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I write to raise my deepest concerns about the purchase by Police Scotland and Aberdeen City Council of the Briefcam enhanced CCTV system as well as recent proposals by Police Scotland to extend its application in Aberdeen City.

Briefcam is a private Israeli provider of the VIDEO SYNOPSIS®️ solution. This type of technology is deployed in 98 sites of illegally occupied East Jerusalem  for surveillance of Palestinian neighbourhoods  by the Israeli Police and Israeli Ministry of Housing and Construction (1,2). The first minister has previously said that companies profiteering from illegal settlments should not benefit from public contracts in Scotland (3).

Firstly, as I am sure you will be aware, Israel is currently under investigation for genocide by the International Court of Justice for the campaign of terror in Gaza that has killed 34,000 people including 14,000 children at the time of writing. It would be impossible for us to recount all the crimes and atrocities in this single email. Beyond the genocide in Gaza, other war crimes and human rights abuses by the State of Israel are well documented not least in reports by Amnesty International, Bet'selem and Human Rights Watch. Horrific human right abuses including illegal imprisonment and torture facilitated by facial recognition systems such as that provided by Briefcam have been documented extensively against all Palestinians living in the West Bank and in Israel itself (4-6).
 
Secondly, purchase of this system violates the recommendations of the UN Human Rights Council (HRC), whom after adoption of resolution 31/36 condemning the construction of Israeli settlements in Palestinian territories, identified business enterprises which have, directly and indirectly, enabled, facilitated and profited from the construction and growth of the settlements (7).

I urge ACC and Police Scotland to lead by example and terminate their contract with Briefcam with immediate effect failing which their disregard for human rights will be highlighted in a public campaign to which I will partake.

I look forward to your confirmation that the contract with Briefcam will be terminated.
 
(1) https://dimse.info/briefcam/
(2) https://www.whoprofits.org/companies/company/6672?briefcam
(3) https://greens.scot/news/ban-companies-complicit-in-west-bank-settlements-from-public-contracts
(4) https://www.amnesty.org/en/latest/news/2023/11/israel-opt-horrifying-cases-of-torture-and-degrading-treatment-of-palestinian-detainees-amid-spike-in-arbitrary-arrests/
(5) https://www.amnesty.org/en/location/middle-east-and-north-africa/middle-east/palestine-state-of/report-palestine-state-of/
(6) https://www.newyorker.com/news/q-and-a/the-brutal-conditions-facing-palestinian-prisoners
(7) https://www.ohchr.org/en/hr-bodies/hrc/regular-sessions/session31/database-hrc3136