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Αξιώσεις της μυστικής φυλακής CIA για τους υπόπτους τρόμου στο βρετανικό νησί
Κυριακή, 21η Οκτωβρίου 2007
? Η νομική φιλανθρωπία ωθεί τη δράση στις αξιώσεις του Diego Garcia Ian Cobain και Richard norton-Taylor
Οι ισχυρισμοί ότι οι κρατημένοι CIA ύποπτοι Al-Qaida για την ερώτηση σε μια μυστική φυλακή στο κυρίαρχο βρετανικό έδαφος πρόκειται να ερευνηθούν από τους βουλευτές, ο φύλακας έχουν μάθει. Η επιτροπή εξωτερικών υποθέσεων όλος-συμβαλλόμενων μερών πρόκειται να εξετάσει τις από μακρού υφιστάμενες υποψίες ότι η αντιπροσωπεία έχει ενεργοποιήσει μιας από τις αποκαλούμενες φυλακές «μαύρων περιοχών της» στο Diego Garcia, το βρετανικό υπερπόντιο έδαφος στον Ινδικό Ωκεανό που είναι κατ' οίκον σε μια μεγάλη αμερικανική στρατιωτική βάση. Δικηγόροι από την αναστολή, μια νομική φιλανθρωπία που αντιπροσωπεύει διάφορους κρατουμένους σε Guant; ο κόλπος namo, συμπεριλαμβανομένων διάφορων πρώην βρετανικών κατοίκων, καλεί την επιτροπή για να εξετάσει τους βρετανικούς ανώτερους υπαλλήλους των ΗΠΑ και για τους ισχυρισμούς. Σύμφωνα με την υποβολή της οργάνωσης στην επιτροπή, η βρετανική κυβέρνηση είναι «ενδεχομένως συστηματικά complicit στα σοβαρότερα εγκλήματα ενάντια στην ανθρωπότητα της εξαφάνισης, των βασανιστηρίων και της παρατεταμένης σε απομόνωση κράτησης». Το Clive Stafford Smith, ο νομικός διευθυντής της φιλανθρωπίας, είπε ότι ήταν «απολύτως και κατηγορηματικά σίγουρος» ότι οι φυλακισμένοι έχουν κρατηθεί στο νησί. «Εάν η επιτροπή εξωτερικών υποθέσεων πλησιάσει αυτό λεπτομερώς, θα φτάσουν στο κατώτατο σημείο από το,» είπε. Ο Andrew Tyrie, Tory ο βουλευτής για το Τσίτσεστερ και ένας πραγματοποιών εκστρατεία ενάντια στη χρήση της CIA της κράτησης χωρίς δοκιμή, έχουν πιέσει επίσης την επιτροπή για να ερευνήσουν. Είπε: «Κατ' επανάληψη η βρετανική κυβέρνηση έχει στηριχθεί στις αμερικανικές διαβεβαιώσεις σε αυτό το ζήτημα, που αρνείται να εξετάσει την αλήθεια αυτών των ισχυρισμών για τους. Είναι υψηλός χρόνος η κυβέρνησή που μας πήρε το κεφάλι της από την άμμο και εξέτασε αυτούς τους ισχυρισμούς.» Ίδια απάντηση Ένα μέλος της επιτροπής εξωτερικών υποθέσεων είπε ότι η επιτροπή θα ακολουθούσε τους ισχυρισμούς ως τμήμα της έρευνάς της στα υπερπόντια εδάφη της Μεγάλης Βρετανίας. Αν και ο Diego Garcia είναι τμήμα του βρετανικού εδάφους Ινδικού Ωκεανού, είναι ασαφές εάν η βρετανική κυβέρνηση ξέρει εάν η CIA έχει θέσει υπό κράτηση τους φυλακισμένους εκεί ή όχι. UK officials are known to have questioned their American counterparts about the allegation several times over a period of more than three years, most recently last month. Whenever MPs have attempted to press ministers in the Commons, they have met with the same response: that the US authorities “have repeatedly given us assurances” that no terrorism suspects have been held there. The existence of the CIA’s black site prisons was acknowledged by President George Bush in September last year. He said al-Qaida suspects or members of the Taliban who “withhold information that could save American lives” have been taken “to an environment where they can be held secretly, questioned by experts”. Mr Bush did not disclose the location of any prison, but suspicion that one may have been located on Diego Garcia, some 1,000 miles off Sri Lanka’s southern coast, has been building for years. The 2,000 islanders were expelled in the early 1970s after the British government struck a secret deal to lease the 37-mile long island to the US for use as an air and naval base. Any evidence uncovered by the foreign affairs committee pointing to the existence of a secret CIA prison on the island would be hugely embarrassing for ministers. Barry McCaffrey, a retired four-star US general who is professor of international security studies at the West Point military academy, has twice spoken publicly about the use of Diego Garcia to detain suspects. In May 2004 he said: “We’re probably holding around 3,000 people, you know, Bagram air field, Diego Garcia, Guant?namo, 16 camps throughout Iraq.” In December last year he repeated the claim: “They’re behind bars…we’ve got them on Diego Garcia, in Bagram air field, in Guant?namo.” MPs on the committee may inquire into a Gulfstream executive jet which has been linked by its registration number to several CIA prisoner operations - known as extraordinary renditions - and which flew from Washington to Diego Garcia, via Athens, on September 11 2002, soon after the capture of Ramzi Binalshibh, a suspected planner of the September 11 attacks the previous year. A prison of some sort is known to exist on Diego Garcia: in 1984, a review by the US government’s general accounting office of construction work on the island reported that a “detention facility” had been completed the previous December. British ministers have also disclosed that a building on the island was redesignated as a prison after the September 11 attacks. ‘Confirmation’ Last June Dick Marty, a Swiss senator who investigated the CIA’s use of European territory and air space during prisoner operations, concluded in a report to the Council of Europe that prisoners had been held on the island. Mr Marty, who later told the European parliament that he had received help from senior CIA officers, reported: “We have received concurring confirmations that United States agencies have used Diego Garcia, which is the international legal responsibility of the UK, in the ‘processing’ of high-value detainees.” One possibility which the foreign affairs committee may explore is that suspects have been held on a prison ship off the coast of Diego Garcia. The UN special rapporteur on torture, Manfred Nowak, has said that he has heard from reliable sources that the US has held prisoners on ships in the Indian Ocean. There have also been second-hand accounts from detainees at Guant?namo of prisoners being held on US naval vessels. One detainee told a researcher from Reprieve: “One of my fellow prisoners in Guant?namo was at sea on an American ship with about 50 others before coming to Guant?namo. He told me that there were about 50 other people on the ship; they were all closed off in the bottom. The people detained on the ship were beaten even more severely than in Guant?namo.” At a glance ? Diego Garcia is a 37-mile-long coral island surrounding a lagoon in the Indian Ocean, the largest such atoll in the Chagos archipelago. Discovered by the Portuguese in the 16th century, it remained uninhabited until French coconut planters shipped in slave labour 200 years later. ? Ceded to Britain after the Napoleonic wars, the archipelago was a dependency of Mauritius until 1965, when it was detached, later becoming the British Indian Ocean Territories, sovereign British territory. ? Over the next eight years the 2,000 inhabitants were forcibly removed, first to the Seychelles and then to Mauritius, where many remain economically marginalised. The atoll was leased to the US military and it later emerged that Washington made a series of secret payments, including a reported ?14m discount on the Polaris nuclear missile system. ? A 50-strong group of UK military personnel act as customs officers, police and wildlife guardians, and their commanding officer is coroner. But this group is dwarfed by around 3,200 Americans. ? The Chagos islanders won a battle in their campaign to return when the appeal court ruled last May that the right to go home was “one of the most fundamental liberties known to human beings”. ? This article was amended on Friday October 19 2007. Have Your Say: Claims of secret CIA jail for terror suspects on British island to be investigated Please read our posting guidelines before posting. Alternatively you can discuss this report here. 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