The Mail on Sunday is doing a very good job on the odious Jack Straw’s involvement in torture and persecution. I think that at last the truth has entered the established narrative. There is a little box in the report about my own evidence to Scotland Yard. I will type it out here as the Mail’s box format here is not internet searchable:
“Torture” Evidence Handed to the Yard
Further pressure was piled on Jack Straw last night over the “rendition” of Libyan dissident Abdel Hakim Belhadj after sensitive documents were handed to Scotland tard detectives.
Craig Murray, former British Ambassador to Uzbekistan, passed the documents to police as part of the inquiry into the behaviour of Ministers and intelligence officials over the detention of Mr Belhadj in Bangkok in March 2004.
The opponent of Colonel Gadaffi was flown to Tripoli, where he claims he was tortured.
Mr Straw, who was Foreign Secretary at the time, has denied ever condoning the use of torture to extract information.
But the documents appear to cast doubt on that position.
One memo, headed “Uzbekistan: Intelligence Possibly Obtained Under Torture” contains minutes of a meeting Mr Murray held with senior Foreign and Commonwealth officials on March 8, 2003 to discuss his concern that the UK could be in breach of international law by possessing intelligence obtained by torture.
The minute, dated March 10 2003, quoted Linda Duffield, then the FCO’s Director of Wider Europe, apparently justifying the use of such material as part of the fight against terrorism.
A second memo, dated March 14 2003, and written by Simon McDonald – the Straw’s principal Private Secretary – to Ms Duffield says Straw has read the minutes and “agrees that you handled this very well”.
Mr Murray is understood to have told police that during Mr Straw’s time at the FCO diplomats were told to only refer to the policy on torture verbally.
Mr Murray said last night “My evidence stated that Jack Straw introduced a policy of allowing evidence obtained by torture to be used. I also told them that written evidence had been destrpyed, and we were told to not commit details into writing.”
There is a slight misquote in the above. It should say Jack Straw introduced a policy of allowing intelligence obtained by torture, not evidence. In fact it was specifically stated such intelligence would not be produced as evidence in court (people were imprisoned without charge or rendered instead). The instruction not to put things in writing was given to me personally, I don’t know if others were told the same. As I was the only one protesting, perhaps not.
These links are to the documents in question.
The first two were obtained by Freedom of Information Act request. Details of the CIA’s colllusion with the Karimiv regime’s torturers have been redacted by the FCO. Last week Jack Straw came out and argued strongly for the effective abolition of the Freedom of Information Act. Now there is a coincidence for you.
IMMORAL. It was those three kisses from Komodo that gave me the trembles.
Staines has resorted to writing a column in the pornographer’s Daily Star! How low can he go.
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http://www.dailystar.co.uk/posts/view/248750/Guido-Fawkes-Plots-rumours-and-conspiracy-/?tw_p=twt
First Monkey: I see no evil
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-politics-17889838
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The mere fact that Hunt was a contemporary of Cameron at Cambridge is evidence enough, I think…
Senior reptilian moment, sorry. Meant the other place. The one you can get a Masters from by simply waiting a year..
*and others
Mary
My wife once advised Northern and Shell (Desmond’s vehicle). She was actually quite impressed by Desmond’s intelligence and business savvy. However she remembers the way that Desmond introduced her to his executive board: “This is expletive [name]. You’d better expletive listen to her because we’re paying her an expletive load of money. And she doesn’t even have to take her expletive clothes off!”
Do you think Staines has to take his clothes off? Nota nice thought
Red-hot Dutch
15.56 It was “stupid” of the PM to give the bid over from Cable to pro-Murdoch Hunt, says Frank Dobson. The Cabinet Secretary advised Hunt was the appropriate man, Cameron says. The PM has turned puce.
(Commons debate transcript, today)
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Early day motion: That the Prime Minister’s colour should be a matter of record at all times. Anyone?
Red Hot 😉 These three should definitely not take their clothes off in public.
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What is the gross tonnage of Messrs Nicolas Fatty Soames, Eric Podgy Pickles and Toby Tubby Baldry? Must be at least 65 stone. Soames is massive and rose to the defence of Cameron/Hunt in the Urgent Question on Hunt. Should we sponsor them on a diet? Pickles sat impassively alongside Cameron. Hunt makes involuntary lower jaw movements when something tricky is being mentioned.
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Tom Watson seems to have something on communications between Osborne and News Int’l. His question to Cameron was swatted away like many others from the Opposition. Sycophantic remarks from the Tory backbenchers were received gratefully and enlarged upon by Cameron. Obviously planted and pre-arranged.
One hundred and forty-eight US college professors signed a letter objecting to an advertisement in The New York Times by notorious racist David Horowitz naming indvidual faculty members at several US colleges and accusing them of inciting murder of Jewish children, and likening the movement to boycott Israel (BDS) to Nazism.
The Times, however, failed to print it. Here is the letter and the full list of signatories:
http://electronicintifada.net/blogs/ali-abunimah/148-professors-sign-letter-objecting-new-york-times-nazi-ad-paper-refuses-run-it
Did Richard Desmond go to Eton like Boris?! They use the same vocabulary. Didn’t Boris also swear at Ken in a lift?
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http://www.huffingtonpost.co.uk/2012/04/30/boris-johnson-in-swear-bbc-reporter_n_1464434.html
Olympic missiles? On apartment buildings? WTF?
http://www.wired.com/dangerroom/2012/04/wiredcouk-london-missile/
defense drill…. are they going top have a drone to shoot at whilst the space beneath is still empty? how would they possibly know that they work?
What if there is a massive smokey fire obscuring the laser….
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Starstreak_%28missile%29#Performance
Ref Ian Tomlinson RIP
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March 28 2011
Inquest into Mr Tomlinson’s death begins – nearly two years after his death.
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May 3 2011
The inquest jury rules that Mr Tomlinson was unlawfully killed by Pc Simon Harwood during the G20 protests in London and that the newspaper seller posed no threat.
{http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/uknews/law-and-order/8490155/G20-inquest-timeline-of-Ian-Tomlinson-death-and-inquiry.html}
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Oct 17 2011
PC SIMON HARWOOD TRIAL NOT TILL JUNE 2012
PC Simon Harwood appeared in court this morning and pleaed not guilty to the manslaughter of Ian Tomlinson. The trial was fixed for June 2012 by which time Harwood will have been suspended on full pay for three years. Why the delay when the CPS had already dragged its feet for years. No doubt they hope the delay will lead to witnesses forgetting what they saw. Meanwhile the ordeal for the Tomlinson family goes on and on.
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http://ianbone.wordpress.com/2011/10/17/pc-simon-harwood-trial-not-till-june-2012/
Hello folks, I had a busy weekend and haven’t checked the blog since Friday, but all seems well here.
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Frazer, spam banished, as requested.
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Nuid, no need to worry, I don’t think you’re here to start fights or divert every thread onto one hobby-horse issue.
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Hey, I hope I haven’t been seeming like some rottweiler moderator; there’s only been a couple I got pissed off at. One of them continually spewed racist insults, and the other was singing praise to Hitler!
Olympic missiles – UPDATE
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The missile battery is the HVM A5 Missile System and consists of a two-stage solid propellant rocket motor, a separation system and three high-density titanium ‘darts’.
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Once clear of the canister, the 1st stage motor is jettisoned. The second-stage motor ignites and accelerates the missile to a velocity greater than Mach 4. A separation system at the front end of the motor contains three ‘darts’. When the second stage motor is burnt out, the thrust triggers the three ‘darts’ to automatically separate.
The ‘darts’ maintain a high kinetic energy as they are manually guided to the same single target, a jet plane, drone or helicopter. Each dart contains guidance and control circuitry, a thermal battery and a high-density penetrating warhead with fuse.
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The separation of the darts initiates the arming of the individual warheads. Each dart is guided independently using a double laser beam riding system. As the dart impacts the target, the inertial forces activate the delay fuse, allowing the warhead to penetrate before detonation.
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Only a small number of A5 missiles have been fired in trials, at West Freugh in Scotland and two malfunctioned according to a Thales trials engineer.
I don`t know Mary.
The world has gone mad.
“Hey, I hope I haven’t been seeming like some rottweiler moderator”
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Not at all, Clark. I think both you and Jon do a great job.
Thanks, Nuid.
Hmm self-destructing missile – watch out for falling shards of hot metal in Barking: Ilford: Highbury: Holloway: Poplar: Southwark and the City of London, esp. in fog or smoke or if the operator is having a bad day and forgets the superelevation marker application (the missile ground impacts on launch).
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I am not joking and the information has been verified.
State Terrorist Tacticians Required:
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You will be required to think up new ways of giving the population the heebee geebees, preparing them for ever increasing levels of unsettling and bewildering bullshit, which is in practice the backbone of our private political social strategy for the new millenium.
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Things like posting anti-aircraft batteries in central London ‘just in case’ more jet diverting terrorists could possibly exist and now break through all the bullshit we previously installed into all the airports….
“which is in practice the backbone of our private political social strategy for the new millenium.”
‘Children of men’ comes to mind.
I look forward to seeing all these criminals locked up in jail for all of us to gawp at. Thats all they are – plain and simple.
No, Desmond did not go to Eton. In spades –
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Richard_Desmond
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He just, er, assimilated well.
Okay, so let’s just say that there are one or two airliners hijacked during the Olympics. The usual culprits,not with destruction on their minds,but demands.
Our brave armed forces will blast them out of the skies with missiles before they can disrupt the 100 yard dash. Their demands will never be known never mind met, and the wreckage of the planes will crash into one of the most densely populated cities in the world.Job done.
I think it is just an excuse to begin deploying military onto our streets.Our Police force is already para military. It is definitely not to protect the 99%.
Have to say, the Lexington House development looks very much to me like a gated community created by a property speculator (Luke Doonan) trading on the yuppification of parts of East London . £245,000 for a flat, indeed. Serve them right to have a squad of pongos marching around on the roof, rich bastards.
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Seriously, the Olympics lost any credibility as a vehicle for international goodwill some decades ago. It’s a pain in the arse for the home city – except for sundry franchisees and developers; the tourist trade peaks at that time of year anyway, and no significant increase in spending would occur – and the money would be much better spent simply redeveloping areas that need it…with some provision for the man in the street. The flaming fragments of a hijacked airliner descending on the Olympic Village ( or better yet, No. 10) will only (a) highlight the fatuity of the enterprise and (b) be a good day to bury the latest economic figures.
Shalom….*
http://us.shalomlife.com/news/17083/israel-helping-britain-prepare-for-2012-summer-olympic-games/
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* Peace
Some six major mortgage companies arr putting up interests rates and they blame the cost of borrowing. This means that the banks, despite the lack of interest rate rise from the bank of England, have to pay more, either due to the Moody’s and Fitches, or we are being prepared to pay for next years bonuses.
Whatever it is, it looks like another banking collywobble in the making, more reposessions and more pressure on everyone who has not had a payrise for three years plus.
I have not paid myself a living wage for years and hence this will hurt any family where there is only one wage earner.
@Mark G. isn’t it surprising that they use the HVM A5 in the midst of one of the most polluted smog filled City. Large fires could render their defenses useless for hours on end and should this happen, all other security would have to be scaled up, increasing the rub up situations with the locals, already mightily peed off cause they’re loosing out on business which is all provided ‘on site’. They seem to be creating their own flashpoints alright.
I’d like to see a risk assessment. How many lives less will be lost of a hijacked airliner is shot down than if it is allowed to proceed on its way?
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Say, for instance, if it is diverted by ground fire from The Gherkin or the Houses of Parliament (which it would hit intact), to Hendon ( which it would hit still substantially intact, though with options for the tail section going somewhere else; but out of control and on fire)
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Clue:
http://hiplane.files.wordpress.com/2011/09/locker-b.jpg
How about this for getting desperate? a bin tax on new households… If they get away with that they will soon spread this elsewhere.
http://www.edp24.co.uk/news/politics/breckland_council_looking_to_introduce_a_wheelie_bin_tax_for_residents_in_new_mid_norfolk_homes_1_1363058
Will CaMoron feel the Brown effect of the flooding. Do you remember that whatever Brown tried, the hand of God sent down pestilence, plague and floods. 😉
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http://conservativehome.blogs.com/
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6 hours ago – “David Cameron will face one of his toughest tests this week as his …. Flood chaos to last all week – Daily Express … Unless a government appeals to its natural supporters and delivers concrete improvements in living standards it is doomed. …. The worst days of Major and Brown felt like this – but the public …
Chris Hedges on our current condition. I have just been reading this on reports of scavenger schoolchildren, desperate for food.
{http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2136070/Recession-created-scavenger-pupils-hunt-scraps-food-schools-use-place-warm-poll-reveals.html}
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The Implosion of Capitalism – Chris Hedges
http://truth-out.org/news/item/8808-when-civilizations-die
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When civilizations start to die they go insane. Let the ice sheets in the Arctic melt. Let the temperatures rise. Let the air, soil and water be poisoned. Let the forests die. Let the seas be emptied of life. Let one useless war after another be waged. Let the masses be thrust into extreme poverty and left without jobs while the elites, drunk on hedonism, accumulate vast fortunes through exploitation, speculation, fraud and theft. Reality, at the end, gets unplugged. We live in an age when news consists of Snooki’s pregnancy, Hulk Hogan’s sex tape and Kim Kardashian’s denial that she is the naked woman cooking eggs in a photo circulating on the Internet. Politicians, including presidents, appear on late night comedy shows to do gags and they campaign on issues such as creating a moon colony. “[A]t times when the page is turning,” Louis-Ferdinand Celine wrote in “Castle to Castle,” “when History brings all the nuts together, opens its Epic Dance Halls! hats and heads in the whirlwind! Panties overboard!”
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The quest by a bankrupt elite in the final days of empire to accumulate greater and greater wealth, as Karl Marx observed, is modern society’s version of primitive fetishism. This quest, as there is less and less to exploit, leads to mounting repression, increased human suffering, a collapse of infrastructure and, finally, collective death. It is the self-deluded, those on Wall Street or among the political elite, those who entertain and inform us, those who lack the capacity to question the lusts that will ensure our self-annihilation, who are held up as exemplars of intelligence, success and progress. The World Health Organization calculates that one in four people in the United States suffers from chronic anxiety, a mood disorder or depression—which seems to me to be a normal reaction to our march toward collective suicide. Welcome to the asylum.
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