Appeal Court decision is a "breath of fresh air" for British Muslims

Law Society vindicates Siddique's solicitor, Aamer Anwar

Civil liberties group Scotland Against Criminalising Communities (SACC) welcomes Tuesday's decision by the Court of Appeal in Edinburgh to quash Mohammed Atif Siddique's conviction under the controversial Section 57 of the Terrorism Act 2000, and to allow him to walk from the court a free man. We share the relief felt by Atif and his family that his long ordeal is finally over. Mohammed Atif Siddique isn't a terrorist and he should never have been charged with terrorism.

But this case has always been about much more than one young man. Tuesday's decision was a victory for freedom of expression and justice. Mohammed Atif Siddique was convicted in 2007 as a result of possessing documents, videos and other material that he had downloaded from the internet. The decision to overturn his conviction should be a breath of fresh air for Muslims throughout the UK who have come to believe that, for them, freedom of expression has been cancelled.

Mohammed Atif Siddique's case was political from start to finish. Most criminal cases take an obvious and identifiable crime as their starting point, then concern themselves with determining whether or not the accused carried out the crime. This case was quite different. There was no obvious crime and there was little dispute about the central facts relating to Siddique's actions. The court was instead invited to consider the political significance of these actions and to decide whether or not they amounted to a crime. The trial judge was unable, as it turned out, to provide the jury with guidance that could stand up to examination by the Appeal Court. All this is an indictment of Britain's wide-ranging, vague and ill-drafted terrorism laws.

Siddique's legal team and the Advocate Depute agreed during the appeal proceedings that Section 57 of the Terrorism Act 2000 is "draconian." That should be reason enough for the rest of us to demand that it be scrapped.

The Section 57 conviction quashed by the appeal court was the main offence for which Mohammed Atif Siddique was convicted and accounted for 6 years of his 8-year sentence. His convictions on two other "terrorism" charges have been allowed to stand. But convictions under unjust terrorism laws don't make him a terrorist.

These two offences related to a website that Siddique ran. The website carried links to documents that were said to provide "a direct or indirect encouragement or other inducement to the commission, preparation or instigation of acts of terrorism or the provision of assistance in the commission or preparation of such acts" contrary to Section 2(1) of the Terrorism Act 2006", and to documents said to provide "instructions on how to operate various weaponry and to make explosives" contrary to Section 54 of the Terrorism Act 2000.

Section (1) of the Terrorism Act 2006, prohibiting the "encouragement" of terrorism, is one of the most controversial pieces of legislation ever passed by the British Parliament. Fears that it would place undue restrictions on freedom of expression led to a game of parliamentary ping-pong between the House of Lords and the House of Commons that only ended when the Lords backed down in March 2006. After police stopped Mohammed Atif Siddique at Glasgow airport on 5 April 2006 they delayed his arrest until 13 April, the day that the new law came into force. In doing so they demonstrated their determination to find something with which to charge him, and also their doubts as to whether any other charges were likely to be successful.

The Appeal Court was not asked to consider Mohammed Atif Siddique's conviction under the Terrorism Act 2006 and did not do so. His conviction therefore stands. If this controversial law remains on the statute books it is likely to lead to many more people being wrongly branded as "terrorists."

The remaining "terrorism" offence for which Siddique was convicted related to the publication on his website of links to documents said to provide weapons training. The Appeal Court declined to quash this conviction, saying that arguments about it were "not focused in any ground of appeal." SACC would have preferred the appeal court judges to have taken the view that the confusion in the trial judge's directions with regard to evidence purporting to show Siddique's intentions undermined this conviction in a way that paralleled its effect on the Section 57 conviction quashed by the appeal court.

In addition to these two "terrorism" offences, Siddique was also convicted for breach of the peace as a result of intemperate remarks made to fellow students at Glasgow Metropolitan College and for showing disturbing images to the students. This conviction also stands. But when Siddique was sentenced in 2007 the trial judge, Lord Carloway, described the breach of the peace charge as "essentially evidential in nature and bound up with charge (1)." Charge (1) was the charge leading to Siddique's conviction, now quashed, under Section 57 of the Terrorism Act 2000. By describing the breach of the peace charge as "evidential" Lord Carloway appears to have acknowledged that it was mainly a device to allow the Crown to place before the court additional evidence that could have a bearing on the main terrorism charge. It seems unlikely that the breach of the peace charge would have come to court in any other circumstances.

In a important footnote to the Siddique case, Siddique's solicitor Aamar Anwar revealed after Tuesday's appeal court hearing that the Law Society of Scotland had decided to take no action against him following an investigation triggered by critical comments made by the High Court at the same time as it cleared Anwar of contempt of court charges brought as a result of statements he made after Siddique's conviction in September 2007. The Law Society decision was taken on 28 May 2009, but was not released until yesterday as proceedings were still live against Mohammed Atif Siddique. SACC welcomes this news. Solicitors, like the rest of us, are entitled to freedom of expression. But their freedom of expression is of more than ordinary importance. It is one of the keys to our freedom, too. 

Aamer Anwar says: "an independent defence able to speak, without fear of recrimination is essential for freedom and justice." We agree.