Friday, November 20, 2009 

The war against evidence of torture continues.

How then goes our glorious government's consistent attempts to stop any primary evidence emerging of our collusion in, if not open acceptance of the use of torture when it came to interrogating suspects caught up in TWAT (the war against terror)?

This week brought rulings to please both sides. Yesterday, for the sixth straight time in a row, the high court rejected the claims of the Foreign Office that to reveal seven paragraphs of a CIA memo sent to MI5 and MI6, a memo which almost certainly details the "treatment" which Binyam Mohamed was being subjected to whilst detained in Pakistan, would damage national security and could potentially stop the CIA sharing information with us. This is, as the judges have repeatedly argued, preposterous. According to them, the memo contains no actual secret intelligence, instead rather a summary sent to the intelligence services on Mohamed. What the memo almost certainly does contain though is prima facie evidence that MI5 and MI6 knew years before they previously claimed that the US was either conniving in or actively mistreating prisoners indirectly under their care or supervision.

In the latest ruling, the judges make clear that one of the paragraphs makes reference to the infamous Bybee memo, released by the Obama administration earlier in the year. The Bybee memo details exactly how Abu Zubaydah, then the most senior al-Qaida operative in US custody, could be tortured, supposedly without breaching the prohibition against torture in the United States code. In a section which remains redacted, there is apparently a verbatim quote from the memo: apparently we can't see what the Americans have already released to the world. To infer, it looks as if the memo is justifying, or explaining to the intelligence services in this country, that Mohamed will be or has been treated in a similar fashion, and that because Bybee OKed it, there's nothing to worry about on the legality front.

The real reason then why the government is so determined to keep this memo secret is that it contradicts everything they have maintained over the alleged intelligence service collusion with torture. Not just the government story, but also the story which the intelligence services themselves have continuously thrust down our throats. They told the intelligence and security committee that they only joined together the dots on what the CIA was doing when the Abu Ghraib scandal broke, claiming that despite knowing about the rendition programme, there was "no automatic connection between secret facilities and mistreatment". To call this laughable would be putting it too lightly; that the ISC believed this most blatant of lies, this lack of intellectual curiosity and complete failure to put two and two together is why it ought to be disbanded and a watchdog with real power to monitor the security services immediately set-up in its place.

While however the government will yet again appeal against the high court ruling, they must have been utterly delighted with the one made in the same parish by Mr Justice Silber. On Wednesday he ruled that MI5, MI6 and the police can potentially withhold evidence from defendants and their lawyers in any civil case, if it is determined to be "secret government information" which they seek. As the Binyam Mohamed memo case shows, what can be determined to be "secret government information" is remarkably elastic. Not that MI5, MI6 or the government could decide personally what is secret or isn't, oh no. Instead "special advocates", presumably the same that act for those being held on control orders and who can't be specifically told on what information their movement and rights are being restricted will decide. As Louise Christian complained afterwards, the judge's ruling effectively allows "government to rely on secret evidence in the ordinary civil courts ... a constitutional outrage".

As one window opens slightly, another is slammed shut. Not that is just us and the Americans who have disgraced ourselves: even the Canadians are finding that "the good war" means handing over captives to the Afghan intelligence services, and with it almost certainly into their torture dungeons. Interesting is the way that the Canadians are attacking Richard Colvin's credibility, just as the government has repeatedly done the same against the whistleblowers here. The taint on all of us is going to take an awfully long time to lift.

Labels: , , , , , ,

Share |

11/20/2009 09:38:00 PM | | | links to this post

Monday, August 10, 2009 

Protesting too much about collusion.

One of the more cutting criticisms made by the Joint Committee on Human Rights last week was that while the head of MI5 had no problems in talking to the media, he seemed to regard it as an unacceptable chore to have to appear in front of a few jumped-up parliamentarians. Yesterday the head of MI6, "Sir" John Scarlett appeared on a Radio 4 documentary into the Secret Intelligence Service, where he naturally denied that MI6 had ever so much as hurt a hair on anyone's head, or more or less the equivalent, as Spy Blog sets out.

This would of course be the same MI6 that passed on information to the CIA regarding Bisher al-Rawi and Jamil el-Banna which resulted in their arrest in Gambia and subsequent rendition to Guantanamo Bay, and indeed the same MI6 which along with MI5 interviewed Binyam Mohamed while he was being detained in Pakistan, where we now know he was being tortured. The Intelligence and Security Committee noted even in their whitewash report into rendition that MI6 had likely given information to the Americans which was subsequently used in his mistreatment whilst in Morocco. We've since learned that "Witness B", an MI5 officer, also visited Morocco on a couple of occasions while Mohamed was being held there, even further heightening suspicions of direct collusion in his torture.

Those two others who declined to appear before the JCHR were David Miliband and Alan Johnson, who also seem to prefer talking to the media than having to face the chore of sitting before a committee with something approaching independence. Their article in the Sunday Telegraph, responding to the report's claims was one of those wonderful pieces of writing which condemns everything, states the obvious whilst not contradicting any of the specific allegations of collusion. It's the lady protesting too much: no one said, as they do, that the security and intelligence services operate without control and oversight; indeed, it's been quite clear that ministers have known from the very beginning just what the intelligence services have been getting up to, they've just denied and denied and denied it until finally forced to admit to specific allegations, like that two men were rendered through Diego Garcia despite previously repeatedly denying it. They've in fact just admitted that they are personally accountable for what MI5 and MI6 officers get up, so we'll know who should be prosecuted should collusion be revealed, and it's difficult to believe that at some point it won't be.

Labels: , , , , , , , , , ,

Share |

8/10/2009 09:58:00 PM | | | links to this post

Tuesday, August 04, 2009 

Torture? Look at this fucking great fish!

You perhaps would have thought, what with it being the silly season and all, that a hard news story such as the most authoritative so far inquiry into British state complicity with torture post 9/11 might have made a few waves. Fat chance. The only thing making waves, or rather no longer making them, is a dead fish. Front page of the Graun, pretty much a given, considering the paper's own contribution to the inquiry by the parliamentary Joint Committee on Human Rights (PDF), was the best it could manage.

Admittedly, it might be because it doesn't tell those of us who have been following the long and winding road from complicity in rendition with the Americans to complicity in torture in Pakistan much that we don't already know. It also doesn't specifically say that we have been complicit: such investigation was outside its remit, and besides, both David Miliband and the home secretary declined to give evidence to the committee, as did Jonathan Evans, the head of MI5. Andrew Dismore, trying to shame the MI5 director into meeting his committee even pointed out to Evans that back in January he gave an interview to a select band of hacks. If he can give an insight into the current workings of the security service to the hoi polloi in Fleet Street, surely he can spare a few minutes to say something to parliamentarians? Alas, no. Evans it seems is only answerable to the toothless Intelligence and Security Committee, where his evidence can be conveniently censored and redacted, and considering their report into rendition, which was a complete whitewash, it's no surprise why the service favours them.

Thankfully, the committee's conclusions pull few punches. Complicity in torture would be a direct breach of our international human rights obligations; despite the need for co-operation between foreign intelligence agencies, there must be mechanisms for ensuring accountability; ministers are determined to avoid parliamentary scrutiny, and the fact they can do so confirms the system for ministerial accountability for security and intelligence matters is woefully deficient; the membership of the Intelligence and Security Committee must be debated to ensure it is subject to frequent scrutiny and that it should be established as a proper parliamentary committee, with an independent secretariat; the government should immediately publish all versions of the guidance given to intelligence officers in relation to the detention and interviewing of detainees overseas; the government should follow the Obama administration and publish all relevant legal opinions provided to ministers; and lastly, the only way to restore confidence in the intelligence services is an independent inquiry into the numerous allegations of complicity in torture, which should make recommendations about improving the accountability of the security services as well as removing any scope for impunity.

Some coverage of these conclusions might well have helped towards that inquiry, one which this government at least is certain not to hold; it's doubtful also that Cameron, especially with the neo-conservatives among his front bench, is likely to piss off the security services as soon as he ascends to power. What it comes down to is that no one really cares: some of those making the allegations are after all convicted terrorists; oh, and probably the fact that all of them have brown or darker skin helps too. We will though remain in judgement of Guantanamo Bay and the explicit involvement of the CIA in torture, even when we ourselves are just as up to our necks in it.

Labels: , , , , , , , , ,

Share |

8/04/2009 10:25:00 PM | | | links to this post

Thursday, June 18, 2009 

Collusion, lying and willing torturers.

Craig Murray quite reasonably wonders whether he's been airbrushed out of history, as the Guardian keeps up its rather belated "exclusives" concerning who knew what and when over the mistreatment of British detainees and our corresponding collusion in torture. I'm more concerned though with how this yet again shows just how useless the Intelligence and Security Committee is. In their report on rendition a couple of years back, which was, it goes without saying, a complete and utter whitewash, they believed the claims of MI6 that they knew absolutely nothing about anyone being mistreated anywhere until the Abu Ghraib scandal emerged:

150. It was only when news surfaced of the mistreatment of detainees at the U.S.-run Abu Ghraib prison in Iraq in 2004 that the UK Government realised that there were real risks of CIDT:
Back in 2003 we were concerned about secret facilities but we did not at that stage, I think, make an automatic connection between secret facilities and mistreatment. That sort of connection grew later as more allegations came to light or… things like Abu Ghraib came to light, which led you to believe, just a minute, if that is happening there, what might be happening in secret facilities.

This itself was unbelievable: what was the point of "secret" facilities except to subject those held there to the sort of treatment which would eventually severely embarrass both the United States and this country? The idea itself that MI6 couldn't or didn't know what was going on was even more ridiculous: what is the point of intelligence gathering organisations if they can't even work out what our allies are up to?

We know now for certain however that MI6 knew full well what was going on as soon as they started being allowed access to prisoners with UK connections, as could have been expected. In January 2002, after an MI6 officer realised that someone in US custody was being mistreated, they sent out official advice which while telling their agents that they could not be seen to condone torture, they were not under any obligation to intervene to prevent it, something which directly breaches the obligation not to be complicit in that mistreatment.

MI6 can't be blamed for lying; that is after all what they are trained to do from the moment they join the service and is to be expected. Our politicians can however be blamed, for both knowing full well what was happening despite their denials and for publishing those denials as if they were true. There is only one way to get to the bottom of the abuses which have happened under the rendition programmes and the mistreatment in the name of the war on terror, and that is through a fully independent judicial inquiry. At the same time, the ISC needs to be abolished and a fully independent watchdog of the security services needs to be established, with the Independent Police Complaints Commission as the model, modified as necessary. Liars may then not be able to prosper after all.

Labels: , , , , ,

Share |

6/18/2009 11:15:00 PM | | | links to this post

Friday, April 17, 2009 

Torturers justifying to themselves that they are not torturers.

It turns out that I did perhaps speak slightly too soon in being disappointed that the Obama administration hadn't opened up the books on the Bush regime's involvement in both rendition and torture. Although the release of the four memos sent between the CIA and two different deputy attorney generals was "required by the rule of law", that certainly wouldn't have stopped the prior administration or some individuals within Obama's from doing the exact opposite.

It's been clear since the first allegations emerged of mistreatment of detainees that just like all the other regimes which subsequently fell, with their secrets and misdemeanours exposed through documents, the Bush administration didn't just discuss what it was doing in secret and on a need to know basis: it left behind a distinct paper trail, of which these memos are just the latest example. The most notorious was perhaps the stress techniques which Donald Rumsfeld signed off with the pithy justification that considering he stood for 8-10 hours a day, why couldn't the detainees be forced to stand for longer than 4 hours? This sort of thinking and a general complete lack of concern at what they were ordering others to do is evident throughout the documents and memos that have so far been released.

The key document of the four released, although the others also have significant sections, is the August the 1st 2002 memo from Jay S. Bybee, then assistant attorney general to John Rizzo, the acting general counsel for the CIA. Rizzo was specifically asking whether 10 "techniques", including the most notorious, "waterboarding", would violate the prohibition against torture "found at Section 2340A of title 18 of the United States Code", as the CIA intended to use them against Abu Zubaydah, at that point the most senior alleged al-Qaida leader to be captured. The document, which recounts in minute detail just how the "enhanced techniques" would be used, is chilling. Of these, the most disturbing is the blithe way in which Bybee recounts that Rizzo had previously informed him that they would not deprive Zubaydah of sleep for more than 11 days, having already kept him awake for more than 72 hours, of how they wished to confine Zubaydah in a box, in which an insect would be placed, Zubaydah apparently having a fear of such creatures, while not informing him that the insect would be completely harmless, and finally of how they would waterboard him, where the simulated drowning would not last longer than 20 minutes, and sessions as a whole would last 2 hours.

Quite why Bybee doesn't just say immediately that he completely agrees that what Rizzo is proposing doesn't amount to torture is unclear, as the arguments he then details are simply pitiful. These amount to little more than the fact that soldiers that were trained in SERE techniques did for the most part not suffer any long-term side-effects as a result of being treated in the same way as they were proposing to deal with Zubaydah. This is akin to comparing apples to oranges: there is a world of difference between undergoing these techniques once or twice with friends and professionals that you trust so that if you are captured you both know what to expect and how to deal with it, and instead having them repeatedly used on you, by people you neither trust and who you quite reasonably believe have the intention and the means to harm you if you don't co-operate with them, despite not being able to comply with their demands.

This finally culminates in Bybee admitting that waterboarding constitutes a threat of imminent death, which directly breaches Section 2340A. This however is not a problem, as Bybee decides that "prolonged mental harm must nonetheless result to violate the statutory prohibition", and, judging by Rizzo's authoritative and extensive research into the long-term effects of such procedures on SERE students, no such mental harm has been recognised. If things were not already Orwellian enough, Bybee then continues onward, concluding that additionally, there has to be "specific intent to inflict severe pain or suffering" for there to be a breach of the prohibition. Despite the fact that the CIA would be using such measures on Zubaydah deliberately in order to get him to talk, because of how they are using these methods in "good faith", and restricting themselves so that they are not abused beyond acceptable limits, there would be no such specific intent. This is no more and no less than torturers justifying to themselves that they are not torturers. It's the sort of thing which dictatorships indulge in; this is the land of the free and the home of the brave resorting to such methods after 9/11 swifter than the likes of Soviet Russia did.

The results of Zubaydah's torture were worryingly predictable. Differences remain between those who claim he was a significant member of al-Qaida and those that instead claim that he was on the periphery, but what is beyond doubt is that in response to his treatment he told his interrogators anything and everything, including details of numerous false plots and individuals, all of which came to nothing. Likewise, the far more senior Khalid Sheikh Mohammed, who became so adept at being waterboarded that he impressed and gained the respect of his interrogators, talked himself into being possibly the most dastardly terrorist in history, the only detail missing from his claims being that he wasn't the one who fired the second shot from the grassy knoll. Even if you completely disagree with the argument that you shouldn't abuse the detainees you capture for moral reasons, the reason to oppose torture is that it simply doesn't work, illustrated perfectly by Zubaydah.

There is one other key passage in one of the other memos which perfectly sums up the hypocrisy and contempt that the Bush administration had when it came to international obligations regarding torture:
In other words: we know full well what we're doing is torture, but the fact that we condemn others for doing exactly what we are isn't going to stop us from continuing with it.

Obama released the documents saying that there would be no prosecutions of those responsible, and this should be a time for "reflection, not retribution". That's fair enough where it concerns those that actually carried out the mistreatment, although post-Nuremberg and indeed, post-Bush, it should be no excuse to say that you were only following orders. Those who should be held accountable however are the ones that wrote these documents, the ones above them that were the ones really pulling the strings, and especially those who both then and now continue to defend the use of such methods. Those who first proposed these techniques are those responsible for them being used routinely, as we saw at Abu Ghraib. As before though, it seems likely that once again it will be the little people that serve the jail sentences while the real war criminals can write their memoirs and parade around the lecture circuit.

Labels: , , , ,

Share |

4/17/2009 09:40:00 PM | | | links to this post

Thursday, March 26, 2009 

A police investigation, but how far will it go?

It's difficult to know whether to be surprised at the decision of the Attorney General to refer to the Metropolitan police her concerns that MI5 may have broken the law through its alleged complicity in the torture of Binyam Mohamed, or surprised but at the same time cynical. The manoeuvres last week by the government, announcing that they would publish the guidelines MI5 and 6 would follow when interviewing suspects abroad, that the Intelligence and Security Committee would reinvestigate Mohamed's treatment, and that there would be a new agreement with the Pakistani authorities concerning their treatment of British detainees seemed to be an attempt to bring the embarrassment involving Mohamed's allegations to an abrupt end. Hopes were not raised by the length of time that Baroness Scotland was taking to look into the claims, which themselves arose after the evidence heard in a secret session of the court case involving Mohamed's lawyers' attempts to gain access to documents detailing his detention was felt to be so serious that the "possible criminal wrongdoing" demanded further investigation. Undoubtedly both the government and MI5 would have hoped to have avoided an investigation of any sort; that Scotland has decided that there is a possible case to answer is deserving of praise, especially considering her predecessor's considerable lack of independence from the government.

It will however be prudent to be concerned about just how wide the investigation will be and whether it will get anywhere. At the moment it looks like it may just be investigating the behaviour of "Witness B", the MI5 officer who drew the short straw and was the person who interviewed Mohamed while he was being held in Pakistan, where he was already suffering ill-treatment but was yet to be subjected to the "medieval" torture that he almost certainly suffered in Morocco. It's apparent from other cases that "Witness B" was not the only person to show a worrying lack of concern for detainees' well-being while in Pakistani custody, and the spectre of him being made a scapegoat and left hung out to dry is potentially worse than there being no investigation at all. As the Guardian has established, Mohamed's interrogation by "Witness B" was almost certainly the result of an official policy which had been drawn up by government ministers in conjunction with the security services. This agreement essentially took the "three monkeys" approach: they did nothing that would directly associate them with the ill-treatment that is endemic in Pakistani custody, while also doing nothing to stop it from happening. This was further compounded by how despite claiming to not know where Mohamed had been taken, they supplied information to the Americans which was subsequently used during the "interrogation" sessions in Morocco.

In other words, this potentially goes all the way to the very top. As has been pointed out, the current head of MI5, Jonathan Evans, was in charge of international counter-terrorism at the time. It hardly seems realistic that Knacker of the Yard is going to burst into Thames House and ask Evans to come along quietly, just as it seems doubtful that the spooks will be letting anything incriminating slip into their statements to the police. They can, after all, just like normal suspects, completely refuse to co-operate with the police's inquiries. This is one of the major reasons why there should be an independent judicial review, where evidence, not necessarily in public, would have to be given under oath. Doubtless also the likes of the Sun, which has been shameless in their disbelief concerning Mohamed's treatment, will be squealing tomorrow about how it will be distracting MI5 from their vital work of keeping us safe from those whom would, uh, not think twice about instigating similar methods.

This though is not just about Mohamed, but about how we suddenly decided that complicity with torture, not just of others but our own citizens and residents was acceptable despite knowing full well that torture makes for hopeless "intelligence". Those responsible should be at the least brought to account and made to explain themselves; criminal charges may well be sought, but again they seem unlikely to stick, just as very little concerning the war on terror has stuck to this government. The hope has to be again that today's announced investigation will shed even more light on one of the most shaming events in our recent history.

Labels: , , , , , , , , , ,

Share |

3/26/2009 11:44:00 PM | | | links to this post

Friday, March 20, 2009 

It's not enough.

As it has done repeatedly in the past, the government has done the absolute minimum possible in an attempt to put to an end the increasing embarrassment caused by the continuing allegations of our active collusion in torture. We perhaps ought to be glad that the puny sops of publishing the guidance which the intelligence services have when it comes interrogating suspects, the reinvestigation of the treatment suffered by Binyam Mohamed by the Intelligence and Security Committee, and the promise of a new agreement with Pakistan concerning the arrest of British citizens have been offered at all; Diane Abbott seemed to sum up this government's attitude towards torture when she described ministers rolling their eyes and whispering about it "all being a Daily Mail campaign" when David Cameron unexpectedly brought the subject up at last week's prime minister's questions. These are former members of the likes of Liberty, some of them apparently still members of Amnesty International, dismissing the most brutal torture of innocent individuals as a tabloid campaign which they can just ignore, sigh and complain in private about. It might not win them many votes at the next election, pretending to care about "terrorist suspects" having their fingernails extracted with pliers or their penises repeatedly slashed with razors, but the general attitude towards such allegations still comes across as shockingly apathetic, even callous.

It's very good news therefore that Craig Murray will be called before the joint committee on human rights' parallel investigation into rendition and torture, his first opportunity to put his personal experience of information obtained via torture being used by the UK authorities before parliament. While the JCHR has been ignored repeatedly in the past, whether by MI5 chiefs or more recently by David Miliband and Jacqui Smith, it will at the least put into the open far more forcefully what has already been known but rarely highlighted for years. The same cannot be said for the Intelligence and Security Committee, a more discredited body it's difficult to think of. Its reports are unintentionally hilarious, when they are not absolutely scandalous, thanks to the ridiculous censorship imposed upon them, such as in these recent examples:

Whilst the primary focus is necessarily on international counter-terrorism (ICT) work, the UK's intelligence and security agencies also dedicate resources towards countering the challenges posed by ***, ***, the proliferation of weapons of mass destruction, regional instability in *** and the ***, and other challenges."

• "Top priority" in the UK's requirements for secret intelligence last year was given to seven areas:

• ***;
• ***;
• ***;
• ***;
• ***;
• ***; and
• ***."


And I hate to keep banging on about it, but it was also the ISC in its investigation into extraordinary rendition which decided that their definition of ER was different to everyone else's, thereby helpfully managing to clear the security services of collusion with ER in the case of Jamil el-Banna and Bisher al-Rawi.

As Ian Cobain points out, it used to be claimed that MI5's 11th commandment was "thou shalt not get caught". Now that they almost certainly have been caught, the only way to fully understand what went wrong, how far the policy went and why we actively connived with the torture of our citizens and residents is for there to be a full judicial inquiry. There have been far too many lies told for anything less to be acceptable, and hopefully the admittance at last that there may have been a problem will inexorably lead towards one being granted.

Labels: , , , , , , , , , ,

Share |

3/20/2009 11:09:00 PM | | | links to this post

Wednesday, March 04, 2009 

Time to support Craig Murray. Again.

It seems an almost yearly occurrence to be making an appeal for or calling for support for Craig Murray, but this one is even more than vital than usual. The Parliamentary Joint Committee on Human Rights, which is investigating our involvement in extraordinary rendition and apparent complicity in torture, has yet to reach a decision on whether Murray should be called to give evidence. To suggest that he is the exact person they ought to be taking such information from is an understatement: he lost his job as a direct result of opposing the Foreign Office policy on accepting intelligence which was the product of torture, as long as we ourselves were not personally involved in it. Both David Miliband and Jacqui Smith have already refused to appear before the committee, similarly to how "Dame" Eliza Manningham-Buller, the former head of MI5, also previously refused to give evidence to the committee. Craig says that the government is furiously lobbying against his giving evidence, presumably for the reason that he has compelling evidence that shows undeniably that we were ultimately complicit in the torture of those picked up by likes of the Uzbek intelligence services.

Craig suggests that you email jchr@parliament.uk and urge them to allow him to give evidence. Although doubtless the full truth will not even begin to come out until a judicial independent inquiry is set-up, as has even been called for by the government's terrorism legislation reviewer Lord Carlile, the investigations by the JCHR and the Foreign Affairs select committee, which is also looking into the allegations of complicity, especially in the torture of Binyam Mohamed, not to mention the recent revelations concerning the handing over of prisoners in Iraq to the Americans who subsequently rendered them to Afghanistan, or the alleged use of Diego Garcia as a "black site". Craig has tried to expose the reality of our involvement in inhuman and degrading treatment; he was treated to smears and vilification from this government's finest as a result. We can't let them do it again.

Quoting Craig:

I wish to offer myself as a witness before the Joint Commission on Human Rights on the subject of the UK government's policy on intelligence cooperation with torture abroad.

I appeared as a witness in person before both the European Parliament and European Council's enquiries into extraordinary rendition. My evidence was described by the European Council's Rapporteur, Senator Dick Marty, as "Compelling and valuable".

The key points I wish to make are these:

- I was British Ambassador in Uzbekistan from 2002 to 2004.
- I learned and confirmed that I was regularly seeing intelligence from detainees in the Uzbek torture chambers, sent me by the CIA via MI6.
- British Ministers and officials were seeing the same torture material.
- In October/November 2002 and January/Februray 2003 I sent two Top Secret telegrams to London specifically on the subject of our receipt of intelligence gained under torture. I argued this was illegal, immoral and impractical. The telegrams were speciifically marked for the Secretary of State.
- I was formally summoned back to the FCO for a meeting held on 7 or 8 March 2003 specifically and solely on the subject of intelligence gained under torture. Present were Linda Duffield, Director Wider Europe, FCO, Sir Michael Wood, Chief Legal Adviser, FCO, and Matthew Kydd, Head of Permanent Under-Secretary's Department, FCO.
- This meeting was minuted. I have seen the record, which is classified Top Secret and was sent to Jack Straw. On the top copy are extensive hand-written marginalia giving Jack Straw's views.
- I was told at this meeting that it is not illegal for us to obtain intelligence gained by torture, provided that we did not do the torture ourselves. I was told that it had been decided that as a matter of War on Terror policy we should now obtain intelligence from torture, following discussion between Jack Straw and Richard Dearlove. I was told that we could not exclude receipt of specific material from the CIA without driving a coach and horses through the universality principle of the UK/US intelligence sharing agreement, which would be detrimental to UK interests.
- Sir Michael Wood's legal advice that it was not illegal to receive intelligence got by torture was sent on to me in Tashkent (copy attached).
http://www.craigmurray.org.uk/documents/Wood.pdf- On 22 July 2004

I sent one further telegram on intelligence got by torture, with a lower classification, following FCO communications on the subject. Copy attached.
http://www.craigmurray.org.uk/documents/Telegram.pdf
It was my final communication before being dismissed as Ambassador.

In conclusion, I can testify that beyond any doubt the British government has for at least six years a considered but secret policy of cooperation with torture abroad. This policy legally cleared by government legal advisers and approved by Jack Straw as Secretary of State.

Craig Murray
2 March 2009

Labels: , , , ,

Share |

3/04/2009 11:59:00 PM | | | links to this post

Friday, February 27, 2009 

Rendition flashback.

Thanks must go to Mr Eugenides for reminding me of a post from 3 years ago which directly accused Jack Straw of lying:

Q 23. Unless we all start to believe in conspiracy theories and that the officials are lying, that I am lying, that behind this there is some kind of secret state which is in league with some dark forces in the United States, and also let me say, we believe that Secretary Rice is lying, there simply is no truth in the claims that the United Kingdom has been involved in rendition full stop, because we have not been, and so what on earth a judicial inquiry would start to do I have no idea.

This was part of his evidence to the Foreign Affairs committee on the 13th of December 2005, six days after a memo had been circulated, subsequently leaked to the New Statesman, that suggested "moving the debate" on about our involvement with rendition. Since then, it's subsequently turned out that we've been fully complicit in both rendition and torture, but it's well worth reminding yourself of just what a bunch of lying cunts some of our leading politicians are.

Labels: , , , , , , , , , , , ,

Share |

2/27/2009 10:08:00 PM | | | links to this post

Thursday, February 26, 2009 

The rabbit hole deepens.

In the last post on our involvement with extraordinary rendition, I asked just how far this rabbit hole went. It turns out that it goes even deeper with each passing week: the defence secretary John Hutton has now had to admit to parliament that fighters detained in Iraq had been handed to the Americans, who subsequently "rendered" them to Afghanistan, presumably to the notorious Bagram airbase.

Again, this isn't any real genuine surprise. Former SAS soldier Ben Griffin, who was discharged from the army after he refused to return to Iraq, was gagged by court order from revealing just how deep the policy went of turning over prisoners to the Americans, who subsequently sent them to prisons and detention facilities where torture was endemic. He was to claim that "hundreds" had been handed over in this way; Hutton for now, despite apparently referring to Griffin, is only admitting to these two instances, allegedly involving fighters associated with Lashkar-e-Taiba, the Pakistani/Kashmiri group accused of being behind the attacks in Mumbai in November last year.

We ought to be clear: despite the claims that they were only sent to Afghanistan because there were no Pashtu speakers in Iraq to interrogate them, there have been few that have been transferred to Bagram for any other reason than to become acquainted with the "extended questioning regime" practiced there. That the men have not been released and are now entering their fifth year of detention, presumably without any charge or trial or much chance of either, is another detail that was conveninently overlooked.

As the human rights groups are now arguing, the only way to clear this up once and for all is for there to be a independent judicial inquiry, investigating all our alleged links to rendition and illegal treatment of detainees since the beginning of the "war on terror". Investigations by the Intelligence and Security Committee are no longer credible, as their perverse clearing of MI6 of involvement in extraordinary rendition in the case of Bisher al-Rawi and Jamil el-Banna showed. One thing is for sure, and that's there is a lot still to come out. This rabbit hole may well turn out to bottomless.

Labels: , , , , , , , , , , ,

Share |

2/26/2009 11:59:00 PM | | | links to this post

Tuesday, February 17, 2009 

How low can we go?

It's quite quickly becoming apparent why the government has been so desperate to prevent the full details coming out regarding the torture of Binyam Mohamed, with it attempting to pass the buck onto the United States, claiming that to release the documents would threaten our intelligence links with that country - the truth now appears to be that we have been directly complicit in the torture of British citizens in Pakistan since after 9/11.

Allegations really don't come much more serious than those being made in today's Guardian, based on the testimony of an MI5 officer during the court case concerning the release of the documents last year. In what appears to amount to a "see no evil, hear no evil, speak no evil" approach, MI5 officers questioned detainees that had been at the least ruffed up and at the worst tortured without expressing any concern for their well-being or bothering with such slight concerns as whether their detention itself was legal. This doesn't seem to have been an ad hoc approach, but rather one which was actively discussed and decided upon by security service lawyers and Whitehall officials. Moreover, in Mohamed's case it appears that MI5 actively cooperated with his rendition to Morocco, or at least knew it was going to happen, where he was brutally tortured, something which it has always denied, although it has previously admitted to giving information to the Americians which was subsequently used during his torture. To top all of this off, David Miliband actively solicited a letter from the US state department which confirmed his claim made to the judges in the case that if the documents were released, the US would stop intelligence cooperation. Miliband then in parliament directly contradicted himself, claiming that the US authorities had done nothing of the sort, which has itself prompted the case to be re-examined.

We did already know that our own intelligence services had been involved in the US programme of "extraordinary rendition", when the CIA helpfully temporarily disposed of Bisher al-Rawi and Jamil el-Banna, former associates of Abu Qutada, who were arrested and taken to Guantanamo after they left the UK for Gambia. We knew from Craig Murray that our government had no qualms whatsoever about using "intelligence" which had its source in the torture of opposition figures in Uzbekistan, and that the same practice was doubtless in place across the globe. These latest revelations though go beyond all that, into direct complicity with the active torture of British subjects and citizens in a third country, with MI5 and the government directly collaborating and discussing how such information should be used and whether it was legal or not. It's little wonder then just how far the government has gone in trying to stop these allegations from coming out: they are the kind which ought to result in instant sackings and resignations, in investigations and inquiries into how and why we decided that torture was fine as long a third party was doing it and those being abused were thought to be involved in terrorist activities. They are due to be investigated by both the parliamentary committee on human rights and the toothless and spineless intelligence and security committee, but neither is likely to get fully to the bottom of what seems to have gone on, and the latter especially has already been involved in a despicable whitewash of our role in rendition.

All this has come at the same time as an interview with the former MI5 head Stella Rimington, in which she warned that the government was directly exploiting and manipulating the terrorist threat in order to restrict civil liberties, a definitive report from the International Committee of Jurists, which investigates how post-9/11 human rights have been abused and sacrified in the name of security and finding terror, as well as making recommendations on how to recover from the current low ebb, and as the government seems to be determined to paint not just Muslims, but anyone with even slightly radical or controversial opinions as potential extremists, not to mention the retrial of the liquid bomb suspects. Anything Rimington says should be treated with caution, not just as an ex-spook but also because she was personally involved in the surveillance and infiltrating of any vaguely radical group during the 1980s, something which was never even close to being justified when most posed about as much threat to the British state as Timmy Mallett, but when a former agent denounces the way civil liberties are being abused, many do pay attention. Likewise, the ICJ report ruthlessly exposes just how low we have sunk in such a short space of time, while the government's latest "counter-terrorism strategy" illustrates vividly New Labour's apparent addiction to demonising those opposed to its own moral and political values rather than engaging and challenging them.

As the Heresiarch argues, we shouldn't kid ourselves that it's only in times of tension that governments and other state organisations try to exert their powers to the limit; it's what they do naturally. It's therefore ludicrous to imagine that an opposition party, however pure their values might be while out of power, would not do much the same once in it in order both to satisfy the traditional demands of the authoritarians and reactionaries in the press and to stay in government itself. It is however equally difficult to believe that the Conservatives or Liberal Democrats could possibly be any worse than Labour has been. How far, after all, does this rabbit hole go? We've had illegal war, complicity in torture and the suspension of habeas corpus. The only thing left for them to do seems to be to go in for targeted assassinations. After all, we've got to get on a level playing field with the Israelis somehow.

Labels: , , , , , , , , ,

Share |

2/17/2009 11:37:00 PM | | | links to this post

Wednesday, February 04, 2009 

New Labour's moral cowardice and collusion with torture.

With the demise of the Bush administration, some of us were dearly hoping that not just would there be distinct policy changes, but that those who know where the bodies are buried would be quickly into the offices of investigative hacks across the world to lay bear just how deeply involved at the highest levels the Americans were with their client torture regimes. It could yet be the case that instead of going to the likes of Seymour Hersh, they've decided to write books, or that the exposes could be yet to come, but for now it looks as if loyalty is still winning out.

Such loyalty also still seems to be in evidence in our own dead men walking. Yesterday's nauseating press conference between David Miliband and Hillary Clinton, full of deeply unconvincing talk of just how special the special relationship is, if indeed you can consider abusive relationships where one partner is completely domineering over the other to be in any way special, was instructive of just how little the substance has changed. Yes, Obama's signed the papers to close Guantanamo within a year, and the CIA's system of black sites used to additionally hold "terrorist suspects" has gone the same way, but the last thing the administration is interested in doing is actually opening up the books and coming completely clean about how the Bush administration operated and how quickly the Americans went from decrying torture to actively practicing it and colluding even more directly with allies that do the same.

It is however difficult to know for certain whether David Miliband is telling the truth when he claimed to Lord Justice Thomas and Mr Justice Lloyd Jones that if he released documents detailing the treatment of Binyam Mohamed, the last British resident detained at Guantanamo, that the US would in response be forced to withhold intelligence from our own security services. The BBC is reporting that Miliband is claiming there were no threats - just that the confidentiality of the documents meant they could not be released. While doubtless the US would be extremely peeved to say the least about information being released that would confirm they colluded in the torture of Mohamed while he was in Morocco, this still seems unlikely to genuinely stop intelligence sharing: it is after all a two-way street, and besides, such intelligence is pooled between all the major security agencies. Information would continue to go to the French and Germans for instance, who could then still pass it on to us if they were so inclined. This was why the Saudi threat over the BAE corruption inquiry was so unconvincing: even if they stopped sharing intelligence data with us, the Americans would have passed it on.

The comparison with the Serious Fraud Office investigation into the Saudi-BAE slush fund is apposite because of what it tells us about the completely craven nature of our government while at the same time being wholly convenient because it means they can do what they also wanted to do regardless. In both cases, we were and are effectively being blackmailed; Prince Bandar even seemed to be directly threatening us with a terrorist attack if the inquiry into his alleged corrupt behaviour was not stopped. Likewise, the supposed American threat to stop intelligence cooperation means that we don't have to expose our own security services, who have long hilariously claimed to be whiter than white, as the true charlatans and collaborators in torture that they are. It's not even as if we don't already know that we rely on intelligence from foreign countries where torture and worse is routinely used: Craig Murray after all was forced out as ambassador to Uzbekistan after he demanded that MI6 stop using "intelligence" which was the fruit of torture of regime opponents.

Furthermore, the Intelligence and Security Committee has already noted that information which MI6 supplied to the Americans on Binyam Mohamed was almost certainly used in his torture in Morocco. In the usual understated, insulting style with which the ISC deals with such outrages, this was "with hindsight, ... regrettable". The ISC has always been utterly useless, far too weak to even begin to hold the security services to account, but their complete wide-eyed believing that MI5 and MI6 themselves didn't know that the US had been mistreating prisoners until the Abu Ghraib scandal broke was beyond a joke. That the government is suggesting that they should investigate again is the biggest cop-out imaginable, and needs to be vigorously resisted.

For while ostensibly today's ruling was about the United States' involvement in rendition and abuse of prisoners, it was also about our own unhappy role in it. We know full well that other former prisoners at Guantanamo ended up there because of how our own security services acted, just as we know that MI5 and 6 were involved with Binyam Mohamed during his detention in Pakistan, and as is alleged, with others detained in Pakistan who were tortured by the ISI. We're meant to believe that such meetings were social visits, where agents of our security assets were only concerned with how they were being treated, not with further interrogation or to see whether they had been broken by their jailers. While America undoubtedly has the most questions to answer about its tactics in the war on terror, we too have been complicit in the abuses and still refuse to even countenace the release of the slightest insight into just how deep the collusion went, even when a man's future might well be at stake. We might yet have to wait for the fall of New Labour before the Obama adminstration becomes confident enough to air the previous incumbent's dirty linen in public.

Labels: , , , , , ,

Share |

2/04/2009 11:59:00 PM | | | links to this post

Thursday, January 22, 2009 

An end to torture porn?

The inauguration ceremony was terrible, but no one can honestly say that Obama hasn't lived up to his promises so far:

Barack Obama embarked on the wholesale deconstruction of George Bush's war on terror, shutting down the CIA's secret prison network, banning torture and rendition, and calling for a new set of rules for detainees. The repudiation of Bush's thinking on national security yesterday also saw the appointment of a high-powered envoy to the Middle East.

Of interest here is that we were explicitly told by Bush and co that the "black sites" had already been shut down. This was always dubious because some of the prisoners that were known to have been captured by the Americans, or captured by others and rendered into their care had simply disappeared. Unless they were tortured so badly that they died or committed suicide, they must presumably still be out there somewhere.

The thing that's so invigorating about Obama's initial moves is because it's all been so effortless: just a simple issuing of decrees and the abuses of the Bush adminstration have been washed away, almost as if they never existed. That's part of the problem: however much praise Obama and his team deserve for moving so swiftly to end his predecessor's crimes, we still shouldn't forget that this nation which supposedly didn't and would never torture did so with such ease and with so little soul-searching. Our abiding image of it though isn't those who adminstered the worst of it, or those who authorised it, but instead most probably Lynndie England, cigarette in mouth, pointing at the limp dicks of her captives. How fitting that those who thought they were the cocks of the walk have had their little empire brought down to size so swiftly.

Labels: , , , , , ,

Share |

1/22/2009 11:59:00 PM | | | links to this post

Thursday, February 21, 2008 

Rendition: the truth begins to seep out.

Unless we all start to believe in conspiracy theories and that the officials are lying, that I am lying, that behind this there is some kind of secret state which is in league with some dark forces in the United States, and also let me say, we believe that Secretary Rice is lying, there simply is no truth in the claims that the United Kingdom has been involved in rendition full stop, because we have not been, and so what on earth a judicial inquiry would start to do I have no idea. I do not think it would be justified.
Oral evidence given by Jack Straw to the Foreign Affairs committee on 13th of December 2005.

To those who lived there, it was a paradise. Living purely off the land, the islanders, despite having no modern amenities, had an incredibly tranquil existence. That was until their island was considered as the prime location to be leased to the US military for a naval base, as another island was considered unsuitable because it was home to the rare Aldabra tortoise. The deal was signed, and the Americans requested that the island be "depopulated" for security reasons. The 2,000 inhabitants of Diego Garcia had their island invaded, their dogs shot and then they themselves were finally rounded up and taken to Mauritius, where they were subsequently dumped. The compensation they were given, which amounted to £400 each, was paid directly to the Mauritius government for them to be re-settled. They instead pocketed the money and denied that they had any right to do so. Most still live in hovels and the most severe poverty as a result.

All of this occurred under a Labour government, and it is undoubtedly one of the most despicable and shameful scandals in British history. Even now, despite numerous court rulings, the government refuses to allow them to return to their home, which has been taken over by a monolithic American base from which planes bombed Iraq. They seem to be hoping that those originally displaced that didn't commit suicide in the first place will die, and then be able to claim their children have no right whatsoever to return.

It almost seems fitting that a second scandal, also involving a Labour government, has now also come along concerning Diego Garcia. In a pathetic statement to the House of Commons, David Miliband today admitted that despite all their furious denials, despite the abundant evidence that flights linked to the US rendition program had landed here to at the least refuel, despite MI6 being involved in the rendition of Bisher al-Rawi and Jamil el-Banna to Guantanamo Bay, that evidence has now emerged that rendition flights had indeed landed on UK territory without the US asking for prior permission. Two flights in 2002 refuelled on Diego Garcia, carrying two unfortunates who according to the CIA, who have not told the truth once about the rendition program without being forced to, were not part of the "CIA's high-value terrorist interrogation program" but who nonetheless were taken to Guantanamo Bay and to Morocco respectively. Presumably the one lucky enough to be taken to Morocco was flown there so he could sample the local culture and high quality hashish, and not so he could be tortured like Binyam Mohammed was in the luxury of Moroccan custody. (Newsnight alleges that the plane used to transfer the detainee to Morocco was N397P, a CIA jet that has landed at UK airports on numerous occasions.)

The CIA has denied that Diego Garcia has served as one of the "black sites" where those in the rendition program were taken to be tortured so that the CIA didn't personally get its hands dirty. This is despite Barry McCaffrey, a former four-star US general on a number of occasions stating that prisoners are being held on Diego Garcia, as well as in other five-star US hotels such as Bagram airbase and numerous sites in Iraq, not to mention Gitmo itself.

The Guardian reported last October that the foreign affairs committee was to investigate claims that Garcia had a black site prison, but the revelation today seems to have come about because of the dogged attempts by the all party parliamentary group on extraordinary rendition, led by the tenacious Tory MP Andrew Tyrie, who had used the freedom of information act to request the minutes of political military talks between the US and UK in September last, a claim denied by the government who said that to release such information "would prejudice the defence" of territory by "exposing plans to counter possible terrorist attacks". Instead, they and the US seem to have decided to try and buy the committee off by admitting that rendition flights did use Diego Garcia, but that the island itself is not being used to hold any detainees themselves.

All those involved then are either "sorry" or "regret" this "unfortunate" happening. Never mind that from the very beginning this government has either directly lied, misled or tried to move the debate on when questioned about rendition flights. Jack Straw tried to tell us it was all a conspiracy theory, and from then on they've feigned ignorance at every turn. Andrew Tyrie has described it as "obfuscation and cover-up", and that seems bang on. They've done the very bare minimum from the very beginning in trying to placate critics, refusing to hold anything approaching a proper inquiry, failing to engage with EU-led efforts to investigate the rendition program and not asking of the US even the slightest of searching questions about what the planes linked to the rendition program were doing stopping over at our airports. Miliband now states that he'll compile a list of all said flights concerns have been expressed over and ask the US whether they too have been conveniently forgotten about. It screams of a government being desperate to wait until the initial disquiet and questioning was over before releasing the unsavoury reality. The real question is why they didn't do that as soon as the allegations were raised, with there being no evidence whatsoever that the government even asked the US whether the flights were anything other than kosher. They simply accepted that the US would have asked first before doing so, something now proved to be of the greatest gullibility and naivete. It of course helps that today most of the media are going to be more interested in the conviction of Steve Wright, and then there's also the other whitewash of the day, the inquiry into the bugging of Sadiq Khan.

This is of course from a government that has repeatedly condemned Guantanamo in various terms, most memorably as "an affront to justice". This same government has been complicit in that affront to justice, complicit in the torture of the various individuals caught up in the rendition program, many of whom have never been found guilty of any offence, let alone the "terrorism" which they are accused of being involved in. Indeed, one of those who was rendered through Diego Garcia has now been released, presumably without any compensation and most likely scarred irrevocably by their experience, living in constant fear of their life and without the slightest idea whether they will ever be released, or even put before the "military tribunals" now being set-up to try the most notorious of those held as "enemy combatants". This, as I've written before, ought to be a front-page scandal. Ministers should have resigned. A full judicial inquiry ought to have been set-up to examine not just ministerial complicity, but also security service involvement. Instead we had the whitewash provided by the Intelligence and Security committee. How deeply sad that the Chaggosians, who were treated as more expendable than animals, now know that they were not the only ones to abused in such a way on their paradise home.

Labels: , , , , , , , ,

Share |

2/21/2008 08:45:00 PM | | | links to this post

Thursday, July 26, 2007 

Rendition: The whitewash is applied.

Another day, another reasonably damning report on rendition, this time from the Intelligence and Security committee, which ties itself in knots (PDF) in order not to implicitly condemn MI6's role in the rendition of alleged terrorist suspects. First, it provides a lesson in how to obfuscate by defining the different sorts of rendition:

Definitions

6. The term “rendition”is used to mean different things by different people. It encompasses numerous variations ofextra-judicial transfer such as: to countries where the person is wanted for trial; to countries where the individual can be adequately interrogated; transfer for the purposes of prolonged detention;and military transfer of battlefield detainees.

7. In order to provide clarity,the Committee has used the following terms throughout this Report:

“Rendition”: Encompasses any extra-judicial transfer ofpersons from one jurisdiction or State to another.

“Rendition to Justice”: The extra-judicial transfer of persons from one jurisdiction or State to another, for the purposes ofstanding trial within an established and recognised legal and judicial system.

“Military Rendition”: The extra-judicial transfer of persons (detained in, or related to, a theatre of military operations) from one State to another, for the purposes of military detention in a military facility.

“Rendition to Detention”: The extra-judicial transfer of persons from one jurisdiction or State to another, for the purposes of detention and interrogation outside the normal legal system.

“Extraordinary Rendition”: The extra-judicial transfer of persons from one jurisdiction or State to another, for the purposes of detention and interrogation outside the normal legal system, where there is a real risk of torture or cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment (CIDT).

For example, the transfer of battlefield detainees from Afghanistan to Guantánamo Bay would fall into the category of “Military Renditions”. The transfer of a detainee unconnected to the conflict in Afghanistan to Guantánamo Bay would be a “Rendition to Detention”. A transfer to a secret facility constitutes cruel and inhuman treatment because there is no access to legal or other representation and, on that basis,we would describe this as an “Extraordinary Rendition”.

Isn't that glorious? According to the committee then, what happened to Bisher al-Rawi and Jamil al-Banna, who were rendered to Guantánamo Bay as a result of information provided to the CIA by MI6 wasn't actually an "extraordinary rendition", as they weren't being sent to somewhere where there was a "real risk of torture or cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment". I don't know about you, but I consider two men being effectively kidnapped by a security service far outside of their own legal jurisdiction and then imprisoned in a camp where numerous former detainees have alleged that mistreatment was endemic, in al-Rawi's case for 4 years, with al-Banna's detention still continuing, to be cruel and inhuman treatment, whether they were personally tortured or not. In fact, I'd say it was pretty much a complete fucking outrage. Using this definition however, the committee comes to this conclusion:

D.Those operations detailed above, involving UK Agencies’ knowledge or involvement, are “Renditions to Justice”, “Military Renditions”and “Renditions to “the Detention”. They are not “Extraordinary Renditions”, which we define as extra-judicial transfer ofpersons from one jurisdiction or State to another, for the purposes of detention and interrogation outside the normal legal system,where there is a real risk of torture or cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment”. We note that in some of the cases we refer to, there are allegations of mistreatment, including whilst individuals were detained at Guantánamo Bay, although we have not found evidence that such mistreatment was foreseen by the Agencies. The Committee has therefore found no evidence that the UK Agencies were complicit in any “Extraordinary Rendition” operations.

With the goalposts thus shifted, the UK agencies get a clean bill of health. Everything is right with the world after all!

Elements of whitewash are splashed liberally around most of the cases which the committee has investigated. On Binyam Mohamed, who you might remember as the prisoner who had his penis repeatedly slashed with a scalpel, MI6 informs the committee that they one of their men did indeed interview him in Karachi in 2002, and that it's quite possible that information they handed to the Americans on him was subsequently used by the Moroccans who tortured him. However, their conclusion is:

Conclusions
M. There is a reasonable probability that intelligence passed to the Americans was used in al-Habashi’s subsequent interrogation. We cannot confirm any part of al-Habashi’s account of his detention or mistreatment after his transfer from Pakistan.

N. We agree with the Director General of the Security Service that, with hindsight, it is regrettable that assurances regarding proper treatment of detainees were not sought from the Americans in this case.

Throughout the report MI6 is repeatedly let off the hook because "at the time" they didn't know what the Americans were doing to those being rendered. This failure to see any evil in what the CIA was doing only changed after the Abu Ghraib torture scandal was unearthed, as is described in a section of the report headed "ethical dilemmas":

149. The Security Service and SIS have, certainly since 1998, where they considered it necessary, sought assurances from foreign intelligence services that individuals facing detention as a result of any action or intelligence shared with them would be treated humanely. This was originally more concerned with the need to ensure a fair trial and avoid capital punishment as CIDT was not thought to be a likely risk.

150. It was only when news surfaced ofthe mistreatment of detainees at the U.S.-run Abu Ghraib prison in Iraq in 2004 that the UK Government realised that there were real risks of CIDT:
Back in 2003 we were concerned about secret facilities but we did not at that stage, I think, make an automatic connection between secret facilities and mistreatment. That sort ofconnection grew later as more allegations came to light or… things like Abu Ghraib came to light, which led you to believe, just a minute, if that is happening there, what might be happening in secret facilities.

From an organisation that is meant to imagine the worst in order to prevent it, this is not just a shocking lack of curiosity, it absolutely reeks of cover-up. Guantánamo itself had been open for over two and a half years by the time the Abu Ghraib scandal occurred, where from the beginning there were allegations of ill-treatment and torture. Is MI6 seriously trying to suggest that when it knew full well that suspects were being transferred to black sites and countries where torture was endemic that it honestly believed the CIA's motives for doing so were entirely pure? Why on earth is the Intelligence and Security Committee willing to accept this errant nonsense?

Finally, the allegations of "ghost flights" containing rendered individuals going through UK airspace are similarly dealt with in a "see no evil" style, especially by the director of the MI6:

We have no knowledge of any detainees being subject to rendition through British territory since 9/11; nor have we helped any “Extraordinary Renditions” via UK airspace or territory; nor have the U.S sought our assistance or permission to use UK airspace or facilities… Unless you say you are going to search every aircraft to check the truth of what you are told, it is a difficult issue… As you know… we are prioritising ruthlessly and I could not possibly justify diverting people to check whether aircraft are CIA-sponsored and what they contain,and frankly I doubt the police have the resources to do this.

In other words then, since the Americans didn't feel the need to inform anyone of what they were doing, we're not going to waste any time investigating the possibility, even if it is backed up by mountains of evidence showing the flights linked to the rendition programme have passed through UK airports. The police also have much better things to do than investigating whether men who have been kidnapped and are on their way to being tortured are being flown through UK airspace; like chastising parents for the way they discipline their children, or removing protesters so that a bull can be slaughtered. The committee's own conclusion is:

FF. The use of UK airspace and airports by CIA-operated aircraft is not in doubt. There have been many allegations related to these flights but there have been no allegations, and we have seen no evidence, that suggest that any of these CIA flights have transferred detainees through UK airspace (other than two “Rendition to Justice” cases in 1998 which were approved by the UK Government following U.S. requests).

All of which reminds one of the phrase "plausible deniability". Don't tell and we won't ask. The silence it seems will forever continue, as shown by Gordon Brown's refusal to condemn the rendition programme yesterday and by the government's pretty pathetic response to the committee's report (PDF). Some things are destined to remain secret.

Labels: , , , ,

Share |

7/26/2007 11:02:00 PM | | | links to this post

Thursday, February 15, 2007 

Rendition: The silence continues.

Yesterday's vote, tighter than expected on the EU's investigation into rendition, brought out the best in some of those elected to represent the UK in the EU. Take for instance, Gerald Batten, of the UK Independence Party:

said the report represented typical "anti-Americanism" and a "grab for more power for the EU". Much of the content of the report, he said, was "speculation". The international community was now engaged in a war of ideology against "fundamentalist Islam" and he thanked the US for leading this battle.

See, it doesn't really matter if the US in leading that battle abducts those referred to as "terrorism suspects", puts them on a jet and flies them either to a willing third-country or a CIA prison in a friendly country where they're tortured. Suggesting as much makes you anti-American.

As for the response from governments rather than MEPs, it's been much the same as it has been since the beginning. The reports have now made clear that however much they denied it, the UK government did know what was going and didn't do anything to stop it. CIA flights landing here may have just refueled, they may have been carrying rendered prisoners, but because of the almost complete lack of cooperation we still don't know for sure.

We do however know that MI5 not only knew about the rendition program, it's helped with it. In 2002, Bisher al-Rawi and his friend and Jamil el-Banna were arrested in Gambia and later transferred from Africa to Guantanamo Bay, after MI5 informed the CIA that the men were carrying an "electronic device" which could be part of an improvised explosive device. It was in fact a modified battery charger. Bisher al-Rawi had previously helped MI5 keep tabs on Abu Qutada, who himself may well have been an MI5 double-agent. With his usefulness apparently at an end, MI5 got rid him of.

Like Geoff Hoon, who was criticised heavily in the report for his lack of cooperation until Labour MEPs got the section removed, Eliza Manningham-Buller, the head of MI5 didn't want to discuss her organisation's involvement in rendition, refusing to attend even a closed session of the joint human rights committee.

As for the rest of our elected representatives, they too are maintaining a less than dignified silence. Some of them have already been shown up as being liars. The all-party parliamentary group on rendition might get some of them to break their vow, but don't bet on it. The intelligence and security committee may give it a go too, but whether we'll get any further without Congress itself investigating seems unlikely. Not that they'll be able to do much other than uncover further information: those CIA agents involved in rendition have already been pardoned, even though they're obviously not guilty of anything in the first place.

Hail then our leaders and their belief in equality, human rights, and liberty for all. As long as they don't see them, and as long as they don't have beards.

Related post:
Big Stick Small Carrot - Sound of Silence

Labels: , , , , ,

Share |

2/15/2007 09:17:00 PM | | | links to this post

About

  • This is septicisle
profile

Links

Last posts

Archives

Email me
Syndicate this site (XML)
Powered by Blogger
and Blogger Templates