UK Quizzes US on CIA Flights

[oldsam]

BBCNews.com

The foreign secretary has written to Washington over claims that the CIA has used EU airports to move suspects to other countries for torture. Jack Straw said the letter "expressed concern" on behalf of all EU countries and he was waiting for a response.

He spoke after human rights group Liberty urged police to probe allegations that the flights called at British airports.

The US government has said its laws have not been broken.
But it has refused to confirm or deny the existence of "secret prisons" in third countries.

Liberty has called for action within 14 days - or, it has said, it will go to court claiming police aided and abetted kidnap and torture.

'Appropriate steps'

The Foreign Office has said it had no evidence of such use of UK territory.

At a news conference with Italian Foreign Minister Gianfranco Fini, who is visiting the UK, Mr Straw said his letter "had gone".

He said he was waiting for a response from the US Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice and he would circulate the reply to all his foreign minister colleagues.

"Meanwhile, let me say, I think there is no purpose in speculating on allegations that are made on this side or the other side of the Atlantic," he said.

"These are allegations about a foreign government. We have taken the appropriate steps, which is to ask for clarification by that government."

The Guardian in September reported claims that at least 210 CIA flights had landed in the UK since the 11 September 2001 attacks on the US.

It is alleged at least 12 airports in England and Scotland have been used, with the busiest being Prestwick in Ayrshire where CIA aircraft landed more than 75 times.

Suspicions

Shami Chakrabarti, Liberty's director, told BBC Radio 4's Today programme: "The allegations, the suspicions, the circumstantial evidence if you like, gives serious enough concern that we should ask chief constables to do their duty.

"They have positive obligations under international law and under our human rights act to investigate, and that's what we ask them to do."

Liberal Democrat foreign affairs spokesman Menzies Campbell told Today: "We need full disclosure by the government.

"If in fact people are being moved from a jurisdiction where torture is illegal to a jurisdiction where torture is permissible, that seems to me to be wholly contrary to international law.

"If we are allowing facilities for aircraft carrying out those actions, then we are at the very least facilitating it; we may even be complicit in it."

Police letters

Liberty has written to the chief constables of Bedfordshire, Cambridgeshire, Dorset, Essex, Hampshire, Kent, the Metropolitan Police, the Ministry of Defence police, Sussex, Thames Valley and West Midlands forces.

Because of the possibility of court action if police fail to respond, Scottish police operating under a different legal system have not been contacted, Liberty says.

The airports allegedly involved include Biggin Hill in Kent, Birmingham, Bournemouth, RAF Brize Norton in Oxfordshire, Farnborough, Gatwick, Heathrow, Luton, Mildenhall in Suffolk, RAF Northolt in north London, Stansted and Prestwick.

[oldsam]

BBC Update Dec 5th

Rice defends US terror policies

US Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice has denied that the US uses CIA flights to transport terror suspects to other countries for torture. However, Ms Rice did say that suspects were moved by plane under a process known as rendition.

She said the US would use "every lawful weapon to defeat these terrorists", and said rendition had saved lives.

But, before boarding a plane to Germany, she refused to say whether the CIA ran secret prisons abroad.

There have been allegations that the US spy agency set up facilities in central or eastern Europe following the 11 September 2001 attacks, where terror suspects have been interrogated without reference to international law.

Ms Rice refused to address the question directly.

"We cannot discuss information that would compromise the success of intelligence, law enforcement, and military operations. We expect other nations share this view," she said in a statement at Andrews Air Force Base, Maryland.

[oldsam]

Merkel: U.S. admits CIA case error

Tuesday, December 6, 2005; Posted: 8:34 a.m. EST (13:34 GMT)

Merkel greets Rice ahead of their meeting Tuesday in Berlin.

Rice faces stories of secret prisons (2:30)
RELATED
• Rice defends U.S. terrorism policy
• Report: 2 CIA flights stopped in France

BERLIN, Germany (AP) -- German Chancellor Angela Merkel has said the United States has admitted making a mistake in the case of a German national who claimed he was wrongfully imprisoned by the CIA.

Merkel spoke Tuesday during a press conference with U.S. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice, who refused to discuss specifics with reporters. The two women leaders' first meeting was dominated by questions about U.S. terrorism policies, including the five-month detention of Lebanese-born Khaled al-Masri and reports of secret CIA prisons and potentially illegal use of European airports and airspace to transport terror suspects.

"The American administration is not denying" it erred in the case of al-Masri, Merkel said through a translator.

Merkel welcomed that admission and added that she is grateful for Rice's assurances that the United States conducts anti-terror operations legally and without the use of torture.

Al-Masri is expected to sue the CIA on Tuesday in Washington. He claims he was seized while on vacation in Europe last year and then brought to a U.S. prison in Afghanistan, where he was mistreated and interrogated for suspected ties to the al Qaeda terrorist group.

The German parliament will soon take up the matter, Merkel said, adding, "That is appropriate."

"We recognize the chancellor will be reviewing this" in parliament, Rice said. "We also recognize that any policy will sometimes result in error and when it happens we do everything we can to correct it."

The American diplomat also offered a broad defense of intelligence gathering in the pursuit of terrorists.

"This is essentially a war in which intelligence is absolutely key to success," Rice said. "If you are going to uncover plots, if you are going to get to people before they commit their crimes, that is largely an intelligence function."

Ticking off a list of recent terror attacks, Rice said the consequence of failing to find out about terror plots ahead of time can be seen not only in New York and Washington, sites of the September 11 jetliner attacks, but also in Amman, Jordan; Beslan, Russia; London; Madrid and elsewhere.

Later Tuesday, Rice was flying to Romania, a country identified as a likely site of a secret detention facility run by the CIA. Romania denies it. She will sign a defense cooperation pact related to an air base the advocacy group Human Rights Watch has identified as a probable site for a clandestine prison.

In Berlin, Rice met with Merkel, the country's first leader from the formerly communist East, for about an hour. Merkel pledged last week to put aside past differences between Germany and the United States even as she pressed for the Bush administration to take the CIA prison concerns seriously.

"Let the battles of the past lie -- those battles have been fought," Merkel said in her first speech to parliament as chancellor.

The United States is eager to get off on the right foot with Merkel after turbulent relations with the government of blunt Bush opponent Gerhard Schroeder.

Rice met in Washington last week with new German Foreign Minister Frank-Walter Steinmeier and promised him an answer on the prison issue. Merkel comes to Washington to see President Bush in January.

European governments have expressed outrage over reports of a network of secret Soviet-era prisons in Eastern Europe where detainees may have been harshly treated and reports of CIA flights carrying al Qaeda prisoners through European airports.

Several countries have denied they hosted such sites. If the United States did operate such prisons, or is still doing so, the information would be classified. The Bush administration has refused to answer questions about it in public.

"Were I to confirm or deny, say yes or say no, then I would be compromising intelligence information, and I'm not going to do that," Rice told reporters on her plane to Germany. Before leaving Washington, Rice told reporters that fighting terrorism is "a two-way street" and that Europeans are safer for tough but legal U.S. tactics.

Copyright 2005 The Associated Press

[oldsam]

US bars access to terror suspects
BBC News

The US has admitted for the first time that it has not given the Red Cross access to all detainees in its custody.
The state department's top legal adviser, John Bellinger, made the admission but gave no details about where such prisoners were held.

Correspondents say the revelation is likely to increase suspicion that the CIA has been operating secret prisons outside international oversight.

The issue has dogged Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice's tour to Europe.

Mr Bellinger made the admission in Geneva.

He stated that the group International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) had access to "absolutely everybody" at the prison camp in Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, which holds suspects detained during the US war on terror.

When asked by journalists if the organisation had access to everybody held in similar circumstances elsewhere, he said: "No". He declined to explain further.

Until now the US administration has been careful in its language, says the BBC's state department correspondent Jonathan Beale.

It has always said that the ICRC has access to all prisoners held at US defence department facilities - leaving open the question of whether there are CIA prisons elsewhere.

Allegations 'ludicrous'

Mr Bellinger's comments will raise suspicions that high-profile terrorist suspects are being held out of international view, our correspondent says.


The ICRC wants access to all foreign terror suspects held by the US "in undisclosed locations".

"The dialogue continues on the question. We would like to obtain information and access to them," ICRC spokesman Florian Westphal said on Thursday.

Human rights groups say there is no way of knowing whether detainees being held in secret are being tortured.

On her visit to Europe, Condoleezza Rice has repeatedly denied that the US tortures prisoners.

On Wednesday, Ms Rice stressed that all American interrogators were bound by the UN Convention on Torture, whether they worked in the US or abroad.

Nato and EU foreign ministers, after meeting Ms Rice in Brussels on Wednesday evening, declared themselves satisfied with her assurances that the US does not interpret international humanitarian law differently from its allies.

[gaijindabe]

So Old, your point is?

[Joeaksa]

While we are at it, when are you going to bring up the fact that the intelligence agencies of other countries have done over-flights over Europe and America and everyone seems to forget them? You think that the KGB and M-6 do not fly their people around? If not then you are as silly as some of the above posts. And before you try to pawn it off, not every flight that is mentioned above is a CIA airplane nor even if it were, they are not all carrying captive passengers.

Then please tell me about the flights around America and Europe from the terrorists. You know, the ones who flew the planes into the WTC buildings on 9/11. They trained 2 miles from my house, and in other places around the world, flying everywhere. I do not see you up in arms about that. I can almost guarantee that there are more of them training in this and other countries this minute and you seem not to care about it. Double standard I believe it what is going on here...

Please show us the other side of the coin and then explain to us why you do not care about the "other side" and what they do.

JoeA

[oldsam]

Europe CIA probe: Prisoners abducted, transferred illegally

Tuesday, December 13, 2005; Posted: 9:09 a.m. EST (14:09 GMT)

Swiss senator Dick Marty presents written report to Council of Europe committee in Paris Tuesday.

PARIS, France (AP) -- A Swiss investigator probing claims of secret CIA prisons in Europe said his committee has evidence that supports allegations that prisoners were transferred between countries and temporarily held "without any judicial involvement."

"Legal proceedings in progress in certain countries seemed to indicate that individuals had been abducted and transferred to other countries without respect for any legal standards," lawmaker Dick Marty said in a written report summarizing his investigations so far.

Marty told a news conference he believed the United States was no longer holding prisoners clandestinely in Europe and believes they were moved to North Africa in early November, when reports about secret U.S. prisons first emerged in The Washington Post. He did not provide any other details.

He presented his findings in Paris to a committee of the Council of Europe, the continent's human rights watchdog.

Marty added that "information gathered to date reinforced the credibility of the allegations concerning the transfer and temporary detention of individuals, without any judicial involvement, in European countries."

He is investigating the CIA's reported transfers of prisoners through European airports to secret detention centers, actions that would breach the continent's human rights principles.

Poland and Romania have been identified by the New York-based Human Rights watch as sites of possible CIA secret prisons, but both countries have repeatedly denied any involvement.

Marty, in his report, added it is "still too early to assert that there had been any involvement or complicity of member states in illegal actions."

He was critical of the United States for not formally denying the allegations. He said he "deplores the fact that no information or explanations" were provided by Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice, who faced repeated questions about the CIA prison allegations on her recent visit to Europe.

Marty has requested air traffic log books to try to determine flight patterns of several dozen suspect CIA airplanes.

He has also requested satellite images of the Sczytno-Szymany airport in northeastern Poland and the Mihail Kogalniceanu Air Base in eastern Romania, after they were identified by Human Rights Watch as possible sites of clandestine CIA detention centers. European officials say such prisons would violate the continent's human rights principles.

After hearing Marty's presentation, Tony Lloyd, a member of the Council of Europe committee, said: "The really difficult thing is the idea is that there is a kind of legal black hole in the middle of Europe."

Copyright 2005 The Associated Press. All rights reserved.This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.

[Rick Lee]

I think I can find all these articles on my own. How about some original thought and commentary?

[Joeaksa]

And while we are at it, how about some proof that there actually was anyone other than the flight crew onboard the planes? Overflights are one thing, while actually flying someone in the back is another.

Oh yea, its legal to fly people in planes the last time I looked (I did it yesterday, hope its legal) so please prove that any pax were prisoners while you are at it.

If you think that the CIA, MI-6 and other intel agencies are going to advertise when they are flying someone around the world, you have another thing coming my friend. They do it very quietly for a reason, so that other countries do not know about it and are not going to change for a tree hugging liberal to get a warm fuzzy feeling.

Joe A

[creaturecat]

the US has flown "suspects" to countries where torture is a way of life. Syria is one country where this is taking place.
Are the patriots denying this? Are the patriots justifying this action?
Please explain why the Geneva convention agreement (regarding torture) - signed by the US - does not apply.
Need proof? Maher Arar: http://obsidianwings.blogs.com/obsidian_wings/maher_arar/

[Rick Lee]

I must be one of those patriots and I couldn't care in the least what we do with terrorist suspects. I guess Syria is good for something. Squeeze them like lemons.

[kach22i]

So much dirt under the carpet that the carpet is lumpy.

[DaveE]

What concerns me about our government's attitude and the attitude of many here is that being a terrorist suspect somehow is a bit different that being a suspect in some other crime so you are no longer 'innocent until proven guilty'. I think Rick's comments show my point. ".....I couldn't care in the least what we do with terrorist suspects." Sorta like Salem. Maybe if we really torture them badly they'll finally admit to being terrorists.

[Rick Lee]

Well, it's not like they're getting pulled from their beds here in the US and shipped off to places where, as Sandy Berger described it, "Justice is streamlined". I think one or two US citizens may have been caught up in this, but they were taken into custody at airports, while attemtpting to re-enter the US. As for the non-citizens, let their governments worry about them. If they want to help us, great. If not, we'll help ourselves. Since these types of operations have nabbed some pretty big al Qaeda names (Khalid Sheikh Mohammed, Ramzi bin al-Shibh, Abu Zubaida, etc.), I'd still say we're doing it right. If it bothers the ACLU, well, that's just icing on the cake.

[oldsam]

"So Old, your point is?"

"I think I can find all these articles on my own. How about some original thought and commentary?"

It is what it is--and the story continues to unfold.