 0x764a6054783e86C321Cb8208442477d24834861a

We have discussed with crowdfunders including those which pay the money direct to our lawyers, but compliance issues re a proscribed organisation have held this up for several days. We hope to be able to offer that further donation option soon.

The post Fight the Proscription of Palestine Action appeared first on Craig Murray.