Two Former Soldiers Who Volunteered To Help Fight ISIS Could Be Charged With Murder


Two former British Army soldiers fighting against ISIS in Syria are operating in a legal no-man’s land and could be charged with murder, a former government legal officer has warned.

Former Solicitor General Sir Edward Garnier QC explained to BBC Radio 4 that Jamie Read, 24, and James Hughes, 26, who are currently helping the Kurdish peshmerga defend the city of Kobane from ISIS, could face police interviews if they return to the United Kingdom.

“We are in a terrible grey area, not least because we don’t know enough about what they are doing.

“The United Kingdom is trying to defeat ISIS. But freelancers are not acting on behalf of the United Kingdom. They may well be guilty of murder, or other sorts of crimes, or they might not be guilty of anything.

“It goes to the general story who go abroad to fight in other people’s wars place themselves not only in physical danger, but in that legal limbo land where they could, if they get on the wrong side of this almost invisible line, into trouble when they get home.”

The two former soldiers, who run a private security firm, have been criticized as mercenaries in some quarters. However, both Read and Hughes, who have done three tours of Afghanistan, stressed repeatedly that they are volunteers in a battle of “good against evil.”

The Telegraph reported that the pair, who were reportedly recruited by an American named Jordan Matson, are adamant that they travelled to Syria to fight ISIS, not for financial gain but because their conscience compelled them to do so.

“We could not do nothing while innocent men, women and children are tortured and murdered by Islamic State while the international community stands by and observes from the luxury of their boardrooms or their tanks on the hill.

“This is not a religious war nor is it a racial war, this is a war of good against evil – a magnificent simplicity.”

[Picture of Jamie Read and Jordan Matson via The Telegraph]

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