Watch the report


http://www.channel4.com/news/articles/politics/international_politics/simon+manns+first+interview+/1761247

First impression, he comes across a rupert muppet, but I reserve judgement until I see the full interview.

What ever the outcome of his 'trial' (as I doubt for one second it'll resemble a fair one in what passes for courts there) in Equatorial Guinea (EG), you have you have ask yourself a couple of questions about the man's (no pun intended) actions leading up to his capture.

OK, there's been lots of bruhahah about Mann being ex-Regiment, but that is no fail-safe against making school-boy errors. Especially when you take into account that that chinless wonder, Mark Thatcher, was involved in the operation.

What on earth were a team of Merc's doing landing in Zimbabwe, en route to EG? Namibia, Botswana, Zambia and a dozen other LZ's would have been far safer bets.

How they thought they would get away with this enterprise (a coup d'etat in EG) without either Vauxhall Cross or Langley having prior knowledge was folly - to say nothing of either or both of those bodies not tipping-off Zimbabwe's CIO (which we can't be sure isn't what happened).

If you thought the prisons in Zimbabwe were the Devil's own toilet, then you would rightly prefer them to those in EG - a country with a traditional African despot-cum-president-for-life who rules the gaff with a complete disengagement from reality and an utter disregard for human life.

Apparently EG has had to give various 'international guarantees' that Mann with not face the death penalty and will be placed in an, ahem, 'upgraded' prison block. Still won't stop him falling foul of the old "there was an attempted break-out one night and he was shot dead attempting to escape..." routine will it? If he's lucky he'll be found to have "fallen down some stone steps and unfortunately broke his neck in the fall" leaving him crippled. I wouldn't be Mann now for all the tea in China. Talk about grim prospects?

Now EG is an oil-rich country with reserves in the $billions - so with such rich post-coup booty on offer, you'd at least like to think that the Merc's running the play would have had their shit together sufficiently and afforded themselves best-in-class ingress and egress. Apparently not - hence my comment about Mark Thatcher.

As we all know, in recent times, there have been few successful Merc teams: one thinks of the SA Recce-populated Executive Outcomes and Sandline (Tim Spicer's mob): the days of 'Mad Mike' Hoare's 5 Commando running riot in The Congo, and Bob Denard's virtual sitting presidency in The Seychelles are a thing of the past - and all ended largely in ignominy. And we won't even mention Kennedy's Bay of Pigs fiasco.

If you're going to be a Merc nowadays, it pays (figuratively and financially) to join 'The Circuit' and at least get the pseudo-coverage and support of the US gov't in places like Iran - although even that little enterprise's days are numbered.

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"Those who forget the past are condemned to repeat its mistakes..."

I believe the yanks, ourselves and anyone else with a desire for more oil will give Mann’s captures a clean run in, without to much diplomatic 'Leave the man alone threats.

So for my part I am preying that he will get a left in peace and not pieces.

I would also hope for there being a bit of disquiet with a few recent demobbed/ or not, regiment members feeling inclined to pay a visit over there, its not all Holly woody, sometimes some of them feel encouraged to do just that.

Simon Mann will be found guilty, lawyer says

By Sebastien Berger in Malabo
Last Updated: 2:15am GMT 26/03/2008

Simon Mann, the former SAS officer accused of mounting a coup in oil-rich Equatorial Guinea, will plead not guilty but will be convicted whatever happens in court, according to his lawyer.



Simon Mann after he was arrested at a military airfield outside Harare in Zimbabwe

Ponciano Mbomio Nvo, the Spanish-trained lawyer who will defend Mann at his trial expected to begin next month, told The Daily Telegraph that his client was facing a judiciary fiercely loyal to the West African country's president.

"All the judges in this country are from the family or the party of the president," he said. "There is no judge or judgement which is neutral. They are only there to defend the interests of the president and his family."

Mann, the Old Etonian son and grandson of England cricket captains and scion of the Watney Mann brewing family, is due to be paraded before the world's media this week to confess publicly his role in the attempt to depose President Teodoro Obiang Nguema in 2004.

Along with 70 other mercenaries, most of them South African, he was arrested at a military airfield outside Harare in Zimbabwe, where he had expected to pick up a consignment of weapons. But the details of the plot had been widely leaked and an advance party was also detained in Malabo, the capital of Equatorial Guinea, a former Spanish colony.

The forward unit's leader, Nick du Toit, was jailed for 34 years in Black Beach prison, where Mann is now awaiting trial.

Despite a conviction being a foregone conclusion, and Mann's recent apologies for his involvement in the attempted coup, Mr Nvo said he would deny the charges, which have yet to be formally laid.

"As I lawyer I don't accept he's guilty, I can't accept that," said Mr Nvo. "He has declared he is guilty but at the judicial level there's nothing. For us lawyers, what is not in the proceedings does not exist in the legal world - TV, newspapers, internet, they don't exist."

Mr Nvo, who spent three years in Black Beach himself under the predecessor of President Obiang, is travelling to Madrid this week for meetings with Mann's British lawyers. He has yet to meet his client, but said that was normal under Equatorial Guinea's justice system.

"The government has promised not to kill or touch him and since he arrived here he's been well treated," said Mr Nvo, who will argue that the court has no right to try Mann.

"I have been informed that the extradition is not in accordance with the law," he said. "There was no extradition treaty between Zimbabwe and Equatorial Guinea when he was arrested and it cannot be made retrospective."

While he does not expect such legal niceties to make a difference - "he will be found guilty because they want to justify the extradition" - Mr Nvo does not expect Mann to spend decades in jail, however long his sentence.

"The intention of the president is that Mr Mann implicates lots of people, especially Severo Moto," he said, naming the leader of the opposition, who has been granted asylum by Spain.

"The president wants to show the international community that there was a criminal act against him. After one year, two years, three years he can decree a pardon and send him to his country. The government's greater aim is the imprisonment of Severo Moto.

"What's he going to do with Mr Mann? He's English, he can't be president of Equatorial Guinea. But Severo Moto wants to be president. He is his enemy."

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"Those who forget the past are condemned to repeat its mistakes..."