Quote Originally Posted by the other bob wilson View Post
You accuse Marina Hyde of “just meeting a demand for anti Government sentiment” and then produce a piece from a right wing website which it seems to me is doing exactly the same thing from the opposite standpoint as an article you like. Ms Hyde’s articles are not close to the truth you say and yet I’d say that article you deem worthy of a C+ plus was a pure opinion piece in a similar mould to what you wrote before a link to Ms Hyde’s article rubbishing viewpoints like yours and his was posted on here.

What I don’t get is how it is deemed not possible to have a viewpoint that is critical of the handling of this issue by both the Iranian and UK Governments because anyone who says a word against the latter on here gets the King of whataboutery (Life on Mars) and you putting them right as to where the real blame lies. What seems to be accepted as fact though is that the UK reneged on a substantial debt from more than forty years ago and this gave the Iranians something they could cite as a justification for their behaviour.

Labour was in power for thirteen of those years, so it’s not just a Tory thing, but the same party was in power for Nazanin Zaghari-Ratcliffe’s time in prison and one of the five Foreign Secretary’s she referred to has admitted that she has a point when she complains about being jailed for too long.

There also seems to be general acceptance that Johnson did her few favours with his intervention when he was a particularly inept Foreign Secretary, so I would argue that Citizen’s Nephew’s D+ grading for the Spiked article should be extended to the UK Government’s performance both in terms of not paying the debt and their actions over the past six years in relation to the jailing of Mrs Zaghari-Ratcliffe.
Jesus.

1 / Spiked isn't a right wing website. It's evolved from Marxism Today. It has evolved I'll grant you, and it's raison d'etre is sometimes to play devils advocate. Nonetheless it offers a lot of diverse opinions. I disagree with a hell of a lot of whats on there. (which is health) not this article though

2 / He's not defending the UK government, he's clarifying that it wasnt the UK that locked her up on trumped up charges etc and kept her incarcerated. Ultimately, we got her released. That doesn't always happen. There are countless foreign nationals of many countries locked up around the world. Maybe it should have happened earlier, but I don't see why the current foreign secretary and her staff are to blame for that? Any government policy on any topic could always have been implemented sooner than it was.

3 / I think it's fair to blame previous foreign secretaries. Clearly they failed. And clearly the current one didn't. THats the reality.

4 / Maybe we should have paid the debt sooner, but remember, this is based on sanctions imposed against a pretty bad authoritarian state. I should imagine we owe Russia a debt at the moment. Does this mean it's fair game for them to capture any British tourist?