Big_Bird
Joined: 31 Jan 2003
Location: Sometimes here sometimes there...
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 Posted: Sat Oct 07, 2006 7:49 pm Post subject: British POW victim denied comp. because parents not British |
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I think this is bloody disgraceful, I hope she wins the appeal.
British PoW faces verdict on how 'British' she really is
The Court of Appeal will this week decide if Diana Elias, an 83-year-old widow who was held in a Japanese PoW camp during the war, should be denied compensation on grounds of her nationality
Read extracts from Diana Elias's witness statement
Mark Townsend, legal affairs correspondent
Sunday October 8, 2006
The Observer
She suffered in silence, petrified of being executed at any moment while interned in an insect-infested prison camp. Sixty years on, the horrific experiences of Diana Elias in a notorious Japanese Second World War camp will this week help to define the controversial issue of what constitutes Britishness.
The 83-year-old widow was interned because she was British. The UK government insists she is not quite British enough, arguing that she has no 'ancestral connection' to the land of her passport and is therefore not eligible for compensation from the government.
Amid the ongoing debate over national identity, the Court of Appeal is to decide whether the government was justified in deciding that to qualify as British an individual must have a 'blood link' through birth or ancestry. Elias was born in the British Empire and has always held a British passport, but the fact that her parents were Indian and Iraqi prompted the Ministry of Defence to claim she did not qualify for a payment scheme for individuals held in Japanese prisoner camps. To receive the payment, the victim's parents have to come from Britain.
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