Has Isis reawakened 'an eye for an eye' bloodlust in Brexit Britain?

Kotey and Elsheikh, who are understood to have been stripped of their British citizenship, were captured in January, sparking a row over whether they should be returned to the UK for trial or face justice in another jurisdiction. Home Secretary Sajid Javid sparked cross-party condemnation, including from senior members of his own party, when it was revealed the UK Government had agreed to share intelligence with the US without seeking the usual assurances the men would not face execution if they were sent to the US for prosecution.

MPs on all sides had accused him of breaching the UK's long-standing opposition to the death penalty, while the Government's former reviewer of anti-terror legislation Lord Carlisle branded the move "extraordinary". A number of Tories raised concerns, with former attorney general Dominic Grieve warning the decision represented a "major departure from normal policy". Shadow attorney general Baroness Chakrabarti said Mr Javid appeared to have "secretly and unilaterally abandoned Britain's opposition to the death penalty".

As the outcry mounted, Javid announced a hasty U-turn on Friday and agreed to a "short-term pause" of the mutual legal assistance (MLA), after a lawyer representing the family of one of the suspects demanded the assistance be suspended. But Javid appears to have the British public on his side, demonstrating that one should never underestimate the bloodlust of the British people when it comes to certain crimes like terrorism, murder or paedophilia.

A YouGov survey found 62 per cent of 7,177 British adults polled believe the UK Government is right to make an exception to the usual MLA assurances to allow “The Beatles” to be prosecuted somewhere they may receive the death penalty. Just 20 per cent said the Government should have opposed the pair being prosecuted where they may receive the death penalty, while 18 per cent were undecided.

In Scotland, support for Javid’s original decision was remarkably consistent with opinion across the UK, despite the frequent “wha’s like us” exceptionalism of politicians and commentators that Scots are more enlightened than the Tory-voting masses elsewhere in the UK. Three-fifths of Scots backed Javid, although there was a slightly larger opposition in Scotland than elsewhere, with 26 per cent saying he should oppose co-operation. Only London returned a larger number of opponents at 31 per cent, but the number of people who backed co-operation with the executioners was still higher at 45 per cent.

The election of Donald Trump as President of the United States and Britain’s decision to turn its back on more 40 years of European unity – largely driven by opposition to immigration – has reignited debates that many thought settled decades ago. Trump has started a protectionist trade war not seen since the days of the pre-war depression, has pledged to pack the Supreme Court with judges willing to overturn the landmark decision to legalise abortion in 1973, and has advocated the death penalty paedophiles and drug traffickers. “Got to do something about these missing chidlren (sic) grabbed by the perverts. Too many incidents – fast trial, death penalty,” he tweeted in 2012, when he was just a rich reality TV star.

His vengeful bloodlust has not dimmed since he became the “leader of the free world”, calling for a debate on executing drug traffickers in March this year. “If someone goes and shoots somebody, kills somebody they get the death penalty,” he said at a rally for Congressional by-election. “A drug dealer will kill 2,000 to 5,000 people during the course of his life. I don’t know if this country is ready but I think it’s a discussion we have to start thinking about.”

Meanwhile, in Brexit Britain a poll of more 2,000 people in February found that the death penalty was the policy that most people would like brought back after Britain leaves the EU. More than a third of people (36 per cent) wanted the return of state executions – rising to 53 per cent among Leave voters while 20 per cent of Remain voters also wanted the sanction reinstated.

Support for the death penalty even outstripped support for the return of the emotive blue passports (31 per cent), pounds and ounces in shops (30 per cent), corporal punishment in schools (27 per cent) and incandescent bulbs (19 per cent). In all categories, support for a return to the policies of the past was backed by Leave voters by a factor of around three-to-one over Remain voters.

So, with Britain being taken out of the EU by a slim majority of people, many of whom seem to live in a bygone age and display attitudes we thought had been relegated to the dustbin of history, is the death penalty now back on the table in Britain?

Peter Anthony Allen and Gwynne Owen Evans were the last men to be executed in Britain in 1964, while Henry Burnett was the last man executed in Scotland the previous year. The death penalty was gradually phased out in subsequent criminal legislation, before finally being abolished in 1998 when Britain ratified the European Convention on Human Rights, which prohibits capital punishment except "in time of war or imminent threat of war". The ban was written into British law with the Human Rights Act later that year.

Extradition is prohibited where the suspect could face the death penalty under the Extradition Act 2003, and successive governments have sought assurances that no British citizen will be executed by a foreign government seeking assistance with prosecution. However, Ben Wallace, the UK Minister for Security and Economic Crime, told Parliament on Monday that this always been a matter of Government discretion. The overseas security and justice assistance guidance states “that there will be cases where, as an exception to the general policy and taking into account the specific circumstances, ministers can lawfully decide that assistance should be provided in the absence of adequate assurances”.

Parliament doves were apoplectic, complaining that Britain’s staunch rejection of the death penalty is an integral part of the “soft power” it uses to influence governments around the world. Britain’s moral high ground is particularly useful when doing business with oppressive regimes, and regularly speaks up to appease angry liberals with an assurance that ministers will, of course, raise the matter of the regimes’ dodgy human rights records while negotiating lucrative contracts. Diane Abbott, Labour’s Shadow Home Secretary, said ministers “cannot be a little bit in favour of the death penalty – either we offer consistent opposition, or we do not.”

The mother of one of the cell’s victims has said she was “very against” the use of the death penalty. Diane Foley, mother of victim James Foley, has also urged warned against making the suspected killers “martyrs in their twisted ideology” by executing them.

Speaking in the House of Lords on Tuesday, Baroness Stern, co-chair of the All-Party Parliamentary Group on the Abolition of the Death Penalty, urged the government to stand by its commitment to see “the end of the death penalty everywhere”. “Death penalty campaigners from all over the world express gratitude to the UK and are grateful for what it does to assist them in the countries in which they work,” she said, adding that any co-operation that leads to a death sentence “will be a huge blow to the death penalty abolition movement”.

Some have speculated that Britain may be keen to assist the US in prosecuting “The Beatles” because they would struggle to prosecute them under British law. Sir Michael Fallon, the former defence secretary, appeared to speak for many Brexiters when he urged the Government to dispense with the pesky human rights laws that lead some to regard Britain as a soft touch. He said: “If it is still too difficult to prosecute here at home those who have gone to work for or to assist Daesh/ISIL abroad, and if that is because of some obligation under the European convention on human rights, is it not time to take back control?”

The UK Government insists it has no plans to withdraw from the European convention on human rights. But with Trump and Brexiters stirring up bloodlust on both sides of the Atlantic, there seems to be a growing number of voices demanding a return to the biblical vengeance of “an eye for an eye” for murderous religious zealots.

OPINION: Dr Kasey McCall-Smith, University of Edinburgh

Brexit and Donald Trump have given a greater platform to those that have very extreme views on the death penalty – but I don’t necessarily think the British people have changed their minds.

If you poll enough people you’ll get the answer you want, but it would misleading to say that there has been a rise in people in the UK that favour the death penalty.

I don’t think there’s any chance that the UK will ever bring back the death penalty, particularly as there is a moratorium across all European states and well over half of the counties throughout the globe have banned the death penalty.

Developed countries are particularly strong in their opposition to the death penalty, with Japan and the USA being notable exceptions.

Sajid Javid has made a very erroneous decision to not seek assurances that there would be no death penalty if these men are tried in the US.

These men were British citizens and they have family in the UK, so the decision to effectively disown them doesn’t give the UK to the moral authority to say that their lives are worth less others.

If they have stripped these two people of British nationality they are making a judgment that some individuals are worth protecting more than others.

They were clearly naturalised and part of the paperwork and the oaths you go through is that if you commit heinous crimes you could potentially be stripped of British nationality.

The Government has to show good cause why nationality should be stripped but at the moment they haven’t been convicted of a crime.

Obviously there is a lot of evidence that demonstrates that they have committed heinous crimes along with the rest of their crew which has been called “The Beatles”, but they haven’t been convicted so stripping them of British nationality in advance of any type of conviction is a bit premature.

If the UK starts stripping individuals of their rights, what happens when there is a British soldier or even a British national picked up somewhere else?

They lose the moral authority to compel that territory with soft power if they start going down that road.

Michael Fallon’s argument (that we should "take back control" if it is too difficult to prosecute them in the UK because of some obligation under The European Convention on Human Rights) is complete nonsense.

The ECHR has nothing to do with the European Union, they are two completely separate regimes, but they are often misconstrued which is frustrating.

It doesn’t provide heightened protection — it just provides the same protection that he would receive if he was in the dock and ensures trials are carried out according to the rule of law with due process and ensure both parties are represented.

Dr Kasey McCall-Smith is a lecturer in public international law and programme director of human rights law the University of Edinburgh. She is a US-qualified lawyer and executive chair of the Association of Human Rights Institutes (AHRI), and is currently based at Guantanamo Bay US detention centre in Cuba.