Five years to the day after the fatal shooting of an innocent Brazilian man at Stockwell underground, leading Greens renew their call for the abolition of the shoot-to-kill option under Kratos.
Shahrar Ali, lead author of the Greens’ 2008 GLA manifesto said: "Five years on, we still do not have public consent for the use of this dangerous policing tactic adopted by the police in 2003. Greens have called for the discontinuation of these rules of engagement on the streets of London, resort to which unjustifiably raises the risk of shooting dead an innocent person, as happened to de Menezes."
Jenny Jones, Green Assembly Member and Member of the Metropolitan Police Authority renewed her call to the Association of Chief Police Officers to urgently review Kratos, saying: "The fact is that we have a policy on the streets of Britain which we don’t understand, and which we cannot possibly know won’t go wrong again."
Notes to editor
1. Jean Charles de Menezes was shot dead by armed officers at Stockwell underground station on 22 July 2005 following a Kratos shoot-to-kill remote command. In a further incident, Nzube Udezue was held at gunpoint and left terrorised by armed officers at Bournemouth station on 8 July 2008. See Guardian report http://www.guardian.co.uk/uk/2008/jul/09/ukcrime.ukguns
2. The IPCC produced two critical overviews in 2007, Stockwell One and Stockwell Two (http://www.ipcc.gov.uk/index/resources), and the jury in the 2008 coroner’s inquest concluded that de Menezes death was in part caused by six failings of the police. Yet in 2010, Commander Cressida Dick, in charge of the operation on the day, received a Birthday Honours.
3. The London Federation of Green Parties adopted the following position for its 2008 GLA manifesto: "In 2003, the Metropolitan Police adopted rules of engagement, known as Kratos, that would enable an officer to shoot-to-kill solely on the basis of a remote command. Greens call upon the Met to discontinue the shoot-to-kill option under Kratos. Lethal force may remain an option outside Kratos, but only under the legal protections afforded by the European Convention of Human Rights." See Change London for Good: 2008 London manifesto https://london.greenparty.org.uk/manifesto08
4. Dr Shahrar Ali, also an applied philosopher, examined the case against Kratos in the chapter, "Is there a justifiable shoot to kill policy?", in Interrogating Terror (eds. Brecher et al), published this year (abstract http://philpapers.org/rec/ALIITA). His work was informed by meetings with the MPA including his participation in their "Together against Terror" conference in 2005.
5. Today the CPS report into the death of Ian Tomlinson, knocked to the ground by an officer during the G20 protests on 1 April 2009, has stated that no police face charges of any form over his death. The United Campaign against Police Violence organised a presence outside the CPS today to coincide with the anniversary of the de Menezes shooting: http://againstpoliceviolence.blogspot.com/