UK ministers at risk of murder charges over drone strikes, committee warns

The UK government must urgently clarify the legal basis for its drone launch policy against Islamist State (IS) militants, a committee of senior parliamentarians has said.

Despite the government's insistence that it it does not have a "targeted killing" policy, it is clear that the UK is prepared to use lethal force overseas for counter-terrorism purposes, the cross-party group of MPs and peers said.

Drone pilots, intelligence officers and ministers could face murder charges if policies are not spelled out, said the findings of the Joint Committee on Human Rights (JCHR).

The committee's inquiry began after the killing in a UK drone strike in Raqqaa last August of British citizen Reyaad Khan, 21, from Cardiff. At the time, Prime Minister David Cameron said Khan was planning attacks against the UK.

"We took this action because there was no alternative. In this area, there is no government we can work with. We have no military on the ground to detain those preparing plots and there was nothing to suggest that Reyaad Khan would ever leave Syria, or desist from his desire to murder us at home," Cameron told parliament.

But Harriet Harman, the chair of the committee, said the government had not been "crystal clear" about the legal basis for the killing of Khan in Syria and the committee raised wider concerns about the potential use of drones in other parts of the world where IS is active.

The committee continued: "We accept that the drone strike in Syria was part of that wider armed conflict in which the UK was already engaged, to which the Law of War applies, and that the government therefore did not use lethal force outside of armed conflict when it targeted and killed Reyaad Khan on 21 August.

"However, our inquiry has also confirmed what the prime minister appeared to tell the House of Commons on 7 September: that it is the government's policy to be willing to use lethal force abroad, outside of armed conflict (in Libya, for example), against individuals suspected of planning an imminent terrorist attack against the UK, as a last resort, when there is no other way of preventing the attack."

That position was "put beyond any doubt" by the permission given to the US to use airbases in Britain to launch air strikes against an IS camp in Libya, the committee said.

The MPs and peers said that "while international law permits the use of force in self-defence against an imminent attack, it does not extend more widely to authorise the use of force pre-emptively against a threat which is more remote, such as plans which have been merely discussed but which lack the necessary intent or capability to make them imminent".

'Slippery slope'

There are concerns, raised both in the report and by human rights advocates, that the UK's drone policy is drifting towards operating similarly to the controversial US drone programme.

Shrouded in secrecy, the US government has yet to officially acknowledged the programme's existence, though it is thought to have resulted in the deaths of hundreds of civilians, according to international human rights organisation Reprieve 

While the government has sought to distance itself from any suggestion that it is following the US model of "targeted killing", it has repeatedly refused to answer questions from MPs and the committee, the group said in a statement on Tuesday.

“The UK’s silence in the face of repeated questioning by the committee only further reinforces the very real danger that the UK is following the US down the slippery slope of kill lists and targeted killings," said Jennifer Gibson, a Reprieve staff attorney said.

"This is alarming, given the CIA’s secret drone war has killed hundreds of civilians and been described as a ‘failed strategy’ by Obama’s own former head of defence intelligence.”

The report has called for greater accountability and has proposed giving the Intelligence and Security Committee a more prominent role in oversight.

The committee also urged the government to take the lead in developing an international consensus on the issue.

"When the government orders our military to take a life outside of armed conflict, there should be proper accountability," Harman said. "Those making and carrying out the order to take a life need to know that there will be independent scrutiny to ensure that the highest standards have been adhered to."