British Envoy Working With Buhari Govt To Keep Nnamdi Kanu In Detention – US Lawyer

Ilesanmi AdekanbiFebruary 11, 2023

2 minutes read

The United States-based International Counsel to the detained Leader of the Indigenous People of Biafra (IPOB), Mazi Nnamdi Kanu, Bruce Fein has accused the British High Commissioner to Nigeria, Catriona Laing, of working with the Muhammadu Buhari-led Federal Government to keep his client in custody.

In a letter to the British envoy dated February 10, 2023, Fein accused the British envoy of complicity and complacency over Kanu’s ordeals.

While expressing disbelief that Britain and her High Commissioner would be unmoved over the continued illegal detention of a British citizen against court orders and the United Nations Working Group on Arbitrary Detention, the US-based lawyer accused Laing of personally sabotaging the pro-Biafra agitators’ release.

He wondered if the High Commissioner was keeping the IPOB leader in detention in order to secure oil and gas deals or lucrative business arrangements for the UK.

The letter made available to Vanguard read in part: “Dear High Commissioner: On July 20, 2022, the United Nations Human Rights Council Working Group on Arbitrary Detention issued a unanimous opinion addressing United Kingdom citizen Nnamdi Kanu’s kidnapping, torture, extraordinary rendition, and protracted detention without trial by Nigeria acting in collusion with Kenya. Among other things, the Working Group Opinion called upon Nigeria “to take urgent action to ensure the immediate unconditional release of Mr. Kanu.

“Paragraph 107 of the Opinion catalogued the serial human rights violations of Nigeria and Kenya regarding Mr. Kanu: “The deprivation of liberty…in contravention of articles 2, 3, 7, 8, 9,10, 11, and 19 of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights and articles 2, 9, 13, 14, 16, 19, and 26 of the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights….” Paragraph 105.

“Evidence has surfaced that you personally are sabotaging Mr Kanu’s unconditional release as mandated under jus cogens norms of international law binding on all nations irrespective of consent. You have taken cynicism and hypocrisy to a new level.

“Your Government has taken extreme umbrage at Russian President Vladimir Putin’s violation of international law in attacking Ukraine and committing war crimes. But you have made the UK complicit in flouting international law like Mr. Putin by affirmatively encouraging the Government of Nigeria to continue its illegal detention of Nnamdi Kanu.

“You and your country plunged to new depths. You go to war over the Falkland Islands thousands of miles from English shores with a tiny population of 3,500 to keep them free from Argentinian misgovernment. But Nnamdi Kanu, a British citizen, is abandoned to the cruel, lawless dungeon of Nigeria’s DSS.

“Have you no sense of decency? Have you a heart of stone unmoved by monumental injustice?”

Source: Naija News