UK Politics

3087 readers

223 users here now

General Discussion for politics in the UK.
Please don't post to both !uk_politics@feddit.uk and !unitedkingdom@feddit.uk .
Pick the most appropriate, and put it there.

Posts should be related to UK-centric politics, and should be either a link to a reputable news source for news, or a text post on this community.

Opinion pieces are also allowed, provided they are not misleading/misrepresented/drivel, and have proper sources.

If you think "reputable news source" needs some definition, by all means start a meta thread. (These things should be publicly discussed)

Posts should be manually submitted, not by bot. Link titles should not be editorialised.

Disappointing comments will generally be left to fester in ratio, outright horrible comments will be removed.
Message the mods if you feel something really should be removed, or if a user seems to have a pattern of awful comments.

!ukpolitics@lemm.ee appears to have vanished! We can still see cached content from this link, but goodbye I guess! :'(

founded 1 year ago

MODERATORS

tom@feddit.uk

GreatAlbatross@feddit.uk

flamingos@feddit.uk

Starmer appoints national security adviser who negotiated secret deal to free genocider Pinochet (skwawkbox.org)

submitted 6 days ago by RobotToaster@mander.xyz to c/uk_politics@feddit.uk

24 comments fedilink hide all child comments

you are viewing a single comment's thread
view the rest of the comments

[–] TheGrandNagus@lemmy.world 20 points 6 days ago* (last edited 6 days ago) (2 children)

Is this straight up misinformation? I've been through 6 articles now and I can't find any other source on this outside of Skwawkbox.

All I can find is stuff about him being a major person behind the Good Friday Agreement and HK + Chagos Islands handovers.

Even the Telegraph and fucking GB News – both of which try to paint Labour/Starmer in the worst light possible – don't say anything about Pinochet. Where does this alleged link come from?

Looking into it, Skwawkbox has been caught lying multiple times, predominantly about the Grenfell Fire. They've also lost a libel case against one Labour MP and breached reporting standards about another. They, and I'm really not joking here, describe themselves as a non-traditional publication aimed at "aunties and uncles on Facebook".

If anybody has any other sources please correct me on this.

[–] FarceOfWill@infosec.pub 6 points 6 days ago

I just assume every skwawkbox link is misinformation.

If not in an absolute sense then always by ommission.

[–] flamingos@feddit.uk 2 points 6 days ago (1 children)

Skwawkbox links to this Guardian article, which itself is sourced from a book from the time. It doesn't seem that far-fetched that a renowned negotiator would be involved with a negotiation.

[–] TheGrandNagus@lemmy.world 6 points 6 days ago* (last edited 6 days ago) (1 children)

This article Guardian article, on top of just being an allegation in a book, doesn't accuse Powell of doing what Skwawkbox says he did.

Literally all it says is that the press chief of the 1999 Chilean government (i.e. 10 years and 2 governments after Pinochet stepped down) had meetings with Powell. That's it. Seems normal to me. I imagine the UK government would be chatting to Chile if they arrested David Cameron tomorrow.

Frei and his government, by the way, was anti-Pinochet. During his presidency, he indicted and arrested Pinochet.

I don't know how you could read that and think it's a confirmation that Powell negotiated release for Pinochet.

[–] flamingos@feddit.uk 5 points 6 days ago

It absolutely argues that:

Frei argued to Blair that neither government would benefit if Pinochet were to die in England and that he could be tried in Chilean courts. […] Blair undertook to do what he could within the law provided the exchanges between the two leaders were kept secret. The authors claim that Blair suggested setting up a 'back channel', with two people appointed to liaise between the leaders' private offices.