Anti-terror bill is not an attack on civil rights: Blair

0 Comments | AFP, February, 2005

LONDON (AFP) — British Prime Minister Tony Blair has defended a controversial draft anti-terrorism bill saying he "rejected completely" that it is an attack on individual liberties.

"I reject completely the allegation that this is a fundamental attack on longstanding civil liberties," Blair wrote in an opinion piece in The Daily Telegraph.

"We have to balance protection for the public from terrorism with safeguarding civil liberties. But there is no greater civil liberty than to live free from terrorist attack," he wrote.

The government triggered a storm of protest on Tuesday when it introduced the bill, which would grant the home secretary (interior minister) broad powers to restrict the movements and actions of foreign and British terrorist suspects....