US on defensive as reports of 'secret torture flights' pile up..

[rodeodance]

http://news.yahoo.com/s/afp/20051201/pl_afp/usattacksciaprisoners;_ylt=Aiad9tJ9uyBx6p7S.Q1Bqn6s0NUE;_ylu=X3oDMTA3b2NibDltBHNlYwM3MTY-

US on defensive as reports of 'secret torture flights' pile up

2 hours, 40 minutes ago

PARIS (AFP) - The United States was facing mounting embarrassment as allegations continued to emerge of a shadowy network of both secret prison camps and CIA "torture flights" carrying undeclared detainees through European and other countries.

In the latest such report the British newspaper The Guardian said Thursday it had seen navigation logs showing that more than 300 flights operated by the US Central Intelligence Agency had passed through European airports, as part of a network that could be involved in the clandestine detention and possible torture of terrorism suspects.

The claims have emerged since November 2, when the Washington Post newspaper reported that "black site" prisons were, or had been, located in eight countries including Thailand,
Afghanistan and "several democracies in Eastern Europe" since the September 11, 2001 attacks on the United States.

The paper also said that the CIA had used planes to send more than 100 suspects to the hidden global internment network, not including prisoners picked up from Iraq.......

[rodeodance]

1. maybe this is why Bush wanted to thank Poland.

...The United States on Wednesday promised a timely and forthright reply to the EU concerns.

In Thursday's report the Guardian said flight logs its reporters had seen showed that CIA planes visited Germany 96 times and Britain 80 times, though when charter flights were added this figure rose to more than 200. France was only visited twice and Austria not at all, the newspaper said.

The logs also showed regular trips to eastern Europe, including 15 stops in the Czech capital Prague.

"Only one visit is recorded to the Szymany airbase in north-east Poland, which has been identified as the alleged site of a secret CIA jail," The paper added.

Among o

[seafan]

2. More info here from a thread that sank fast:

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=102x1956625

[Thorandmjolnir]

3. Kososvo

There is a story in Denmark that in 2002, Alvaro Gil-Robles, the European Council Chairman for Human Rights visited Camp Bondsteel in Kososvo and saw prisoners dressed like the ones in Guantanamo. He basically said they had been there a long time, were not from Kososvo and had not seen a judge, attorney or any other authority. Apparently Camp Bondstell is a huge military complex in Kosovo.

http://politiken.dk/VisArtikel.iasp?PageID=410929

(Sorry, the article is in Danish, the following is a rough translation from the article about Camp Bondsteel)

Camp Bondsteel was build in 1999 as a base for 4.000 of the 7.000 american soldiers in the conflict, members KFOR - tasked with creating peace in the area. In only two month's 1.000 americans and 7.000 local labours finished the base. It is the largest base America has built since the defeat in the Vietnam war of 1975.

The base diameter is 10 kilometer , and there's several districts to in the base. The soldiers resides in little houses , and the base has 300 buildings , several sport facilities, shops, a library, a hospital and landing facilities.

Security experts says that the base was intended to not only be a base for the KFOR force, but to also insure a permanent american attendance to the area. The british general Michael Jackson noticed in 1999, that the base is also meant to safeguard the important oil lines in the area.


More about Camp Bondsteel: http://www.globalsecurity.org/military/facility/camp-bondsteel.htm

[EuroObserver]

8. Yes, the story was also in El País in Spain

I'll see if I can locate it tomorrow (must go now).

ed: and Welcome to DU :hi:

[EuroObserver]

12. Here is the El País article (interview):

http://www.elpais.es/articulo/elpepinac/20051126elpepinac_14/Tes/%22%3BEn%20Kosovo%20hab%C3%AD%3Ba%20un%20centro%20de%20detenci%C3%B3%3Bn%20como%20el%20de%20Guant%C3%A1%3Bnamo%22%3B

<snip>

Pregunta. ¿Realmente cabe la posibilidad de que aún hoy haya cárceles secretas en territorio europeo?

Respuesta. En mi visita a Kosovo en 2002 tuve noticias de que la KFOR tenía poder para hacer detenciones extrajudiciales y pedí ver el centro donde estaban esas personas. El centro de prisioneros estaba dentro de una base militar norteamericana No les gustó, pero fui y lo vi. Era una especie de fortín, igual que un Guantánamo en pequeño. Había pequeñas barracas de madera, rodeadas de alambradas de espino, con 15 o 20 prisioneros vestidos con monos naranja, como los de Guantánamo. Entre los detenidos había cuatro norteafricanos que llevaban barba, leían el Corán y estaban aislados unos de otros. Pregunté qué hacían en los Balcanes esos nacionales de países del Norte de África y me contestaron que habían sido detenidos en la región, aunque eso no pude confirmarlo. No pude hablar con ellos y todo aquello me olió muy mal, me pareció muy sospechoso. Quien dirigía aquello era un asesor que venía de Guantánamo. Pedí que se cerrara el centro y se cerró a los pocos meses y también se cambió el procedimiento para las detenciones de la KFOR.

[KansDem]

4. Seems like an awful lot of anti-CIA stories emerging in the media...

Secret torture flights, secret prisons, secret torture...

I know there has always been some anti-CIA sentiment, especially with revelations about latin American coups and drug running, but the recent barrage seems to be relentless. And it seems to have started to coincide with the Plame outing. In fact, at times I have trouble differentiating between "good CIA"--possibly exposing a Bush Administration scheme to plant WMDs in Iraq to cover for Bush's lies and suffering the outing of one of its operatives/operations as retaliation, and "bad CIA"--secret torture flights, prisons, and torture. Almost like the Bushitas are hellbent on destroying the CIA's reputation in time to deflect any revealing bombshells about Bush's WMD schemes, via Fitzgerald/Plame investigation. After all, who's really going to see a totally-discredited CIA as "the victim?"

Anyone else notice this as well?

[ugarte]

5. According to Richard Clarke, ex-NSA, it's the CIA doing the leaking

They want out of Bush's prison-running business, so they've leaked the info themselves to create public pressure.

Could be. I don't have a link to Clarke. I saw him on Charley Rose last night.

[stillcool]

6. after reading about the Iran/Contra affairs...

and how those 'missions' were set up and run...I have no confidence in anything being as it appears. These people are too familiar with 'plausible denial', and side-stepping any laws or protocol that gets in their way.

[grahamhgreen]

7. Yes

I am thinking that the majority of those in the CIA have reformed and decided that torture, et al, is counterproductive to the goals they are trying to achieve (as myriad as those are).

In addition, I think many of the agents are miffed at having to follow the orders of those they see as their intellectual inferiors. Intellectually inferior, but more brutal, and almost as cunning.

What we are seeing here as regards the torture that is happening, just speculating mind you, is the last holdouts from a previous era (call it the Negroponte era) carrying on with a pathological addiction to torture; i.e. - the torture is counterproductive to their aims (increasing their personal power and wealth), but they can not see it, as they are addicted to it..

They torturers have the mindset that by torturing people, they will instill fear and terror in the hearts of all that oppose them. These elements are comprised of only a small percentage of actual CIA, these elements are mostly supported by a network of thugs from poverty stricken third-world countries. They are out of the mainstream and we are in the process of watching them being marginalized and removed by the intelligence community. Maybe.

[Inland]

9. Except that the admin has actually defended, not stopped, the activity

Even if the CIA operations were entirely created inside the agency, NOW the adminstration owns them by refusing to do anything except defend them in theory.

[Clara T]

10. 80 CIA planes visited UK

Twist to terror suspects row as logs show 80 CIA planes visited UK

Stephen Grey and Luke Harding in Berlin
Thursday December 1, 2005
The Guardian


According to flight logs seen by the Guardian, Britain was second only to Germany as a transit hub for the CIA, which stands accused of operating a covert network of interrogation centres in eastern Europe. Several European governments have launched urgent investigations into whether clandestine CIA flights were used in the aftermath of September 11 to transfer Islamist prisoners to third countries where they could be interrogated beyond the reach of international law.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/usa/story/0,12271,1654728,00.html

[Up2Late]

11. US on defensive as reports of 'secret torture flights' pile up (AFP)

("...The United States was facing mounting embarrassment..." Same could be said about *.)

US on defensive as reports of 'secret torture flights' pile up

01/12/2005 19h32

PARIS (AFP) - The United States was facing mounting embarrassment as allegations continued to emerge of a shadowy network of both secret prison camps and CIA "torture flights" carrying undeclared detainees through European and other countries. In the latest such report the British newspaper The Guardian said Thursday it had seen navigation logs showing that more than 300 flights operated by the US Central Intelligence Agency had passed through European airports, as part of a network that could be involved in the clandestine detention and possible torture of terrorism suspects.

The claims have emerged since November 2, when the Washington Post newspaper reported that "black site" prisons were, or had been, located in eight countries including Thailand, Afghanistan and "several democracies in Eastern Europe" since the September 11, 2001 attacks on the United States. The paper also said that the CIA had used planes to send more than 100 suspects to the hidden global internment network, not including prisoners picked up from Iraq.

Its report did not name the European countries involved, but Poland, a European Union member, has denied being one of them, as has Romania. There have been widespread reports that the alleged network could involve both the transport and torture of undeclared detainees....

(clip)

...The United States on Wednesday promised a timely and forthright reply to the EU concerns. In Thursday's report the Guardian said flight logs its reporters had seen showed that CIA planes visited Germany 96 times and Britain 80 times, though when charter flights were added this figure rose to more than 200. France was only visited twice and Austria not at all, the newspaper said. The logs also showed regular trips to eastern Europe, including 15 stops in the Czech capital Prague.

[radfringe]

13. thank-you for flying Pain-American airlines....

for interrogation purposes your seat cushion can be used as a torture device.....

[truthnproof]

14. Ooh.

Violating everybody's airspace on the sly while we smile in their faces. This is gonna make a big stink AND it proves they lied yet again about torturing people.