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Probe of CIA prisons implicates EU nations
A slam dunk says the AP...PARIS - Fourteen European nations colluded with U.S. intelligence in a "spider's web" of human rights abuses to help the CIA spirit terror suspects to illegal detention facilities, a European investigator said Wednesday. Ooooooh! A "spider's web"... Swiss senator Dick Marty's report to Europe's top human rights body was thin on evidence but raises the possibility of a cover-up involving both friends and critics of Washington's war on terror. It says European governments "did not seem particularly eager to establish" the facts. Thin on evidence, ya say? That can't be good for an investigation, can it? The 67-page report, addressed to the 46 Council of Europe member states, will likely be used by the rights watchdog to pressure countries to investigate their suspected role in U.S. rendition flights carrying terror suspects. Release the Rights Watchdogs! Marty's claims triggered a wave of angry denials but also accusations that governments are stonewalling attempts to confront Europe's role in the flights. "This report exposes the myth that European governments had no knowledge of, or involvement in, rendition and secret detentions," said lawmaker Michael Moore, foreign affairs spokesman for Britain's second opposition party, the Liberal Democrats. Hey, they got one too. In the strongest allegations so far, Marty said evidence suggests planes linked to the CIA carrying terror suspects stopped in Romania and Poland and likely dropped off detainees there, backing up earlier news reports that identified the two countries as possible sites of clandestine detention centers. Officials in Romania and Poland vigorously denied the accusations."This is slander and it's not based on any facts," Kazimierz Marcinkiewicz, Poland's prime minister, told reporters in Warsaw. But Filip Ilkowski, leader of Poland's "Stop War" movement protesting the Iraq war, said the Polish government was trying to thwart European Union investigators. ...and who ya gonna believe, the prime minister or the head of the Polish antiwar movement? I mean, why even ask? "It is hard to say whether prisoners were dropped off here, but from what we know, U.S. planes landed in Poland outside the official channels. The government has done nothing to clarify the matter, it is doing everything to cover it up," Ilkowski said. U.S. planes might've landed in Poland. No film at eleven... British Prime Minister Tony Blair also denied the collusion allegations and said Marty's report contained no new evidence. "I have to say, the Council of Europe report has absolutely nothing new in it," he told lawmakers. There was no immediate U.S. reaction. Prepare the cover up! What are we covering up? I dunno... Rest at the link. Posted by: tu3031 2006-06-07 |
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