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Boris Johnson faces a legal fight to keep terrorists locked up after Labour’s Shami Chakrabarti and civil rights groups today hinted they could challenge an emergency law to stop terrorists being automatically released.
The Prime Minister wants to pass legislation over the next 10 days to stop terrorists being automatically freed half way through their sentence without going before a parole board, under rules introduced by the Labour government in 2003.
The government could also bypass European human rights laws to make the legislation law by ‘derogating’ — effectively suspending — the European Convention on Human Rights (ECHR) in order to apply the strict new measures.
Although Britain left the EU on January 31, the ECHR is a separate treaty between 47 European countries, with the option to derogate ‘in time of war or other public emergency threatening the life of the nation’.
Human rights and civil liberties activists are already lining up to challenge Boris Johnson’s emergency law, and could use the ECHR to ultimately contest it because it contains rulings on restrospective legislation.
If the suspension of the ECHR was successfully challenged, the government could leave the ECHR — something previous prime ministers including David Cameron and Theresa May both considered before the Brexit referendum.
Johnson could use his 80-strong majority to easily pass legislation withdrawing from the ECHR — but critics argue that the Convention is signed by Russia and Turkey and leaving would give those countries a moral boost.
In the meantime, Labour shadow attorney general Shami Chakrabarti today indicated she was against retrospectively changing terrorists’ sentences and civil rights group Liberty called the plan ‘dangerous’.
It comes after terrorist Sudesh Amman stabbed two people in London on Sunday before being shot dead by police. Amman had been automatically freed from prison half way through his sentence, despite boasting of his plans for a terror attack.
Scroll down for the 18 terrorists who are set to be freed automatically in months
Shami Chakrabarti (left) indicated she was not against automatic release being replaced for those terror offenders sentenced in the future but urged caution for those who had already been sentenced.Pictured on the right is Boris Johnson
Both automatically freed early: London Bridge terrorist Usman Khan, left, killed two in December after being automatically released from prison. Sudesh Amman, 20, rt.chatruletka-18.com was also released automatically before stabbing two people in Streatham on Sunday
<div class="art-ins mol-factbox floatRHS news" data-version="2" id="mol-988935e0-477b-11ea-afaf-a769490fb09a" website Johnson 'faces court battle' over bid to keep terrorists in jail