Ruth Dudley Edwards: Only Trump can save us from this crowd of ‘international lawyers’ - that's a sobering thought
One of the throw-away remarks at home that baffled me as child was ‘The Skibbereen Eagle has its eye on Russia’.
Eventually, some kind adult explained that this related to a threat in a West Cork village in 1898 from a new competitor to the 40-year-old Eagle.
Fred Potter, the newspaper’s owner, was Protestant and anti-nationalist.
The upstart Southern Star was very nationalist.
Fred had the bright idea of distracting from this familiar battle by drawing readers’ attention to global political affairs.
As he explained in an editorial, the Eagle would be keeping its eye “on the emperor of Russia and all such despotic enemies - whether at home or abroad - of human progression and man’s natural rights which undoubtedly include a nation’s right to self-government. ‘Truth’, ‘liberty’, ‘justice’ and the ‘land for the people’ are the solid foundations on which the Eagle’s policy is based.”
Those words became famous for independent voices putting oppressors under scrutiny.
For people like my parents, it was also a satirical comment aimed at people who took themselves and their opinions too seriously.
But we need to take very seriously a worryingly interesting world with - in the United Kingdom – a skipper and crew of novices who appear not to have the faintest idea how to steer the ship.
This is particularly true when it comes to China.
This week our government - inspired by prime minister Keir Starmer, his attorney general Lord Hermer and their best buddy Philippe Sands - has given permission to China to build a gigantic embassy in a sensitive area of London full of underground cables carrying national and international traffic.
The embassy plans show extensive residential facilities for staff, giving unprecedented and virtually unchecked opportunities to install a few hundred spies.
Useful too could be the unlabelled rooms underground which could be very convenient for interrogation and even torture.
Those of us not blinded with wishful thinking have watched with alarm as Sir Keir insouciantly gives away to Mauritius, a Chinese ally, the priceless asset of the Chagos islands in the British Indian Ocean territory, which we've held since we captured them from France in 1814.
Governed by the UK and East African Mauritius in a joint administration, the islands gained independence in the 1960s to allow the construction of a US military base on Diego Garcia, which hosts B-52 long-range nuclear-capable bombers.
Mauritius - whose capital city Port Louis is 1,300 miles away - was given £3,000,000 compensation.
In 1967 the Labour government began the removal of the entire population of about 1,000 descendants of freed African slaves, who relocated to Mauritius or the UK.
Mauritius has smartly been using anti-imperialist rhetoric to campaign to get the islands back from the UK.
Philippe Sands has been their most influential legal representative.
Starmer did what he does best: he caved in, agreed to hand over the territory and - amazingly - pay the Mauritians to take it away.
Trump has tweeted that this is “an act of GREAT STUPIDITY”.
We should all be keeping our eyes on ideologues calling themselves international lawyers.
It is a sobering thought that only Trump can save us from them.
l Ruth Dudley Edwards is the author of The Faithful Tribe: An Intimate Portrait of the Loyal Institutions and also of Aftermath: the Omagh bombing and the families’ pursuit of justice