POLISH AND ROMANIAN SECURITY OFFICIALS CONFIRMED EXISTENCE OF CIA JAILS
PanARMENIAN.Net
08.06.2007 15:46 GMT+04:00
/PanARMENIAN.Net/ The CIA operated secret prisons in Europe where
terrorism suspects could be interrogated and were allegedly tortured,
an official inquiry will conclude today.
Despite denials by their governments, senior Polish and Romanian
security officials have confirmed to the Council of Europe that their
countries were used to hold some of America’s most important prisoners
captured after 9/11 in secret.
None of the prisoners had access to the Red Cross and many were subject
to what George Bush has called the CIA’s "enhanced" interrogation,
which critics have condemned as torture. Although suspicions about the
secret CIA prisons have existed for more than a year, the council’s
report appears to offer the first concrete evidence. It also details
the prisons’ operations and the identities of some of the prisoners.
The council has also established that within weeks of the 9/11 attacks,
NATO signed an agreement with the U.S. that allowed civilian jets
used by the CIA during its so-called extraordinary rendition program
to move across member states’ airspace. Its report states: "We have
sufficient grounds to declare that the highest state authorities
were aware of the CIA’s illegal activities on their territories." The
council’s investigators believe that agreement may have been illegal.
The full extent of British logistic support for the extraordinary
rendition program was first disclosed by the Guardian, which reported
in September 2005 that aircraft operated by the CIA had flown in and
out of UK civilian and military airports hundreds of times.
The 19-month inquiry by the council, which promotes human rights across
Europe, was headed by Dick Marty, a Swiss senator and former state
prosecutor. He said: "What was previously just a set of allegations
is now proven: large numbers of people have been abducted from various
locations across the world and transferred to countries where they have
been persecuted and where it is known that torture is common practice."
His report says there is "now enough evidence to state that secret
detention facilities run by the CIA [existed] in Europe from 2003 to
2005, in particular in Poland and Romania". Mr Marty has told Channel
4’s Dispatches, in a report to be broadcast on Monday, that the jails
were run "directly and exclusively" by the CIA. This was only possible
because of "collaboration at various institutional levels of America’s
many partner countries".
He succeeded in confirming details of the CIA’s prisons by using
his own "intelligence methods", which included tracking agents on
both sides of the Atlantic, and persuading them to talk. Officials
in Poland and Romania have repeatedly denied the existence of CIA
facilities or the presence of detainees held by U.S. authorities.
But Mr Marty concluded: "All the members and partners of NATO signed
up to the same permissive – not to say illegal – terms that allowed
CIA operations to permeate throughout the European continent and
beyond …" There was no immediate comment from NATO, The Guardian
Unlimited reports.
From: Emil Lazarian | Ararat NewsPress
