Sir, As second in command to the interpreters section of Multinational Division (South East) in 2004 and 2005, I was responsible for the recruitment of our civilian Iraqi interpreters (report, August 7). They were often top-level graduates in medicine, chemistry and engineering who had obtained an excellent command of English because of the texts they were required to study. I watched these unarmed individuals working side by side with our Forces, facing the same dangers as our troops and then going home to live among those individuals who had been targeting them hours earlier. When we lost an Iraqi interpreter to a car bomb and large numbers of the locally employed Iraqis demanded to be flown back to Basra, I remember one interpreter refusing to leave the team of British soldiers because “they were his friends and would not abandon him if he was in trouble”.

I can think of no more damning indictment of our attitude towards these people than to contrast the sentiment of this individual facing danger alongside our Forces with that of our Government.

JAMES MILTON
Formerly Captain,
Adjutant General’s Corps
Defence School of Languages

Sir, You quote a Home Office spokesman as saying “anyone who is seeking to apply for refugee status must do so from within the United Kingdom. There is no exception to that.” This is at variance to an assurance given by the then Leader of the House of Lords, Baroness Amos, in reply to questions on June 11. Referring to an earlier oral question I had asked specifically about the position of Iraqi administrators and translators, Lady Amos said that “given the strength of feeling in the House on that occasion I went back to the Home Office to get further information”.

She said that the majority of asylum claims came from Iraqis within the United Kingdom. But she added that were people to apply “having worked for the United Kingdom and were the other circumstances to mean they would qualify for refugee status within the United Kingdom” then those would also be looked at case by case.

We owe a clear duty to those who have risked their own and their families’ lives to help the British authorities, but might I suggest that our duty goes rather farther. There are other Iraqis who have been acting as interpreters, for example to help British correspondents based in Baghdad and Basra, who also face similar danger. Surely we can also help them?

LORD FOWLER
House of Lords

Sir, It is incumbent upon this Government to recognise the great contribution made by the Iraqi translators and fully consider their situation. It is in Britain’s moral and strategic interest to hold its reputation as a country that does not abandon those who have staked so much in support of British military operations.

KEITH VAZ, MP
Chairman, Home Affairs Select
Committee

Sir, Having very recently returned after 18 months in Iraq, I was never less than humbled by the commitment to the coalition efforts in the reconstruction of Iraq of all the interpreters I used and met. All of them were risking their lives because they believed in my Government’s expressed aim of improving the lives of Iraqis. Perhaps more than any, they have trusted my Government’s word and are still risking their lives to support that Government.

Its treatment of Iraqis who have supported its policies, and now have their lives threatened for doing so, presents my Government with perhaps one last chance to show some moral integrity in its dealings with the Iraqi people.

THE REV DAVID COOPER
Datchet, Berks

Sir, What makes the callous indifference of the Government all the more remarkable is the contrast with how the United Kingdom deals with the deportation or extradition of nonnationals who pose a threat to its national security interests.

Here the UK has been fastidious in not putting people into situations where there is a real risk to their lives or of torture. By failing to provide asylum to the Iraqi interpreters we will be exposing them to the same risks that we deem unacceptable for terrorist suspects. Indeed, it is arguable that by failing to provide asylum to the interpreters the Government is acting unlawfully under the Human Rights Act.

RICHARD A. EDWARDS
Principal Lecturer in Law
University of the West of England

Sir, This sorry saga merely proves the old Arab saying: “It is better to be an enemy of the British than a friend. If you are an enemy they will buy you. If you are a friend they will sell you.”

HUGH MCINTOSH
Glasgow

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