Bruce Fein, a lawyer based in the United States of America who represents Mazi Nnamdi Kanu, the detained leader of the Indigenous People of Biafra, has accused Catriona Laing, the British High Commissioner to Nigeria, of conspiring with the Nigerian government to keep Kanu in detention forever.
Since his extraordinary rendition to Nigeria from Kenya in June 2021, Kanu has been held at the Department of State Services, DSS, headquarters in Abuja.
Fein claimed that the envoy was personally sabotaging efforts to free the IPOB leader and accused Laing of complicity and complacency regarding Kanu’s difficulties.
Kanu’s attorney expressed disbelief that Britain and her High Commissioner would be unmoved over the continued illegal detention of her citizen in violation of court orders and the United Nations Working Group on Arbitrary Detention in a letter dated February 10, 2023 that was made available to Sunday Vanguard.
The US attorney was surprised that, despite the UN Working Group on Arbitrary Detention’s recommendation that Nigeria unconditionally release Kanu, Laing didn’t take advantage of that to press for Kanu’s release.
So, Fein wanted to know why Kanu, a British national, had been silent about her experiences.
“What is your hidden agenda? For the United Kingdom, oil and gas? lucrative business deals in the UK? He asked.
In part, the letter read: There is evidence to suggest that you are personally preventing Mr. Kanu’s unconditional release, which is required by international law’s jus cogens norms, which are binding on all nations regardless of their consent. You have elevated hypocrisy and cynicism to new heights.
“You have made the UK complicit in flouting international law like Mr. Putin by affirmatively encouraging the government of Nigeria to continue its illegal detention of Nnamdi Kanu. While your government has taken extreme umbrage at the Russian President Vladimir Putin’s violation of international law in attacking Ukraine and committing war crimes, you have made the UK complicit in flouting international law like Mr. Putin.
“You and your nation descended to new heights. In order to protect the 3,500-person Falkland Islands from Argentinian mismanagement, you declare war on them, thousands of miles from English shores. However, British national Nnamdi Kanu is left in Nigeria’s DSS’s cruel, lawless dungeon.
In addition, Fein had written to President Muhammadu Buhari earlier this year to remind him of the dire consequences of keeping Kanu in illegal detention in spite of a UN opinion and a number of court orders authorizing his immediate and unconditional release.