Recently in CIA Renditions Category

Human rights group Liberty joined forces with its American counterpart to demand a public inquiry into allegations that a terror suspect has been secretly detained in a British territory.

The activists wrote to Foreign Secretary David Miliband urging him to launch a formal investigation into claims about US activities on Diego Garcia, the UK territory in the Indian Ocean.

By Martin Murphy
Epoch Times Staff Aug 4, 2008

The United Nations Human Rights Committee released its findings with respect to Ireland's Human Rights record last week.

The Irish Council for Civil Liberties (ICCL) has welcomed the UN Committee’s concluding observations which outlined Ireland’s failure to uphold human rights guarantees under the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights (ICCPR).

NEW YORK, Aug 1 (Reuters) - The United States imprisoned and interrogated one or more terrorism suspects at the British Indian Ocean island of Diego Garcia in 2002 and possibly 2003, a former senior U.S. official has told Time magazine.

"The official, a frequent participant in White House Situation Room meetings after Sept. 11 who has since left government, says a CIA counter-terrorism official twice said that a high-value prisoner or prisoners were being held and interrogated on the island," the magazine reported.

By Jason Lewis
Last updated at 9:01 AM on 04th August 2008

Fears that the UK is still being used as a stop-off point for the CIA’s controversial terrorist renditions resurfaced last week when a flight to Guantanamo Bay landed at an RAF base.

Mystery surrounds the mission of the US military aircraft which touched down at RAF Mildenhall in Suffolk last Sunday amid tight security, refuelled and then flew on to the prison camp in Cuba.

Published on 29/07/2008

By Ben Agina

Details on how 19 terror suspects arrested in Kenya, but removed from police custody by foreign security agents for interrogation can be revealed today.

Interrogation by the foreign agents — including US’ Federal Bureau of Investigations (FBI) and Britain’s MI6 — have been described as "most inhumane" and involved blindfolding suspects, shackling their feet and handcuffing them from the back.

The security and intelligence agencies were "mixed up in wrongdoing" in cooperating with the US in the unlawful treatment of a UK resident now held in Guantánamo Bay, the high court heard yesterday.

They allegedly gave information to the US about Binyam Mohamed, held incommunicado in Pakistan before being secretly rendered to Morocco where he said he was tortured. In return, the US "provided the UK with the fruits of his interrogation", the court was told.

One Page "Summary" of Report Called "Absurd"

WASHINGTON, DC - April 28 - Today, the Center for Constitutional Rights (CCR) sent a formal letter to the Office of the Inspector General (OIG) of the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) in response to the single page Unclassified Summary of the OIG’s report released on the case of Maher Arar, the Canadian citizen and rendition victim sent by the United States to be tortured in Syria more than five years ago. The letter states, “More than four years since the OIG inspection began, the release of the one-page Unclassified Summary is wholly inadequate,” especially as compared to the Canadian public inquiry, which released two public reports after a lengthy investigation.

The government has rejected calls from Europe's human rights watchdog to step up efforts to prevent American "rendition" flights using Irish airports.

The call came in a report published by the Council of Europe's Human Rights Commissioner Thomas Hammarberg. He urged Dublin to "take effective measures" to prevent "extraordinary renditions" taking place "through Irish territory and airspace".

But in a formal response to the report, the Irish government rejected the need for more pro-active checks, saying "categoric" US assurances of no rendition flights using Irish territory are enough.

http://ukpress.google.com/article/ALeqM5gx55JKQxlXSiWBRBMQu1i-p3_ZZQ

The Associated Press
Published: April 22, 2008

BUCHAREST, Romania: Romanian lawmakers on Tuesday approved a report denying that Romania permitted CIA secret prisons in the country or that it allowed flights by the American intelligence agency that carried terrorism suspects.

The report, adopted by a vote of 56 to 6, was drafted by a special parliamentary committee.

MILAN, April 16 (Reuters) - Prime minister-elect Silvio Berlusconi could find himself in a Milan court as a defence witness in a CIA "rendition" trial, thanks to a request by his former spy chief on Wednesday.

Nicolo Pollari, who ran the SISMI military intelligence agency during Berlusconi's previous 2001-2006 government, is on trial along with 26 Americans for helping the CIA kidnap a terrorism suspect in Milan in 2003 and fly him to Egypt.

NEW YORK, Apr 8 (IPS) - Jordan, often described in the mainstream press as the most moderate country in the Arab Middle East, was the first to receive prisoners "as a true proxy jailer for the CIA" and has received more victims of "extraordinary rendition" than any other country in the world, according to a new report by Human Rights Watch (HRW).

Cairo, 1 April (Aki) - The lawyer for a former Muslim cleric allegedly abducted by the CIA from a Milan street and tortured in an Egyptian jail, has pledged to take his client's case to the European Court of Human Rights in the Hague.

Montaser al-Zayyat represents the cleric, Osama Mustafa Hassan Nasr, also known as Abu Omar.

Last month The Observer carried a claim from a United Nations source that the British Pacific territory of Diego Garcia has been used to house prisoners subjected to extraordinary rendition by America. Manfred Nowak, the UN special rapporteur on torture, said several detainees had told him they had been held there before being transferred to secret detention centres elsewhere.

By Kim Sengupta
Friday, 14 March 2008

Khaled al-Maqtari's nightmare began when American troops arrived at the al-Ghufran market in Fallujah in January 2004. He was arrested along with other terrorist suspects and taken to Abu Ghraib jail. For the next four years he was held captive, moved from country to country and suffered, he says, appalling torture.

Mr al-Maqtari, from Yemen, was one of the many inmates in the US's secret "ghost detention" who disappeared into an international network of prisons, their whereabouts unknown to family and friends. British soldiers, he claims, were involved in investigating him although they did not play any part in the abuse.

From correspondents in Oslo

March 15, 2008 03:39am

The suspected 'rendition' flight was made from Brno in the Czech Republic to Sola airport near Stavanger.

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
CONTACT: media@aclu.org; (212) 549-2666

SAN JOSE, CA - A federal court yesterday bowed to pressure from the Bush administration and dismissed a case against Boeing subsidiary Jeppesen Dataplan, Inc. for the company’s role in the CIA’s “extraordinary rendition” program. The lawsuit, brought by the American Civil Liberties Union, charged that Jeppesen knowingly aided the program by providing flight planning and logistical support services for aircraft and crews used by the CIA to transport victims to U.S.-run prisons or foreign intelligence agencies overseas, where they were subjected to harsh interrogation techniques and torture.

(Brussels, 11 February) - A year after its enquiry into alleged European complicity in the CIA renditions program, the European Parliament is still considering follow up to its work. In a letter issued today ahead of discussions in the Civil Liberties Committee, Amnesty International urged the Parliament to commit to effective and urgent follow up and to stop its silence on this serious human rights problem.

By PAUL ELIAS -

SAN JOSE, Calif. (AP) — Bush administration lawyers cited national security concerns Tuesday in urging a federal judge to toss out a lawsuit accusing a Boeing Co. subsidiary of illegally helping the CIA secretly fly terrorism suspects to overseas prisons to be tortured.

The American Civil Liberties Union sued Jeppesen Dataplan Inc. last year in San Jose federal court, accusing it of aiding the CIA in the "forced disappearance, torture and inhumane treatment" of five suspected terrorists in violation of national and international laws. The ACLU alleges that Jeppesen, based in San Jose, knowingly participated in the program by supplying aircraft, crews and logistical support to the CIA flights.

Prosecutors from Spain’s National Court are seeking key witnesses in relation to alleged secret CIA flights in which dozens of Islamist prisoners were transported via Spain to Guantanamo Bay.

The National Court suspects that dozens of prisoners captured in Kandahar, Afghanistan by US forces were transported to Guantanamo via Spanish airports or using Spanish airspace between January 2002 and October 2006.

The spy, using the pseudonym "Paul Stokes", told a Federal Court hearing yesterday that what might happen to Mr Habib was discussed with government officials from the beginning of his detention in October 2001.

CONTACT: ACLU
Rachel Myers, (212) 549-2689 or 2666;
media@aclu.org
Ravi Garla, ACLU of Northern California, (415) 621-2493; rgarla@aclunc.org
 
ACLU in Court Tuesday for Extraordinary Rendition Case Against Boeing Subsidiary
Group Opposes Government’s Attempt to Throw Out Case By Misusing 'State Secrets' Claim
 

SAN JOSE, CALIFORNIA - February 1 - The American Civil Liberties Union will argue in federal court next week for the continuation of its case against Boeing subsidiary Jeppesen Dataplan, Inc. for the company’s role in the CIA’s extraordinary rendition program. The ACLU is opposing the government’s attempt to throw out the case by misusing the “state secrets” privilege in an effort to avoid legal scrutiny of the unlawful and shameful program.

Friday, 1 February 2008

MPs and human rights group have accused ministers of a cover-up over government knowledge of rendition flights and the use of British military bases to hold suspects after the United States launched its war on terror more than six years ago.

Now ministers have blocked an attempt by an influential parliamentary committee to secure the release of secret military papers which they believe will reveal whether the British island territory of Diego Garcia was used as a detention centre for rendition prisoners.

Copenhagen - Denmark would ask US authorities for information if the CIA violated Danish airspace or used an airport in Greenland for renditions of alleged terrorist suspects, Prime Minister Anders Fogh Rasmussen said Thursday. "The government views the information that has been put on the table seriously," Rasmussen said, adding he opposed an independent probe until the government had reviewed the allegations.

The allegations were presented in a documentary, The CIA's Danish Connection, that was screened by public broadcaster DR on Wednesday evening.

Sunday January 27 2008

FIFTH Column loves a good row and it appears that maybe the Greens might, just might, be gearing themselves up for one with Fianna Fail.

An apparent split in Government has emerged over the issue of the suspected use of Shannon airport for rendition flights. The Green Party ministers said that they are "concerned" with the lack of flight inspections at Shannon. The matter is currently the subject of ongoing meetings between Environment Minister John Gormley and Minister for Communications, Energy and Natural Resources Eamon Ryan of the Greens and Minister for Justice Brian Lenihan.

By BALZ BRUPPACHER - 23 hours ago

BERN, Switzerland (AP) — Swiss authorities have frozen an investigation into CIA operatives suspected of illegally transporting an abducted Egyptian Muslim preacher through Swiss airspace, an official said Friday.

"The case was suspended in November 2007," said Jeannette Balmer, a spokeswoman for the Swiss federal prosecutor's office.

Switzerland authorized the start of criminal proceedings in February, joining Italy, the country from which the preacher was allegedly abducted, and Germany in raising the threat of prosecution of CIA operatives.

Human rights advocates surprised at government's assertion that UN convention on torture isn't a constraint

BILL CURRY

January 9, 2008

OTTAWA -- The federal government drew the ire of human rights advocates yesterday for telling an inquiry that Canada was justified in working with countries accused of engaging in torture.

Justice Department lawyer Michael Peirce also told the internal inquiry yesterday that the United Nations Convention Against Torture is not a factor in deciding whether to send information to countries such as Syria and Egypt about Canadians detained there.

American citizens must face the fact that torture is happening ‘in their names’ and by their country - despite George Bush's denials, says Mona Eltahawy.

 
One man’s waterboarding is another man’s torture.

Most people would consider simulated drowning -- otherwise known as waterboarding -- to be a form of torture. What, besides torture, could describe the combination of waterboarding with head-slapping and exposure to frigid temperatures? President George Bush disagrees.

“This government does not torture people,” he insisted last week, after reports emerged that in 2005, the U.S. Justice Department had secretly endorsed such painful interrogation techniques. Claiming that highly trained individuals from the CIA conducted the interrogation of terrorism suspects in keeping with U.S. and international law, Bush offered that it was all done for the sake of protecting the American people.

More

By James Vicini

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - A German citizen who says he was kidnapped, imprisoned and tortured by the CIA lost his appeal on Tuesday when the Supreme Court refused to review a decision dismissing the case because it would expose state secrets.

Attorneys for Khaled el-Masri, a German of Lebanese descent, argued in the high court appeal that his lawsuit did not depend on the disclosure of state secrets and that it should be allowed to go forward in U.S. court.

Private security firm Blackwater USA has confirmed it sometimes flies its security personnel through Malta, but has vehemently denied any participation - through its landings in Malta or anywhere else in the world - in the extraordinary renditions of terrorism suspects practiced by the American authorities.

In a communication with The Malta Independent on Sunday, legal representatives of the American private security firm confirmed, “Blackwater provides training for military and law enforcement and protects US government civilians overseas. Its personnel often fly overseas on sister-company aircraft, including landings in Malta.”

La charla que Joanne Mariner dio el otro día en la Argentina fue muy interesante, entre otras cosas porque la dio en la Argentina. Mariner es la directora del Programa de Terrorismo y Contraterrorismo del Human Rights Watch, la principal organización de derechos humanos de los Estados Unidos.

Ante un auditorio de unas 20 personas en la sede del CELS, contó los resultados de su investigación sobre el tratamiento que reciben los prisioneros de la CIA acusados de actos de terrorismo. La experta empezó diciendo que, a raíz de su visita para dictar un taller a organizaciones de derechos humanos, acababa de leer el último documento que emitió la dictadura argentina sobre la lucha contra los movimientos armados, el llamado “Documento Final de la Lucha contra la Subversión y el Terrorismo” de 1983. En ese documento los militares intentaron justificar el uso de “procedimientos inéditos”, un eufemisno para encubrir su plan de exterminio. “Lamentablemente, en Estados Unidos hoy se usa el mismo enfoque para combatir al terrorismo, sólo que el eufemismo que usa el gobierno para describir la tortura es ‘métodos de interrogación alternativos’.” El paralelo no termina ahí. Así como militares argentinos secuestraron, torturaron y desaparecieron personas, lo mismo hace la CIA, que secuestra sospechosos en cualquier parte del mundo, los tortura en cárceles propias o extrañas, y en algunos casos los hace desaparecer, apuntó Mariner.

(AP) U.S. authorities have told Germany that they will not extradite 13 purported CIA agents sought in the alleged kidnapping of a German citizen, an official said Saturday.

A Justice Ministry spokeswoman said the Bush administration told Berlin it would not hand over the group and said the ministry had, as a result, decided against giving Washington Munich prosecutors' formal request for their arrest. She spoke on condition of anonymity as required by the ministry.