The British establishment has waged a 17-year vendetta campaign against former diplomat-turned-dissident Craig Murray

The Supreme Court’s decision to uphold former diplomat Craig Murray’s prison sentence on contempt of court charges has predictably been ignored by the mainstream British media.

Murray - who was originally sentenced to 8 months imprisonment by Scotland’s Court of Session - had his appeal rejected by the Supreme Court.

The case revolves around the Alex Salmond trial and the former diplomat was charged with contempt of court after publishing information that could potentially lead to the identification of some of the women who had accused Salmond of sexual assault.

Murray’s imminent imprisonment marks possibly the culmination of the British state’s vendetta against him.

A former UK ambassador to Uzbekistan, Murray was sacked by the Foreign Office (now officially referred to as the Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office), for criticizing the host country’s human rights record as well as vehemently opposing the US government’s extraordinary rendition program, which involved torturing terrorism suspects.

Following his sacking from the British diplomatic service Murray embraced journalism and human rights activism and established his own blog to publish his views and findings.

A prominent supporter of the Scottish nationalist movement, Murray was deeply scathing of the British state’s attempt at destroying the political career of veteran pro-independence leader, Alex Salmond, through what in the end proved to be baseless sexual assault charges.

Salmond’s support for Salmond did not endear him to the leadership of the Scottish National Party (SNP), who view Salmond’s attempt at setting up a rival pro-independence party in the form of Alba as an irritant and a distraction.

Nevertheless, Scottish nationalists of all stripes have leapt to Murray’s defense as they perceive he is being unjustly persecuted by the British state.

One former SNP official who has since defected to Alba took to the social media platform Twitter to condemn Murray’s imminent imprisonment as the latest assault on independent journalism.

Former MP and gadfly politician, George Galloway, who is no friend of the Scottish independence movement, also took to social media to assert that the UK’s mistreatment of journalists like Murray and Julian Assange removed the British government’s moral authority to lecture other countries about human rights.

Meanwhile, former Labor Party MP and Israel lobby critic, Chris Williamson, decried the misuse of the judiciary to punish Murray as yet another bloody disgrace.