MPs call on Theresa May to release 'kill list' for UK drone strikes

Lord Macdonald, the former director of public prosecutions, has co-signed a letter to Theresa May calling for greater transparency on the UK’s use of a “kill list” for drone strikes targeting British fighters in Syria and elsewhere.

The letter calls for the release of a report by parliament’s intelligence and security committee (ISC) into the British drone strike that killed Cardiff-born Reyaad Khan in Syria in August 2015, as well as the names of any further targets killed in the name of self-defence.

“[T]here are sound reasons to question whether the oversight role of parliament and the ISC can be meaningful” without more information, the letter says.

It is co-signed by Labour MPs Clive Lewis, a former shadow defence secretary, and Lucy Powell. It was organised by the all-party parliamentary group on drones, co-chaired by Powell.

SNP politician Kirsten Oswald, another co-chair of the APPG, demanded an urgent parliamentary debate on the UK’s use of targeted killing. Lewis told the Guardian that debate about the rules and accountability of targeted killing was necessary.

Khan had featured in a prominent Isis recruiting video in 2014. David Cameron went to parliament in September 2015 to defend the strike that killed him as “entirely lawful”, even though MPs had not voted in favour of military action against Isis in Syria, and had voted against action against President Assad. Cameron and his officials argued that Khan posed an “imminent threat” to the UK that justified his killing outside a British war zone.

The announcement was the first time the UK had acknowledged killing people using drones beyond the legal battlefield.

Last week the Sunday Times reported a draft ISC submission on the Khan strike expressing frustration at the information provided by intelligence officials sent to Downing Street in December. An intelligence official told the paper that some of those involved in the strike were unconvinced Khan posed an imminent enough threat to meet the legal threshold.

“Given that the ISC review ... has been held out as the primary form of accountability for that strike, and that some 18 months has now passed since it occurred, we hope you will be able to authorise the release of the ISC report, obviously redacted as necessary,” the letter reads.

On Wednesday the Daily Mail reported that British drone pilots based at RAF Waddington in Lincolnshire had continued to pursue and kill British foreign fighters without notifying parliament.

The UK has conducted military strikes against Isis as part of a coalition of nations since parliament authorised this in November 2015. The UK appears to be conducting a parallel campaign within Syria hunting British and other fighters, the APPG says, calling for increased accountability about the practice.

“[T]he kill list is devised and implemented based on the Khan strike ‘self-defence’ model, which is distinct from the coalition mission approved by parliament,” the politicians write.

They call for the government to publish redacted versions of the ISC report and the UK’s targeting policy, and to make a statement in response to the reports in the Sunday Times and Daily Mail. They also call for May to “identify any ‘kill list’ targeting since the Khan drone strike in August 2015”, including the names, dates and approximate locations of the targets.

Lewis told the Guardian: “The PM must now make a clear commitment to return to parliament at the earliest opportunity every time the government carries out drone strikes without approval. We need an urgent debate about the rules and accountability for ‘kill list’ strikes, both by the UK and carried out jointly with foreign partners.”