What happens on tour…

Monday 13 November 2017

While Jersey’s government says it’s committed to openness and transparency, it seems that, when it comes to top meetings with foreign officials, ‘what happens on tour stays on tour.”

A recent Freedom of Information (FOI) request sought details of the Chief Minister’s meeting with Bahrain’s Finance Minister HE Shaikh Al-Khalifa.

In a tweet following the meeting, Senator Gorst claimed that he had been “honoured” to meet the Shaikh.

But some, including St Helier Deputy Sam Mezec who described the Finance Minister as a “random dictator”, blasted the Chief Minister’s choice of words given the country’s human rights record.

Honoured to meet HE Shaikh Al-Khalifa @BahrainMOF to discuss close ties btw @StatesofJersey & #Bahrain #jerseyci pic.twitter.com/lvL4Itrwbx

— Senator Ian Gorst (@Ian_Gorst) October 12, 2017

“He is not a democratic politician. He is a member of the ruling family of Bahrain which has been in charge for hundreds of years, ruling with an iron fist and having zero-tolerance for opposition...Torture is widespread. Since the 2011 Arab Spring protests, a hundred dissidents have been murdered and thousands have been wounded. They even called in the Wahabist and ISIS-backing Saudi Arabian military to help them brutally put down these protests,” Deputy Mezec wrote in a blog post.

The FOI request questioned whether the subject of human rights had been discussed during the meeting, or indeed in any other meeting between States of Jersey and Bahraini government officials.

But the information was not disclosed. The response argued that holding meetings in private was key for “advancing Jersey’s external relations” and that sharing information about them “would be likely to prejudice relations between Jersey and the Kingdom of Bahrain.”

Pictured: Deputy Mezec, who criticised the meeting.

“This could reduce the Government of Jersey’s ability to protect and promote Jersey’s interests through its relations with Bahrain in the future, which would not be in the public interest. For these reasons, we consider that the public interest in maintaining the exemption outweighs the public interest in disclosing the information,” the response read.

It added: “It is not known if the issue of human rights has been brought up by any member of the Jersey States Assembly when meeting Bahraini government officials in the past.”