[garinda]

Originally Posted by Eric

I realize that it grates on the nerves to have to accord those men the rights that are guaranteed to everyone in the UK; but, that's just one of the difficulties of democracy. Durinng the war, tens of thousands of German soldiers, sailors and airmen were held as POWs and accorded humane treatment at an immense cost ... no doubt many felt that these men, many of them responsible for bombing your cities, should be punished, starved, killed ... in the same way that the Germans were treating the Russian POWs. But it didn't happen. Because, if you are defending freedom and civilization, as Great Britain was, much of the time alone and under siege, you have to act in a civilized fashion ... or else, what's the point.

I'm not a starry-eyed idealist, or a "bleeding heart liberal", just someone who believes that democracy has to be more than rhetoric. If there's no substance, it's worth nothing. And it's the substance, having to act according to our expressed principles, that seems to cause the problems.

Find me any proof that Al-Qaeda operatives are tortured or killed in Pakistan, and you might have a case.

I can find no such evidence.