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From: "Fredrik S. Heffermehl"Date: May 15, 2008 5:36:40 PM GMT+02:00To: Mailing List IALANA and progressive European lawyersSubject: Vanunu - great political battle in Norway - a lawyers appeal -Oslo, May 15, 2008Dear colleague,In the last 6 weeks there has been a tremendous interest in Norway for theliberation of Mordechai Vanunu, Israel´s nuclear hostage. The media havegiven extensive and sympathetic coverage, and the cabinet obviously isunder strong pressure to stop ignoring the many calls for action in the matter.The launch of the Lawyers´ appeal yesterday was a media success. Aneditorial in a main Oslo paper today, said that the pressure on the cabinetis building and called the lawyer´s appeal a very heavyweight contribution.Earlier appeals for a strong Norwegian intervention to protect Vanunu´s securityand human rights have been made by the 2005 congress of all Trade Unions,a month ago by the Council of Norwegian Bishops. Generally there is both astrong feeling of sorrow and indignation in Norway about the plight of Vanunu.A translation into English of the lawyers´ appeal is attached. In Norwegianyou will find it on the web with the lists of signatories, at this address:You may not be able to decipher all the titles in Norwegian. A delicate point isthat the petition has been signed by 2 Judges of the Supreme Court. Further,the signatories include around 20-25 "professors dr. of law" and a very solidlist of over 60 lawyers involved in foreigners law, immigration, asylum andrefugee law, human rights and international law. This just is not something tobe ignored - the petition makes it clear that legal formalities and the argumentsused by several Norwegian governments as a fig leaf to excuse inaction, areclearly untenable law. The point is that the fact that MV is in his "home country"iss no bar to granting him asylum and a Norwegian passport and protection.In the final paragraph, the petition lays out a three-point action plan on how tocome to the rescue of Mordechai - if the political will is there. It further makesthe point that under international law any country is entitled to grant asylumand issue a passport for a foreigner in need of protection on humanitariangrounds, even those under foreign jurisdiction. I hope this could be used bycolleagues and peace movements in many countries to approach their gvmts.The support for Mordechai in the Norwegian media and the general public isenormous - I should wish you could have read the main editorial in Dagsavisento create the political will also in the cabinet (The interesting position is thatthere is an internal split in the three-partite cabinet between the two juniorpartners and the main party (Labor) and also within the ranks of Labor itself).Our foreign minister (Labor) still sticks to a standard statement "Israel isa rule of law democracy and Norway will not wish to interfere in theoperation of Israeli justice". I have again and again said that he is givingan answer to a question that has not been asked, what we are demandingis that Norway intervenes forcefully in an individual case where it is clearfor everyone to see that Israel is violating the principles of law anddemocracy. We hope the cabinet of Norway will in discrete forms convincecolleagues in Israel that the 60 years anniversary is a good occasion forIsrael to appear as a state under the rule of law by releasing Mordechai.Fredrik S. Heffermehl