Akmal Shaikh

[mockney piers]

Yeah, you go there Vince. Before those bloody liberals stuck their bleeding heart oar in we could be proud of the way we received a quarter of our government's revenue from selling opium to the chinese, and when their government tried to stop us doing so because of the desperate misery widespread addiction caused to their society we went to war with them and made damn well sure we could carry on selling it there.

Those awful liberals were apparently a bit upset when they heard of this, bloody PC. I imagine many chinese reacted with equal sympathy when they heard of General Gordon's fate in Khartoum, but I doubt many denigrated the liberals' record on this matter.

The irony of this all does make me laugh.

BTW we're not slipping down the world order, we slipped down it ages ago, we're just taking ages coming to terms with where we are in the world order. A small country with little manufacturing capacity thinking we're we're top dog. We want to be a consumer society with our cheap goods and energy available to all, and have sacrificed our inefficient (read relatively expensive labour) industry to this chimera.

You complain about us taking one from the bankers, but that's all we have left, and that's not the politicians fault, that's our fault, we have noone else to blame. It sure as hell ain't the bleeding hearts' fault who simply say respect for your fellow man is a good thing.

As far as not kicking terrorists out, the whole world has been complaining about Britain being a refuge for the worlds' terrorist organisations for the best part of fifty years, and we made a cynical unspoken deal that they could all hang about London as long as they never committed any atrocities in British territory. There was an awful lot of schadenfreude emanating from an awful lot of foreign offices around the world when 7/7 happened; some might even say it was comeuppance.

The country only appears to be going to the dogs to delusional twonks who still think this country is something it hasn't been since it was a rapacious empire. Personally I think it's a great country to live in, as long as we make sure those thugs on the street belonging to the impotent police stop killing people going to work or walking their dogs.

[mockney piers]

Gaaah, wasn't going to sucked into this trolling nonsense.

Phooooey.

[Keef]

I don't read the papers anymore, because they are basically all shite, including the Guardian, Observer, and Indie. However, The Mail, is special in it's ability to be everything that I hope this country isn't.

I love the fact that before making any kind of "argument", they just say things like "the bleeding heart liberals" and stuff like that. Meaning, that anyone who disagrees with them is a bleeding heart liberal. It's like saying "before all ou nazis pipe up about this and that...".

As an aside, what I found especially disturbing about this case (unless I have it wrong) was that he didn't know he was to be executed until the day before, when his family had to tell him he'd be dead the next day. That can't be right can it?

As another, and far more important aside, sports pages in broadsheets are just plain wrong aren't they.

[The Eye]

"As another, and far more important aside, sports pages in broadsheets are just plain wrong aren't they."

I couldn't agree more.

[????]

Keef...would that 'bleedin heart liberals' thing be the same thing that anyone who disagrees with the 'bleeding heart liberals' gets called a Daily Mail reader?

[The Eye]

Sort of. A bit like when Daily Star readers refer to FT readers as 'stone bleedin' arseholes'.

[mockney piers]

And the bipolar (pun intended) mud slinging continues ad nauseum.

I think what most on here want is a bit of perspective and rationality when discussing these matters. Bandying about names happens, but does noone any good. However when someone frames their point of debate by straw-manning any possible rebuttal with the use of either 'daily mail readers' or 'bleeding heart liberals' that just drags it down to its basest level.

Bottom line, a man got caught smggling and the nation has applied its maximum penalty. It took them 30 minutes to come to this conclusion in the trial despite the man being doolally (his appealwas so rambling and deluded it caused the whole court to laugh out loud) and from everything I've read, duped by unscrupulous operators who no doubt continue to smuggle drugs in via naive/desperate and/or impressionable mules. Death sentence not much of a deterrent for the real perpetrators was it.

For those taking some sort of satisfaction or delight maybe you'd like to read this and think for one moment with a bit of empathy about this man, his family and all those who live in countries less free and liberal (synonyms dont you know) than ours.

http://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/asia/shackles-convulsions-and-sheer-terror-life-on-death-row-in-china-1851448.html

Oh and while I'm at it "Where does this guy get off insisting he is British?"

Where do I get off suggesting the same then Steve? I'm a first generation immigrant born in a hot swarthy country, I guess I should just bin my British passport then huh if that's the welcome I'm given; at least I know where I stand now!!!

[The Eye]

"And the bipolar (pun intended) mud slinging continues ad nauseum."

EDF's passim, surely?

[The Eye]

Mockney Piers.

Re Indie. I'm sure that the majority of those following this thread are aware of the brutal nature of China's penal system that was undoubtably modelled on the Soviet example. Although sadly, I'm equally sure the unfortunate soul we're focusing on wasn't.

[mockney piers]

"EDF's passim, surely?"

very true eye, of course!! ;)

[Keef]

???? Wrote:

-------------------------------------------------------

> Keef...would that 'bleedin heart liberals' thing

> be the same thing that anyone who disagrees with

> the 'bleeding heart liberals' gets called a Daily

> Mail reader?

Yes probably. Like I say, they're all shite. BUT, I wasn't talking so much about the readers, more the actual stuff printed in the papers. I'm not sure (and I may be wrong) that you'll see the term "daily mail readers" printed in the guardian, whereas the mail does print things like;

His case has prompted outrage in this country from politicians and from the trendy metropolitan elite, for whom drug use is a fashionable habit rather than serious criminal offence.

That is just agressive for no reason. I was outraged, and I'm just a normal bloke, and have never been trendy in my life!

[Jah Lush]

Keef wrote -

>

> As another, and far more important aside, sports

> pages in broadsheets are just plain wrong aren't

> they.

There aren't any broadsheets anymore Keef. They're all tabloids these days apart from the Financial Times and The Guardian/Observer.

[The Eye]

And The Times.

[katie1997]

and the Telegraph.

[buggie]

SteveT and VinceAyre seem to both be trying to twist this thread to fit their own moan about how the country's going to the dogs and it was so much better in the old days - well shame to you both.

The nationality of the guy involved is the least important factor in this case as it is an international issue as organisations such as Amnesty and Reprieve work hard to recognise - human rights are equal to all humans not just those of our own race/culture.

China took the easy way out and picked on the weakest link in the chain

He was a vulnerable adult who was sucked into and taken advantage of by international drug smugglers who deliberately watch out for people like this to use as cannon fodder - Indulge them in their dreams or offer what to them is unobtainable while keeping the person in the dark as much as possible.

With increased publicity on cases they're having to go younger/more vulnerable who won't be so canny (the schoolgirls who ended up in Ghana after being lured by men who befriended them springs to mind as well) while they stay safe raking in the money and limiting how much danger they're in themselves and I am sure within China there were (very possibly Chinese nationals) waiting for Akmal to arrive to "help him with his bags" who likely blended back into the crowd to return to meet the next mule arriving.

It's the guys either side who should be caught and made an example of (not supportive of death penalty personally) but they are more difficult to catch.

The prosecutors must have noticed that Akmal had mental health issues, and I hope it remains on their conscience.

Unfortunately as long as there is a market for drugs, whether its a homeless smack addict, or a middle class dinner party wanting something to "kick off" the evening with, or even someone just wanting a joint to wind down the day with, then drugs will continue to be smuggled and the dealers will be looking for people to smuggle/have them planted on them.

[Tarot]

Its all so sad, Half the world is still primitive.

[Peckhamgatecrasher]

Keef, shame on you! The Guardian OBO is superb - and that's from a Telegraph stalwart!

[SteveT]

Mockney piers wrote:-

Where do I get off suggesting the same then Steve? I'm a first generation immigrant born in a hot swarthy country, I guess I should just bin my British passport then huh if that's the welcome I'm given; at least I know where I stand now!!!

You are free to become as petulant as you wish young mockney!

[mockney piers]

You can call me what you like Steve, no skin off my nose, I simply refer people back to your words

"Where does this guy get off insisting he is British?

He was born in Pakistan has a Pakistani name and looks like a Pakistani.............."

People can make up their own minds about you I know I have.

[SteveT]

Good for you!

[KidKruger]

I seem to agree with SteveT's quote, however I then find myself remembering I was born abroad, have a name from there, moved here aged two and call myself British.

[SteveT]

You might well be justified too KidKruger but the drug donkey Akmal Shaikh didn't,

he lived in Poland and other places where they needed copious amounts of 'smack'!

Sorry but I have no sympathy for him or any others dealing in it, and I do not care what other poster's may think of my

right wing Daily Mail reader's attitude.

He was caught 'at it' in a strict regime and whoever is caught doing it there, gets it.

My wish is that we would treat our 400+ MPs for their 'misbehaviour' in a position of trust to at least a flogging and a

few years of hard labour!

See if that is not a deterrant!

[mockney piers]

Likewise kid (though I was 5).

It does bring up those perennial questions, what is british. I always thought it was a conceptual thing, an idea. Like Rome. People stil spoke of Rome and Roman long after Rome itself had become nothing more than a small provincial capital and the seats of power had moved Byzantium and Milan.

Wasn't British a blanket idea that all it's subjects were encouraged to feel, whether you were Edmund Hilary (brton conquers everest) or a sepoy fighting for the king in the world wars. I wasn't aware there was some sort of exclusivity based on race or background, indeed the fact that the powerful and wealthy were encouraged tonsend their children to be educated in schools here and/or send them to Sandhurst shows that the inclusivity was encouraged and one of the reasons for the empire's success.

Contrast that with the Spanish empire that had very specific rules fir racial exclusivity and look how much weaker it was in the long run.

If you mean English then there's a while new set of conundrums. How far back to you draw lines to allow someone to be English. Anyone who was born here, or must there be a racial profiling? If I find I'm the direct descendent if a Roamn Nubia stationed here does that exclude me even though my family have been here a thousand years longer than a Viking blonde living in York? Do you have to prove that you are 100% of native post ice age stock (and I challenge anyone outside of the far west of Ireland to even have the tiniest chance of doing that)?

Or does it Mean sounding the part, looking the part? I feel british and could easily pass for it but I'm proud of my Spanish heritage. Being of Scottish, SpanIsh, German, English, welsh (all via the west indies) and god knows what else am I simply excluded from having any nationality like a mongrel banned from crufts of do we admit were all abut of a m?lange.

I'm of the opinion that nationalism is on it's way out in this shrunken world. It's a pretty recent concept anyway and though it has helped forge modernisation, I think for the most part it's been more trouble than it's worth and has certainlybeen at the heart of millions of deaths overthe last three hundred years or so.

Good riddance I say.

[mockney piers]

Luckily for this country Steve, you don't have a say.

In fact very few of those MPs broke rules outright, it was mostly that those rules were designed specifically to be abused to a certain extent as a way around awarding politically unpopular wage rises. It just a culture

of greed Started stretchig them to politically unacceptable levels.

Four MPs have broke the law and are being charged and may well go to prison, I too hope so.

[Keef]

Oh Piersy, I'll always see you as a geeky English boy.