JOINT STATEMENT: The Conviction of Ben Jamal and Chris Nineham Is an Unprecedented Attack on Civil Society
We, the undersigned organisations, are alarmed and appalled by the conviction of Ben Jamal and Chris Nineham, two respected civil society leaders. Over the last 2 years, Ben Jamal and Chris Nineham have been involved in organising marches of hundreds of thousands of people, which remained overwhelmingly peaceful, on the streets of the UK in opposition to the atrocities committed by the Israeli military in Gaza. Week after week, they have negotiated with the police to ensure that people could peacefully and safely exercise their democratic right to protest.
Jamal and Nineham, were convicted for failing to comply with conditions that had been imposed on a peaceful protest and, in Jamal’s case, inciting others to do so. Jamal and Nineham had hoped to take a small delegation to lay flowers in memory of Palestinians killed in Gaza to the BBC, which was beyond the police line, and if permission was refused, had made it clear they would lay them at the feet of police officers. According to video footage the first line of police can be seen to part and permit the group to pass. Following this Chris Nineham was arrested and a second police line did not permit any further passage, at which point Ben Jamal encouraged the group to leave their flowers and return to the original site of the demonstration
They were sentenced to 18 and 12 months conditional discharge respectively. They were each ordered to pay £7500 in prosecution costs.
That such an act has led to criminal conviction, hefty costs, and lengthy conditional discharge periods should alarm anyone who believes in our basic democratic human right to protest.
Whilst no charges were brought against the other members of the delegation that accompanied Ben and Chris to lay the flowers, including members of Parliament and a Holocaust survivor, these charges may cause a broader chilling effect for protest organisers.
When governments in Georgia and Hong Kong sought to arrest civil society leaders and activists for their roles in organizing peaceful protests, the UK rightly condemned it. Jamal and Nineham’s convictions are a testament to how far this country has swung towards adopting authoritarian approaches to protest, and the damage successive governments have done to our democratic rights to freedom of speech and assembly.
Human rights law requires that the state carries out its positive obligation to facilitate peaceful protest, and only imposes restrictions that are necessary and proportionate.
Jamal and Nineham’s convictions are a major concern for organisations like ours. We are civil society leaders who peacefully stand up against injustice. We should not fear criminalisation for doing our jobs.
We represent organisations working across human rights, civil liberties, environmental protection, and freedom of expression. While our goals may differ, we share a commitment to the core principle that peaceful protest is not a privilege to be granted by those in power, but a fundamental right that democratic governments should uphold and protect.
As if the Police, Crime, Sentencing and Courts Act 2022 and the Public Order Act 2023 had not gone far enough in handing police sweeping powers to restrict and criminalise peaceful protest, the Crime and Policing Bill currently before Parliament extends those powers further still.
Jamal and Nineham’s situation is emblematic of the sweeping powers police now possess to strangle peaceful protest.
Many of the human rights we cherish – civil liberties, workers’ protections, votes for women, environmental safeguards – were won through protest. Recasting those same forms of action as inherently suspect risks forgetting that history and hollowing out the very rights that those struggles secured.
Ben Jamal and Chris Nineham are appealing their convictions. But we cannot wait for an appeal to voice our grave concerns: these convictions are wrong, and the trajectory they put the UK on is one that anybody who cares about democracy should be alarmed about.
Signed,
Yasmine Ahmed, UK director, HRW
Kerry Moscoguiri, Chief Executive, Amnesty International UK
Akiko Hart, Director, Liberty
Asad Rehman, chief executive, Friends of the Earth England, Wales and Northern Ireland
Silkie Carlo, Director, Big Brother Watch
Daniel Gorman, Director English PEN
Areeba Hamid and Will McCallum, executive directors, Greenpeace UK
Barbora Bukovska, Senior Director for Law and Policy, Article 19
