From EUOBSERVER

CIA officials have corroborated reports that extraordinary renditions – transfers of prisoners from one country to another bypassing due judicial rule – have taken place on European soil with the blessing of EU governments.

A delegation from the European Parliament committee investigating allegations of US kidnappings and secret prison camps in Europe, on Wednesday (17 May) reported the information after a recent visit to the US.

“More than one source in the CIA…told us that between 30 and 50 people have been transported by extraordinary rendition,” Italian Socialist MEP and committee rapporteur Giovanni Claudio Fava told reporters in Strasbourg.

According to Mr Fava, the information MEPs received when meeting with the US state department’s top legal advisor, John Bellinger, assistant secretary of state Daniel Fried, members of the US Congress, lawyers and NGO representatives had been “patchy and inconsistent.”

But one clear point did emerge from the conversations, MEPs said.

“The only point in common from the officials we spoke to was that it was not possible to organise extraordinary rendition such as this without the active complicity of European governments,” said Carlos Coelho MEP, chair of the temporary committee.

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From the Jurist

Martin Scheinin, UN Special Rapporteur on Human Rights and Counterterrorism, said Tuesday that US officials have been stonewalling investigations into allegations that the Central Intelligence Agency flew terrorism suspects through Europe to countries where they could be tortured. Scheinin expressed concern that as a result of US reluctance to cooperate with investigators it could take several years to determine the truth of the allegations.

Members of a European Union delegation investigating the practice known as rendition also complained of a lack of cooperation from the State Department during its visit to Washington last week. The EU visit was part of a European Parliament inquiry into whether European countries were involved in clandestine CIA prisons or flights moving suspected terrorists.

Reuters has more.

The break with their usual quiet diplomacy illustrates the Red Cross’s level of frustration at the intransigence of the US administration.

From The Guardian

WASHINGTON (AP) – Taking issue with the International Committee of the Red Cross, the State Department said Friday the United States is not obliged under the Geneva conventions to give the committee access to all prisoners under U.S. jurisdiction.

Department spokesman Sean McCormack commented in response to criticism about U.S. policies by ICRC President Jakob Kellenberger.

Setting aside his normal practice of keeping his views confidential, Kellenberger said in a statement Friday that he deplored the Bush administration’s refusal to allow ICRC access to prisoners being held in secret facilities.

”No matter how legitimate the grounds for detention, there exists no right to conceal a person’s whereabouts or to deny that he or she is being detained,” Kellenberger said.

He said the ICRC would continue to seek access to these people ”as a matter of priority” despite the ”the disappointing lack of results and the current U.S. position.”

Kellenberger issued his statement through the ICRC’s Geneva headquarters after meetings here with Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice and other officials.

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From the American Civil Liberties Union (08/05/2006)

The ACLU’s report to the Committee Against Torture is available here

The ACLU’s petition is available here

GENEVA — Today the American Civil Liberties Union delivered a petition with more than 51,000 signatures calling for the enforcement of the universal prohibition against torture to the U.S. State Department delegation at the meeting of the U.N. Committee Against Torture in Geneva. The ACLU has been monitoring the committee proceedings and providing information about U.S. sponsored policies and practices of torture and abuse at home and abroad. The U.S. delegation denied on Friday that incidents of detainee abuse are systemic.

“Instead of denying the systemic abuse of detainees confirmed by its own documents, the U.S. government must own up to the truth and take full responsibility,” said Amrit Singh, an attorney with the ACLU Immigrants’ Rights Project who is currently observing the committee’s examination of the U.S. report in Geneva. “We hope that the Committee Against Torture will hold the government accountable for the torture and abuse of detainees both within the United States and abroad.”

Addressed to Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice, and delivered to John Bellinger, a Department of State legal advisor who is heading the U.S. delegation, the petition states: “Torture. Government kidnapping. Indefinite detention. These are not ideas we associate with the United States of America. They do not represent who we are as Americans. By promoting and condoning these practices in our military and intelligence forces, your administration has broken faith with the American values of freedom and fairness.”

The ACLU also expressed deep concern with many of the responses of the U.S. delegation to questions posed by committee members. In particular, the ACLU is concerned about the inadequacy of the measures taken to prevent torture and abuse, and the failure to hold military and civilian leaders accountable for the torture and inhuman treatment of persons in U.S. custody. In addition, the U.S. said that it can kidnap persons from outside the U.S. and transport them to third countries without violating the Convention. The ACLU charges that the U.S. has illegally rendered detainees to countries and places where torture and abuse are common, and that diplomatic assurances have failed to prevent their torture.

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From Amnesty International

Critical loopholes in the McCain amendment show that the once-clandestine practice of torture is now an official weapon in the War on Terror.

Click for multimedia presentation

BY ALFRED W. MCCOY

Alfred W. McCoy is professor of History at the University of Wisconsin-Madison and is the author of several books, including the recently published “A Question of Torture: CIA Interrogation, from the Cold War to the War on Terror,” “Closer Than Brothers” and “The Politics of Heroin: CIA Complicity in the Global Drug Trade.” He is also a member of Amnesty International USA.

Just before Christmas last, President Bush and Senator John McCain appeared in the Oval Office to announce an historic ban on torture by any U.S. agency, anywhere in the world. Looking straight into the cameras, the president declared with a steely gaze that this landmark legislation would make it ‘clear to the world that this government does not torture.’

This meeting was the culmination of a tangled legislative battle that had started six months before when Senator John McCain introduced an amendment to the must-pass Defense Appropriation Bill, calling for an absolute ban on ‘cruel, inhumane and degrading’ treatment. The White House fought back hard, sending Vice President Cheney to Capitol Hill for a wrecking effort so sustained, so determined that a Washington Post editorial branded him ‘The Vice President for Torture.’ At first, Cheney demanded that the amendment be dropped. The senator refused. Next, Cheney insisted on an exemption for the CIA. The senator stood his ground. Then, in a startling rebuke to the White House, the Senate passed the amendment last October by a 90-9 margin, a victory celebrated by Amnesty International and other rights groups. With the White House still threatening a veto, the appropriation gridlocked in an eyeball-to-eyeball standoff.

Then came that dramatic December 15th handshake between Bush and McCain, a veritable media mirage that concealed furious back-room maneuvering by the White House to undercut the amendment. A coalition of rights groups, including Amnesty International, had resisted the executive’s effort to punch loopholes in the torture ban but, in the end, the White House prevailed. With the help of key senate conservatives, the Bush administration succeeded in twisting what began as an unequivocal ban on torture into a legitimization of three controversial legal doctrines that the administration had originally used to justify torture right after 9/11.

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From Amnesty International

Amnesty International today made public a report detailing its concerns about torture and other cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment of prisoners and detainees both in the US and in US detention sites around the world.

The report has already been sent to members of the UN Committee Against Torture, who will be examining the US compliance with the Convention against Torture and Other Cruel, Inhuman or Degrading Treatment or Punishment on 5 and 8 May in Geneva. The Convention against Torture prohibits the use of torture in all circumstances and requires states to take effective legal and other measures to prevent torture and to provide appropriate punishment for those who commit torture.

The US is reportedly sending a 30-strong delegation to Geneva to defend its record. In its written report to the Committee, the US government asserted its unequivocal opposition to the use or practice of torture under any circumstances — including war or public emergency.

“Although the US government continues to assert its condemnation of torture and ill-treatment, these statements contradict what is happening in practice,” said Curt Goering, Senior Deputy Executive Director Of Amnesty International USA. “The US government is not only failing to take steps to eradicate torture it is actually creating a climate in which torture and other ill-treatment can flourish — including by trying to narrow the definition of torture.”

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