Tag: rendition

UK lawsuit to expose CIA role in “ghost flights”

Crossposted at Daily Kos

   

    We are about to learn exactly what was going on and where under the Bush/Cheney “Extra-ordinary” rendition program.

    Lawyers for Binyam Mohamed, who spent some seven years in US custody, five of them at Guantanamo, say that Jeppesen UK, a subsidiary of Boeing, has agreed to the presentation of evidence about the “ghost flights” it allegedly operated for the CIA – off-the-grid private jets that transferred terrorist suspects to sites where they would be tortured.

rawstory.com

   Binyam Mohamed, if you recall, had his genitals mutilated by either the CIA or one of the host countries where he was tortured.

   Mutilating genitals.

    What could possibly justify genital mutilation, or even the torture program itself? It’s not like the Bush/Cheney Administration was above bald faced lying to us. In my opinion they did it because they can.

    The Object of Torture IS Torture.

    The Object of Power IS Power.

Bagram Detainee Abuse

Ex-detainees allege Bagram abuse

Alleged CIA ‘rendition’ officer warned not to travel abroad

 

Sabrina De Sousa stands accused by Italian officials as being one of the chief American agents participating in the alleged extraordinary rendition of Hassan Mustafa Osama Nasr off the streets of Italy and flying him to Egypt where he claims to have been tortured and imprisoned.

According to the Washington Post, De Sousa seeks diplomatic immunity from prosecution. “De Sousa, a naturalized U.S. citizen who was born in India, says she was ordered not to travel abroad because of the fear of arrest, preventing her from visiting her mother in India and siblings in Europe. De Sousa quit her job in the federal government in February.”

Italian prosecutors, according to the NY Times, claim that De Sousa “was a C.I.A. officer serving under diplomatic cover in the United States Consulate in Milan” at the time of Nasr’s abduction – an accusation that she denies. Rather, De Sousa “described herself as a diplomat”.

Dystopia 8: The Touch

“There stands, my friend, in yonder pool

An engine called the ducking-stool;

By legal power commanded down

The joy and terror of the town.

If jarring females kindle strife,

Give language foul, or lug the coif,

If noisy dames should once begin

To drive the house with horrid din,

Away, you cry, you’ll grace the stool;

We’ll teach you how your tongue to rule.

The fair offender fills the seat

In sullen pomp, profoundly great;

Down in the deep the stool descends,

But here, at first, we miss our ends;

She mounts again and rages more

Than ever vixen did before.

So, throwing water on the fire

Will make it but burn up the higher.

If so, my friend, pray let her take

A second turn into the lake,

And, rather than your patience lose,

Thrice and again repeat the dose.

No brawling wives, no furious wenches,

No fire so hot but water quenches.”

Benjamin  West  1780

[Note from the author:  Okay…I know this is out of order.  Sorry about breaking tradition, but I just couldn’t get what I wanted out of the next Utopia chapter so I am still working to make it better.

In the mean time I had this pretty well cooked.  So here is the 15th chapter of the Utopia/Dystopia series.]

A Farce in the Making? Holder’s Task Force on Interrogations and Detention

According to the New York Times, Obama administration Attorney General Eric holder announced today he would appoint a new “special envoy” on Guantanamo, former assistant secretary of state for European affairs in the Bush Administration, Daniel Fried.

Also on Wednesday, Attorney General Eric H. Holder Jr. named two government lawyers with national security experience as staff directors of task forces set up by President Obama to analyze detention issues.

J. Douglas Wilson, a senior federal prosecutor in California, is to lead an analysis of guidelines for interrogation and transfer of detainees to other countries. Brad Wiegmann, a senior Justice Department national security lawyer, is to help lead a task force charged with recommending the legal rules for detention of future terrorism suspects.

Mr. President, Have I Been Rolled On Torture?

Mr. President, have I been rolled? I write today to ask this question, because it is truly, critically important to me as a citizen and a voter. All my life I have derided single issue voters, after all can’t they see that there is a bigger picture beyond their issue? That they find it compelling and are sincere in their commitment is not in doubt, but there has to be a balancing of the issues in any democracy. Now, I find myself in the position of being a single issue voter. It is due to the fact that there is finally an issue that is so overriding, so critical to the very notion of what it means for all of us to be Americans that I find myself in this position. That issue, Mr. President, is the extra legal holding, rendition and torture of prisoners in the so-called War on Terror.  

Under Oath, MI5 Officer Reveals Official British Torture Program

The UK Guardian, which has been right on top of the Binyam Mohamed drama unfolding in the British courts, delivered another bombshell article this morning in London. “Whitehall devised torture policy for terror detainees,” the headline reads, “MI5 interrogations in Pakistan agreed by lawyers and government.”

The British High Court resumed their hearing of Binyam’s request for documents to prove his torture, as part of the legal proceedings against him at Guantanamo. Previously, the British judges had ruled that what they called “powerful evidence” suppressed relating to the torture of Mohamed by the U.S. and their proxy torturers in Morocco, where Mohamed had been sent as part of the Bush Administration’s policy of “extraordinary rendition.” The judges then revealed that they had been told by the British Foreign Minister, David Milibrand, that the requested documents could not be released, or U.S.-UK intelligence relations would be affected.

Scott Horton: Yes, They Hid Torture Evidence from Obama

Scott Horton has followed up on the UK Guardian story, which I also wrote on last night, describing how Reprieve attorney Clive Stafford Smith, whose organization is helping defend Guantanamo detainee and British resident Binyam Mohamed, had information he was sending to President Obama on Mohamed’s torture censored by the U.S. Department of Defense.

At Daily Kos, a number of readers were incredulous at the claims I, and by implication, Stafford Smith was making about Obama being kept out of the information loop, suggesting that I was prone to conspiracy theories, or a dupe for grandstanding by Mohamed’s attorneys. Some suggested either the Guardian or myself or both had completely misunderstood the situation.

But Horton, who has been following this story carefully, and is known to have excellent sources, reported on the Guardian article much as I had, and added this:

Obama DOJ Advocates Immunity From Civil Torture Litigation

I listened to the oral arguments of the Jeppesen civil lawsuit seeking damages from an aircraft company for its role in the rendition & torture of 5 suspected terrorists. It was shocking to hear that Obama wants to continue Bush’s policy to elevate state secrets from an evidentiary privilege to blanket immunity. Under this view, the subject matter of a lawsuit is grounds for dismissal even if the plaintiff does not need any classified evidence to prove its case. This is not the standard created by the US Supreme Court, the law governing criminal litigation or the proposed law for civil litigation. The judges also seemed surprised:  2 of the 3 judges asked the DOJ lawyer if he was “representing” the “thoroughly vetted” positions of the Obama administration.  Some Democrats reacted by introducing a bill today to require judges to determine “whether a blanket claim of secrecy by the government is necessary to protect national security.”  (h/t Meteor Blades)

Torture Liability for Rendition Aircraft Company

On Monday, the Obama administration may answer some lingering questions about the parameters of our torture policies now that Bush is history. Oral argument is scheduled to address whether Boeing subsidiary Jeppesen Dataplan can face trial on civil liability for torture based on its role in extraordinary rendition flights (pdf file).  Five men claiming that they were tortured by the US alleged that Jeppesen transported the rendered prisoners to countries known for torture or to CIA black site prisons. A federal district court dismissed the lawsuit when Bush invoked the state secrets privilege. The issue is now on appeal before the 9th Circuit. This is not an either/or issue: The courts have authority to protect our national security, promote governmental transparency and redress harms to torture victims.  

US-UK Torture Cover-up, While Conditions Worsen at Guantanamo (Updated)

(I see our own buhdydharma has also covered important and somewhat overlapping aspects as this diary, with a great video, too, in his aptly titled essay, “Wow!”)

Controversy continues to mount over the suppression of key evidence of U.S. torture in the case of Ethiopian national, Binyam Mohamed, at the suspected behest of the Obama administration. UK High Court judges in the case wanted to release the evidence, but Foreign Secretary David Miliband prevented this, saying it would harm UK intelligence cooperation with the United States. The U.S. reputedly threatened a break in cooperation with British intelligence services if the torture evidence, which is part of a CIA file, was released. (Update: The Age has now published documentary evidence of the U.S. threat — see below. H/T to Patriot Daily News Clearinghouse.)

Whatever threats were made, after the suppression of the evidence, and in the face of the protest by the UK judges, the Obama administration told BBC News it was grateful for the cooperation, i.e., the cover-up.

Democracy Now Debate: Horton vs Ratner on Renditions, Appendix M

A fascinating debate took place at Democracy Now! yesterday. With Amy Goodman as host, Harpers Magazine’s Scott Horton, and President of Center for Constitutional Rights, Michael Ratner, went at it on the subject of Obama’s renditions and interrogation policies, including the existence of coercive interrogation instructions in the Army Field Manual. These policies have been a matter of some debate ever since Obama issued his executive orders regarding the issues a few weeks ago.

(An excellent companion piece to this debate would be the interviews Goodman did with former CIA analyst Melvin Goodman and Michael Ratner last November, when it was announced that Obama was staffing his transition team with John Brennan and Jami Miscik. The former was a supporter of wireless wiretapping and extraordinary rendition, while the latter was involved in the scandals around “faulty” intelligence in the run-up to the war in Iraq.)

Load more