Catamite.

It's not a new one, no. It's the one he quoted from the UN charter of rights, that the US have been using for about a decade in pakistan without the hoo hah we've got for doing it once, on so-called British citizens.

Optimistic as ever

Actually, yes they were. More or less, plus I distinctly remember them hanging a s**tload of war criminals after the second world war (and arresting and punishing even some allied soliders for crimes committed during war, including unlawful killing).

Also, we're not talking about 'giving them a warning' before we blow up a known IS location (perfectly legal) were talking about killing specific people with drone strikes, who are suspected of being part of terrorist organization, on the basis of intelligence reports.

That's never gone badly wrong before. Its not like we recently invaded an entire country on utterly false intelligence and the say so of a Prime Minister. That hasn't at all blown up in our faces (infact an indirect result is the creation of ISIS, from Al-Qaeda in Iraq, and the fact we're bombing the f**k out of Syria now.

When the state kills individuals, it needs to legally determine the right to do so, and that its actions are lawful (and that the targets are actually reasonably likely to be guilty of something).

"One Nation Under God, has turned into One Nation Under the Influence of One Drug"
[Link]

That's the US, they didn't recently have parliament decide not to expand airstrikes into Syria. I don't want a 'we have the right', all I want is that people are accountable for the decisions they make when conducting what essentially amounts to an assassination - i.e. A judge maybe, to actually determine that the information presented of someone actually being a valid target is crosses a reasonable threshold.

Because what you have otherwise, is the state executing people without trial or oversight, on the basis of intelligence, which lets face it was a dogs breakfast over Iraq. Accountability. Preferably before we start doing things like firing drone missiles into Wedding parties or houses where 'someone might be' and killing a shed load of civilians, and then deciding its better to cover it all up.

Just like we were sure WMD were in Iraq, and the British weren't complicit in torture, or rendition.

"One Nation Under God, has turned into One Nation Under the Influence of One Drug"
[Link]

And so were these people taken out by drones identified as enemies. So what's the difference? Perfectly legitimate and both intelligence-led.

The assassination of Heydrich was a British operation from start to finish, carried out by Czechs. It was not under Czech direction.

Two years ago isn't recently, things change.

How is a judge better qualified to determine a valid target than the military? People act like the PM just did this all on his own. The decision probably involved quite a lot of people, and a lot more qualified people than those that Mr & Mrs Smith voted for as they said they'll keep our local library open.

Then we go into amdram... "what if a wedding or house full of civlians get killed..."

Optimistic as ever