Craig Murray

Craig Murray

Born	October 1958 West Runton, England
Nationality	British
Education	MA (Hons), University of Dundee
Occupation	Political activist University rector Former ambassador
Website	www.craigmurray.co.uk

Craig Murray (born October, 1958)^[1] is a British political activist, university rector and former ambassador to Uzbekistan.

While at the embassy in Tashkent, he accused the Karimov administration of human rights abuses, a step which, he argued, was against the wishes of the British government and the reason for his removal. Murray complained to the Foreign and Commonwealth Office in November 2002, January or early February 2003, and in June 2004 that intelligence linking the Islamic Movement of Uzbekistan to al-Qaeda, suspected of being gained through torture, was unreliable, immoral, and illegal.^[2] He described this as "selling our souls for dross".^[3]

Murray was subsequently removed from his ambassadorial post on October 14, 2004.

Background

Murray was educated at the Paston School in North Walsham, Norfolk ^[4], an all-boys grammar school where he had an undistinguished record. He says he barely gained entrance to the University of Dundee. There he attended few lectures, instead reading voraciously to teach himself history. He graduated in 1982 with a MA (Hons) 1st Class in Modern History. He was President of Dundee University Students' Association, elected to this sabbatical office twice (1982-1983 and 1983-1984), an occurrence so unusual that the university court changed the rules to stop him running a third time. He was reserve member of the team that won University Challenge in 1983.^[5] He spent seven years in total at the university, compared to a normal four for a Scottish first degree.^[6]

He joined HM Diplomatic Service through the 1984 Civil Service Open Competition. Until 2002, he had a number of overseas postings with the Foreign and Commonwealth Office (FCO) to Africa and to Europe. In London, he was appointed to the FCO's Southern European Department, as Cyprus desk officer, and later became head of the Maritime Section. He also led the Foreign Office team in the Embargo Surveillance Centre between 1990-91, responsible for analysing intelligence on Iraqi attempts to evade sanctions.^[7] In 2002, he was appointed British ambassador to Uzbekistan. Craig Murray was dismissed from that post in October 2004.^[1]

In July 2004, he told The Guardian that "there is no point in having cocktail-party relationships with a fascist regime," and that "you don't have to be a pompous old fart to be an ambassador." He is separated from his wife, Fiona, with whom he has two children.^[8]

Uzbekistan

In October 2002, Murray made a controversial speech at a human rights conference hosted by Freedom House in Tashkent, in which he claimed that "Uzbekistan is not a functioning democracy" and that the boiling to death of two members of Hizb ut-Tahrir "is not an isolated incident."^[9] Later, United Nations secretary-general, Kofi Annan, confronted Uzbek President Islom Karimov with Murray's claims.^[8]

Murray was summoned to the FCO in London and, on March 8, 2003, was reprimanded for writing, in a letter to his employers, in response to a speech by George W. Bush, "when it comes to the Karimov regime, systematic torture and rape appear to be treated as peccadilloes, not to affect the relationship and to be downplayed in the international fora ... I hope that once the present crisis is over we will make plain to the U.S., at senior level, our serious concern over their policy in Uzbekistan."^[10]

Discipline charges

In July 2003, some of the embassy staff were sacked while Murray was away on holiday. They were reinstated after he expressed his outrage to the FCO. Later, during another holiday, he was recalled to London for disciplinary reasons. On August 21, 2003, he was confronted with 18 charges including "hiring dolly birds [pretty young women] for above the usual rate" for the visa department, though he claims that the department had an all-male staff, and granting UK visas in exchange for sex. He was told that discussing the charges would be a violation of the 1989 Official Secrets Act. The FCO encouraged him to resign.^[8]

He collapsed during a medical check in Tashkent on September 2, 2003 and was airlifted to St Thomas' Hospital in London. After an FCO internal inquiry conducted by Tony Crombie, Head of the FCO's Overseas Territories Department, all but two of the charges (being drunk at work and misusing the embassy's Range Rover) were dropped. The charges were leaked to the press in October 2003.^[11] Immediately upon his return to work in November 2003, he suffered a near-fatal pulmonary embolism and was again flown back to London for medical treatment. In January 2004, the FCO after a four-month investigation exonerated him of all 18 charges, but reprimanded him for speaking about the charges.

Removal from post

Murray was removed from his post in October 2004, shortly after a leaked report in the Financial Times quoted him as claiming that MI6 used intelligence provided by Uzbek authorities through torture.^[12] The FCO denied there was any direct connection and stated that Murray had been removed for "operational" reasons. It claimed that he had lost the confidence of senior officials and colleagues. The following day, in an interview on the Today programme, the BBC's flagship political radio show, Murray countered that he was a "victim of conscience," and in this and other interviews was critical of the FCO.^[13] A few days later he was charged with "gross misconduct" by the FCO.^[14] Having negotiated a settlement whereby he was paid six years' salary payment in compensation, Murray agreed to resign from the FCO in February 2005.

Subsequent career

Murray has continued his opposition to the so-called War on Terror since leaving HM Diplomatic Service. He sums up his current occupation: "Being a dissident is quite fun." ^[15]

He stood for parliament in Blackburn, as an independent candidate, against his former boss Foreign Secretary Jack Straw in the May 2005 general election. He polled 2,082 votes.^[1]

In November 2005, he took part in the Axis for Peace Conference in Brussels.^[16]

In December 2005, he published a number of confidential memos on his website, which outlined his condemnation of intelligence procured under torture, and the UK government's ambivalence to this. The British government subsequently claimed copyright over the documents and demanded they be removed. ^[17]

He has written a book entitled Murder in Samarkand - A British Ambassador's Controversial Defiance of Tyranny in the War on Terror.^[18] This book is to be filmed by Michael Winterbottom with a script by David Hare.

A character based on him appears in the 2006 UK-U.S. television co-production The State Within, in which the former British ambassador to the fictional country of Tyrgyzstan, a hard-drinking womanizer, is embroiled in a plot to stop human rights abuses amid escalating threats of war.

On February 16, 2007 he was elected to the position of rector at the University of Dundee, his alma mater. The other nominee was former Scotland rugby captain Andy Nicol.^[19] Murray opposes cuts to University departments and services which were proposed in a document drafted by a working group chaired by the outgoing Dean of the School of Engineering, Professor Michael Davies. The election saw an increase in turnout of 50% from the previous election, with Murray winning by 632 votes to 582. Coincidentally, Murray was in the same class at his secondary school as actor Stephen Fry, who also held the title of Dundee's rector^[20].

In July 2007, he was elected an Honorary Research Fellow at the University of Lancaster School of Law.

Awards

In recognition of his campaigning work on torture and human rights he was awarded the Sam Adams Award for Integrity in Intelligence in the spring of 2006.^[21]

In November 2006, he was awarded the Premio Alta Qualità delle Città of Bologna.^[22]

Legal pressure

During an interview with Alex Jones on August 21, 2006, regarding torture and the 2006 transatlantic aircraft plot, he claimed that false intelligence on al-Qaeda plots was obtained through torture done by CIA proxies and that the intelligence gained is used as a propaganda tool.^[23]

The threat of legal action against Murray by the Treasury Solicitor for the unauthorised publication of official documents on his website^[24] resulted in a large number of people mirroring the documents on their own websites and releasing them via peer to peer networks.^[25] A list of other current mirrors can be found in the posts and comments at the Craig Murray friends blog.^[26]

In September 2007, Murray expressed views on the character of Alisher Usmanov, following Usmanov's investment in Arsenal Football Club^[27] but the post^[28] had to be removed from his web site following an intervention from Usmanov's lawyers, Schillings, who threatened his webhost. Despite Murray's repeated assertions that he was happy to defend his statements in court, Schillings declined to sue Murray but concentrated on stamping out the story by threatening hosting companies who had no interest in defending the case. Under further pressure from Usmanov's lawyers the hosting company, Fasthosts^[29], decided to permanently close the server for the web site on 20 September 2007, an action that also had the effect of deleting several other related and non-related political blogs. A campaign by bloggers against Usmanov's legal pressure ensued. Murray's website has since returned.