Indefensible

While the trial of Tony Blair is still a somewhat tenuous possibility, that of John Demjanjuk has been adjourned on the grounds of ill health. Demjanjuk was born in Ukraine, where Stalin's economic policies resulted in what Tony and Daveybloke would presumably call a period of tough agronomic readjustment. A little later the Nazis invaded; Demjanjuk, as a soldier in the Red Army, was captured and, like Daveybloke's new chums in Latvia's Decent Waffen-SS, defected to the other side. Demjanjuk served as a concentration camp guard, doubtless doing his best under difficult circumstances. After the war he emigrated to the United States, though he does not quite seem to have reached the heights of Tony's own accomplishments on the lecture circuit. Curiously enough, Gordon Brown, despite his sure legal touch where big Islamic plots are concerned, has not pronounced a verdict; Jack Straw, despite his famous humanitarian concern over General Pinochet, has not intervened; and not a single one of Daveybloke's Cuddly Conservatives has come forth in defence of this unfortunate victim of Soviet aggression. Now, I wonder why that could be.