i'm afshin rattansi and we're going on the ground is today in london the man responsible for controversial changes to the british welfare system david cork discusses how mass surveillance can offer smarter social security coming up on the show was it breck said boris johnson on the iraq war we asked a lot more of tony blair's former attorney general why britain is often seen on the international court of justice for the first time in seventy one years and as he you breaks it negotiating we shall bonnie's in berlin for security talks today britain's justice select committee boss and former vice chair of the ruling u.k. conservative party neil tells going underground fixing

a date to leave the you could be a big mistake from the headlines some optimal subtitles for jeremy called end of last orders for turing's on my shoulders and more coming up in today's going underground but first this week in one thousand nine hundred five a rich arms manufacturer staying in a club in paris affectively created a peace prize that is still revered by nato nation mainstream media notoriously the prize went to this man i think they would trip a new should not be thrown a wrench to get it to. reflect on the people who you would yes u.s. president says national security advisor henry kissinger won the nobel peace prize in one nine hundred seventy three and he says calling him out for being a war criminal because of the tens of millions killed wounded or displaced by his actions in vietnam laos and cambodia reflects me on his accusers no doubt the other nobel peace laureate the dalai lama would say the same even though it was kissinger

who allegedly stopped his cia payments but of course there was also nobel peace laureate barack. bomber who neo liberal media applauded for the peaceful firing of tomahawk missiles some of the first u.s. tomahawk missiles had been launched on libya and now we can give you an idea of exactly how this is going to play out there not no one on corporate media adequately explained how obama's drone strikes on civilians let alone wars on libya and syria would play out and as for nobel peace laureate aung san suu kyi leader of burma even mainstream media is casting doubt on her simon henschel an assistant secretary in the u.s. state department. coverage catch replying to every single miss linson mine it is suffering heat. passed hand your excellent reporting i learned a delegation out to burma mankell dash last week well even if murdoch's media can leverage events in myanmar of a deals in china u.k.

pm drazen may have to tread more carefully as she attempts to forge a post break that deal with the communist party in beijing some of speculated that the latest decision of the un general britain from the international court of justice for the first time since it was created nine hundred forty five is itself a symptom of u.k. post breaks it needs for new trade allies certainly the i.c.j. as a controversial history from cases like the u.s. shooting down of an it raining in passenger plane killing two hundred seventy four to nicaragua versus the usa well joining me now is britain's former attorney general lord boris of oberon who is chief legal advisor of the crown and its government in england and wales under tony blair lord morris welcome back to going underground what is the international court of justice and why should we care that britain along as a judge on it well it's a very old court going back to one thousand nine hundred five or thereabouts it's a very distinguished court and it settled international disputes a lot of dealing with the role of the sea where the boundary should be in the case

and i was in it was the guardian trying to get special measures to stop the bombing in yugoslavia. and i appeared as counsel there quite a few years ago when i was attorney general of the bombing of yugoslavia of start stop the bombing of yugoslavia because we were bombing it night after night in order to save the cost of us there was ethnic cleansing on the scale of the hundreds of thousands of people who'd been turfed out of their homes and in yugoslavia the cause of others and we had to do something to avoid another color cost and i didn't want another holocaust on my conscience so we were parties ten countries to trying to bring yugoslavia to heal to stop the ethnic cleansing the rape the murders the movie it's been turfed out of their homes and that's what that was about there are very different there are different views about the yugoslav conflict would you say that now there is an indian judge replacing the british one will get on to him in a second it would be more difficult for nato

a nation like britain to get the judgment it's sort of in yugoslavia no i don't think so because they're all very distinguished judges of their own country and as it happened you have to have. the approval of both the security council and the assembly of the united nations agree nude of on. a very large vote in the security council christopher greenwood christopher created and i've known him because you happen to be my my junior in the case in kosovo so i've known him there or i've looked at the records of all the judges and they're all of blessed taking and learning and distinction in their own countries and elsewhere so it basically comes down the fact yes i regret that we have not got the british judge but i'm confident that justice will be equally well dispensed with all the judges who have been elected. and resume is nomination of the christopher greenwood apparently got

to a stalemate within the u.n. security council including the sort of floating members and then britain wanted to introduce some whole new process well the later post which i think people are saying. is that our two bodies would have a joint determination they disagree there must be machinery for resolving that issue. greenwood passed the test with the security council he had nine votes he had he didn't have a sufficiently large number in the assembly of the united nations so the two outfits whether the heads but there is a machinery to which has never been used to have a joint conference of the national assembly under thirty eight could the council to resolve the issue and apparently our foreign secretary decided with the approval of greenwood that we would not pursue it any further that our affection regard a working relationship with india was more important than to have another go which

might have resulted yet another stalemate and we wouldn't have one in any event so that was the decision taken and i don't disagree with it if if that excellent candidates all sides of the all are and i really stress that i've looked at their records i've looked at the service they've performed in their own countries and elsewhere and they were existing members of the court already both of them and it's very difficult then to decide which is the better they're not we know this is about geopolitics rather than the individual record actually of judges the fact that india uses that britain wanted good relations with india is opposed breck's a judgment on the international i don't regret want to deal with india i just got into reflects it because most of europe and countries if i think all of them voted for judge for our candidate that i meant to raise a million boris johnson withdrawing the nomination. in favor de facto of india to get their member on the i.c.j.

no i don't think it's any relevance whatsoever i think we agreed not to go any further because it might a well have added that was the critical factor it might well have ended in another state that we might not have one. had done would have soured international relationships and because there was a good candidate it was an existing member with a tremendously good record we decided not to head to heads against a blank wall i know this guy's a grocer greenwood was a junior with you you just said about yugoslavia we also heard from some sources saying you know amongst the international community greenwood is associated with his advice for tony blair for the. illegal invasion of iraq how would international people everything that's against the greenwood could ever again on the international here obviously gave legal advice i've never commented on the iraq war or my comments have been in my book was that we should have pursued the diplomatic

road and tried to persuade the french to get a new nanny was decision in the trip to the council but as i said from your role as attorney general is it true the legacy carries on for people like the christopher greenwood that i don't know i don't know but there are. dozens of decisions a different car in this week may well have offended some people if you look at the record and i've looked at many of the cases in some way and he's been involved in most of the decisions in the nine years he's been there and he may well have offended somebody i don't know but whether iraq played a part of it that is beyond my knowledge ok well the fact remains that an aide to him secretary on the road to robert general has accused boris johnson of a major failure of diplomacy in this whole i.c.j. nomination priding that's highly exaggerated it's not at all i mean india is part of a couple of india is a very close trading nation with us. it's a country we have very good relations i have believe as close relations with russia

which china irks countries russia certainly seem to be supporting india's nomination and china reluctantly well not reluctantly but china but we did have you know nine votes in the security council for greenwood and he did particularly well there he did better than the indian candidate did in the security council but he did worse in the assembly my mother's to say an election is an election and you never know with certainty what might happen and when you have a large gathering of countries from all of the world well they do flex their muscles on time to time and i don't think auditors are not as merely unfortunate that it was not in our favor just to publicize the accident that the decision came as britain learned that it was losing the european banking agency the european medicine agency they were moving to paris and it looked like in the press britain was just losing i don't think so i think that's coincident our coincidental i mean the the general assembly in june you mentioned the way the general assembly can

start to have decisions against britain i mean they they voted against britain's role in the change your silence britain rents out diego garcia military base you don't sense from this decision that we should detect the britain's role in the world is diminishing as as some british when the world is different i mean we've been developing since nine hundred forty five we were one of the creators of the united nations. camelot clear bevin were one of the major factors and the then law offices of the time where helped to draft a charter. out of rooms obviously does very we've got a big country we have a small country but we do a punch above our weight from time to time over the years. that's on the long running saw and i know that our feelings on all sides i don't know the details but i don't think next it has any significance whatsoever with. this decision where we no longer have a member of the court who happens to be british just finally i know the talk in

this country is about the budget we had asthma lord west former head of counterintelligence on this show complaining before the budget about defense cuts you've been speaking about in the house of lords about the displays and regarding our armed forces the armed forces act what's concerning about section forty two of the armed forces act i believe the whole system is out of date it's been there since time immemorial having a court martial where you can have a verdict by a majority of one you can have a court martial with five members maybe seven at the outside and you can have a verdict of guilty of murder by three to two. don't you know the defendant doesn't know whether it unanimous or not it's all secret and i have succeeded i've won my daughter to have a view of the whole system so by the time we change the look at the next time we will i think there's all of this issue to bring in right now a british soldier can be convicted by a by one vote on

a jury as of yet and that's where i really got it's deeply offensive when we moved in our civil system to a majority of addicts i was very concerned because you can have a verdict by ten to two but it worked it worked over the years otherwise you have trials which we trials going on and on and on and costing enormous amount of money in order to get a verdict i believe our system should be in the court martials should be brought more into line with the civil system and you should have a julie perhaps a civil jury maybe a mixture of the hierarchical position whereby a senior officer may all are you know have a bigger influence on a more junior officer or maybe a warrant officer or noncommissioned officer that doesn't look good to me and three to two is not in our period in the twenty first century is not suitable not fit for purpose or matter in general thank you very much after the break. should we fear

the power of the press when it comes to break up negotiations we are the chair of the u.k. just a select committee told me i'm from the headlines we report the suicide the same and sinai. takes its time to unclog the new york times all of them all coming up in part two of going underground. so many bankers are jumping off buildings and jumping off ears out of the fia world and being crushed by crypto so americans special magic you can fish for the bankers i use patented dead banks get a good look at those that bank right here and you can go faster debt bankers. can a trump was criticised for not having a coherent understanding of global affairs indeed largely dismissed the foreign

policy elites a year after his election in since his inauguration is there such a thing as a trump view of the international system. welcome back with me to go do something week's papers now is lembit opaque. and formidable democrat member of parliament let's go to the joyous news in the african-american fan of new and sean ski interesting about policy on syria ukraine palestine meghan look all the actor is marrying there to the throne i love this song the spectator previously said meghan malkuth is unsuitable as prince harry's wife for the same reason that wallace since it was unsuitable she was divorced and grandmother supreme governor of the church of england that's a spectator it's ancient history now they've said something else now they've said it would be childish to expressed reservations just compare that to live in the present childish to expect that some souls go tonight is going to be invited to any

royal wedding. so how did the b.b.c. the state mandated broadcaster cover jerry corwin leader of the largest socialist movement western europe's congratulations to happiness breaks down let's go to the sun as the half. the sun reports a little bit of a problem says buller b.b.c. subtitles make it look like jeremy corbin is congratulated. on it royal engagement . well that's what actually happened instead of saying something which was faithful to what he said the text read underneath the subtitle read i really do out my the way harry and hezbollah have drawn attention to mental health community couldn't jeremy called it up with his bull or so clearly it's a fake news is that it yes but it wasn't meant to say that it was meant to congratulate harry and his brother on drawing attention to mental health issues but of course it could only happen to jeremy called bill you could only have been to the b.b.c. and its fake news did a cover and started talking about select committees not getting the right

information about bricks it's just imagine if they'd done not with the reason maze comments nothing would happen with no well anyway as well or it has a democratically elected m.p.'s in the beirut parliament fighting isis diaspora and with britain and the united states let's go to this tragic story that's been moved off the front pages i think of the newspapers here let me read the headline and tell you what i think about the last in the christian times reports egypt mosque attack officials say assailants carried isis flags as death toll rises to three hundred five what you just said is the core point here three hundred five people dead or more in an attack with a large number of of assailants twenty five to thirty militants there very suicidal very very messy business they surrounded the mosque and then shot into it until that many people with that where is it in the headlines you even if you are a loyalist this indicates a level of carnage which would be. heard of even

a few years ago but no one seems to be reporting live from your story britain's department for international development backing the white helmets which are linked to islam ists which are linked to isis station al qaeda type groups isn't it interesting the british media doesn't want to connect britain's influence over this indirectly you even say that will be people not listening and watching who are surprised that you say anything negative about the white helmets they have this almost unassailable positive image but once you say there's a link it's we can't go into too much detail now but it leads directly to exactly that connection that you said i should say russia has been accused of the draw city is russia denying that it's caused. civilian casualties ahead of the law it's been a recurring theme as well but the dog has not been on the headlines r.t. is being be ranked by google because they don't get this news out but part of the internet censorship campaign look at this b.b.c. is proving r.t. is not the only victim of censorship the b.b.c.

reports to its a block's new york times by about time the new york times which has got us into wars in libya in iraq in yugoslavia and there understand the apparently justin trudeau left out an apology from a decade ago about native people in newfoundland and labrador but it's not really clear it's connected to that there's a certain vagueness to this is important to the new york times to be banned surely that's all brazil obviously whether they're saying it's not minister to vero or whether some wise guy there said no we've got to ban the new york times because what they said twenty four hours it took them to get them back on stream eleven minutes when donald trump went off air you draw your own conclusions well i mean if i was editor surely you'd ban all the competitor tech organizations as well so your share price does well i expect that sort of censorship to come from you and yours hail to twitter in the old days we used to go to the pub read the local paper usually a murdoch paper let's go to this would be less. independent news for the bing as

well while all that's going on the prime minister may not be able to get a pint in a local because independent reports landlords into reason may's constituency threaten to bomb from every pub why because she's cut over four hundred million pounds from the police budget the publicans are saying they have to wait an hour before the police turn up sometimes if if a fight breaks out i know what they're afraid of eruption they're afraid of the fact that the reason main boris johnson turn up in a pub they start a fight and there aren't any police to separate them for a whole hour bad for business we invite the foreign secretary the prime minister on the program to respond to that thank you. well earlier on in the show we heard from britain's former attorney general or morris about the u.k. for the first time losing its seat on the international court of justice joining me now is a man who believes it could be a sign of more fundamental geopolitical change in the balance of power bob neil is the chair of the u.k.

just a select committee and former vice chair after resumes ruling conservative party bob barr welcome to going underground we heard from former attorney general lord morris just before about this international court of justice decision just before you know the bricks it matters your reaction to britain not having a judge on the court for the first seventy one years but it's a serious setback and very disappointing the judge cristol remoter done an excellent job and i think it's a great shame i think is possibly an indication of a bit of a shifting power balance between both the security council and there's been a struggle assembly but that's been going on for decades arguably i mean there's the head of the just as we are isn't it what do you think well it's done to stem the tide i think a couple of things here a lot of this of course is as much a political matter as a judicial one it's interesting that about a month or so ago the french lost their post on one of the other international legal tribunals so we're not actually the first member of the security council to come off worst in this but it does mean that we have to up our game on this we have

to i think be selling very strongly the really big benefits that britain's legal institutions have and their reputation because you know we lead the world in setting up some of these international tribunals and we mustn't ever give the impression that we're pulling back from that or that we don't take responsibilities to international courts really really seriously aside from the colonial imperial past aspect of this what does it mean in practical terms of britain has no judge on the international court of justice. well i think it would depend precisely upon what is he comes along as you know a lot of it that deals with disputes between member states often territory or other types of disputes type of mediation work i mean obviously we don't have a say in media the top table obvious we're still able to adults are cases when it involves us which isn't very often and i think it's a shame in terms of our status now that we don't have somebody there on a great believe that we should be fully engaged in all of these international tribunals is the i.c.j.

a political court the judges themselves they behave in a political way but the appointment system in every way does because it's the member states both in the security council and the un doing the voting if you know about it and just a select committee here know about britain and redrawn its nomination for a candidate that the i suggest that is dealt with predominantly by the foreign office rather than by the ministry of justice i want to say that a lot of boris johnson mistake. i think wrote general my colleague raised some concerns had the foreign office mate paid enough attention to this identity tired of that but i do think the lesson has to be learned that we must be seen to take these international bodies extremely seriously and put absolutely all of our resource behind our candidates in the visit reno or whether the foreign office made a mistake and prematurely we drew the candidate for britain's judge on the i.c.j. now and i think that's a judgment call probably that the diplomats on the ground have to then relay back to their ministers to decide. what we best is to make sure we haven't got into that

position in the first place well michel barnier there are the man we're negotiating with over a brics it is in berlin talking about security let's go to a different territorial dispute arguably what do you think about the fact the barclay brothers' daily telegraph says you are one of forty mm maybe fifty to twenty mutineers well it's the first time i've actually gone out and bought two copies of the daily telegraph one so i can frame it and put it up in an appropriate room in my house. that's a badge of honor because mutiny is a corpse's perhaps like nonsense we're doing the job that we were sent by our constituents to do which is to scrutinise legislation that's the first also meant republic a you of you voted for article fifty now you must have heard even in parliament people saying the european union negotiators and people are trying to deliberately slow it down surely that's why the prime minister has to set some kind of date some get a line in the sand otherwise civil servants or maybe even the good sides of the journal

will be slowing this down will never leave the european union or not only that is the case in that explain what could be the context a lot of the amendments that we put down group i would argue constructive friends to the government can sit concern a lot of important legal detail was a very technical bill the particular one about the putting the leaving date on the face of the bill as it's called is actually a very late. that the government came out i don't think was consulted the government and i think it's an era and the reason i say there is this the leave date was set by the article fifty process but the article fifty process does permit an extension of time if there's unanimous agreement made up that may or may not be possible to get but the experience of both of european deals i think most people would say many business deals is it very often things go to the wire you get to a stage where we virtually got a deal but you're going to need another month or so to make sure that say all the other european member states to be able to get their parliaments to agree to it we

could do that at the moment simply by seeking that unanimous agreement for a short time if we put on the pace of the bill our own law would prevent us doing that it would have to bring in an emergency act to poland to repeal that bit of the bill to give us a bit of extra flexibility i think it comes of paranoia on the part of both the barclays press and so the rather mia press that the telegraph in the mail seem to be a competition to scaremonger that some help people are going to steal bricks off that is absolute nonsense it's a demonstration of their insecurity so they're looking for plots mutinies when all there is and actually has tried to help the prime minister to deliver the foreign speech ok we're given how serious the issues you're raising are how should we fear the power of the press to give us dissent from ation during this negotiation process that when i did a piece for the guardian in response to the telegraph recently where i reminded people of that famous line of another conservative stanley baldwin when he was fighting the press barons in the 1930's and he reminded about the dangers of power

without responsibility and he's are all old fashioned phrase after that the prerogative of the whole of throughout the ages but no factual heard now we get to . work here i think we probably can but regulate but you get what i'm trip yet the gist of what i'm saying that it's actually the irresponsible indulgence of on the elected people trying to intimidate those who are elected which always you. that we're not accusing any press baron to being a sex worker. but surely the dangers of this that the press could continue doing this all through the negotiating process and with a minority government to raise a male leads surely she has to listen to what the press baron say because she may lose the party lose the election lose the government a free press is really important in any democracy i mean it's called that we've got

that but that doesn't mean that the press have any special status or that their immune from criticism and when we get a proper deal it's got to be one that works for the forty eight percent as well as the fifty two percent we need to bring the country together rather than exacerbate divisions i think some of that and all that sort of intimidatory top of headlines which have any substance to them doesn't help in any of that process at all neal thank you and that's it for the show we're back on saturday from the russian british business center of london to talk to the founder of britain's all party parliamentary group but central asia. russia's ambassador till then to be judged by social media will fewer than sixty one years to the day revolutionaries led by fidel castro and take of our adoption cuba with grandma one hundred ninety four years to the day of the signing of the road didn't washington bickering de facto u.s. sovereignty of western hemisphere. politicians

to. put themselves on the line begin to accept the reject. so when you want to be president. or somehow want. to go right to the press this is what before three in the morning can't be good. i'm interested always in the waters in the house. you're out most of. your little. group at least the former

boss of the military commander slobodan dies after taking poison at the war crimes court in the hague. want helpless to regain embroiled in controversy after reporters without borders tries to cancel a press event that was critical of the syrian group their request was rejected by the host solve it as an attack on free speech. very disappointed to see the joint is the solution asking for. the international committee banned for life three more russian athletes preventing them from competing in the upcoming winter games it takes the total now to sixteen.