21 APRIL

THE ROUTINE USE OF TORTURE AGAINST DETAINEES IN ADEN 18 December 1965 – Medical reports by the Aden Director of Health Services backed allegations of torture made against the British run interrogation centre at Fort Morbut in Aden. A representative of the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) was eventually allowed to visit the…

BRITAIN BLOCKS SFO INVESTIGATION INTO HUGE BRIBES PAID TO SAUDI PRINCE 14 December 2006 – The Attorney General Lord Goldsmith announced that it was not in the public interest for the Serious Fraud Office to be allowed to continue its investigation into allegations of enormous bribes paid to Saudi officials and royals to secure an…

THE LORD MAYOR OF CORK DIES ON HUNGER STRIKE IN BRIXTON PRISON [25 October 1920 ] Terence MacSwiney, the Lord Mayor of Cork, died at 5.40 am on Monday 25 October 1920 on the seventy fourth day of his hunger strike at Brixton prison.  His biographer, Francis Costello, remarked that the MacSwiney’s ‘solitary protest would…

FORTY INDIAN MUTINEERS BLOWN FROM GUNS [ 10 June 1857 ] On this day in 1857, Herbert Edwardes, the British political officer at Peshawar, ordered forty captured Indian mutineers to be blown from guns, a method of execution in which the victim was tied to the mouth of a cannon which was then fired. As…

BOBBY SANDS MP DIES AFTER 66 DAYS ON HUNGER STRIKE 5 May 1981 – The Sinn Fein MP and Irish Republican prisoner Bobby Sands died after 66 days of his hunger strike at the H-Block Prison hospital at Long Kesh. At the age of ten Sands and his family had been forced to leave their…

CONSERVATIVES BACK FAR RIGHT GOVERNMENT OF VICTOR OBAN [ 12 September 2018 ] On this day in 2018 Conservative MEPs, representing Britain’s largest political party, were among a small minority in the European Parliament to back the far right Hungarian government of Victor Oban, during a crucial vote.  Since he was elected prime minister in…