Further letter to the Chairman of the
Committee from Andrew Tyrie MP, Chairman, All-Party Parliamentary
Group on Extraordinary Rendition
FOREIGN AFFAIRS COMMITTEE INQUIRY INTO THE
OVERSEAS TERRITORIES: DIEGO
GARCIA
1. I wrote to you on 15 October 2007 about
Extraordinary Rendition, requesting that the Foreign Affairs Committee
examine the repeated allegations that Diego Garcia had been used
by the US administration in its rendition programme. These allegations
included "concurring confirmations" established by the
Council of Europe[264];
statements by members and former members of the US administration[265];
and a flight log depicting the arrival on Diego Garcia of a plane
thought to have taken part in rendition flights, N379P.[266]
2. Last week the Foreign Secretary confirmed
some of these allegations. He stated that recent US investigations
had revealed two occasions in 2002 when Diego Garcia had been
used for rendition flights. I strongly agree with your response
to him in the House of Commons that the Bush administration had
"clearly misled or lied to our Government",[267]
and that this in turn led the Foreign Secretary to mislead the
Foreign Affairs Committee and the House. I also agree that this
is a "most serious matter".[268]
THE ROLE
OF THE
FOREIGN AFFAIRS
COMMITTEE
3. Your Committee can now play a major role
in getting to the truth on extraordinary rendition. I recognise
the difficulties your Committee has previously faced in its attempts
to investigate rendition and possible UK involvement. In the Committee's
Sixth Report of 2004-05 you highlighted the government's "policy
of obfuscation",[269]
and stated that:
"We conclude that the Government has failed
to deal with questions about extraordinary rendition with the
transparency and accountability required on so serious an issue".[270]
4. Nonetheless, your Committee has made
a number of important findings and recommendations in past investigations.
In the Committee's Fourth Report of 2005-06 you said:
"We conclude that there has been a lot of
speculation about the possible use of rendition to countries where
torture can take place, so called "Black Sites" and
the complicity of the British Government, all of which would be
very serious matters, but that there has been no hard evidence
of the truth of any of these allegations".[271]
Some such evidence has now been provided by
the US administration, and set out in the Foreign Secretary's
Statement of 21 February 2008.
SUGGESTED ACTION
BY THE
FOREIGN AFFAIRS
COMMITTEE
5. In the light of this I am asking your
Committee to bring greater transparency to the issue of rendition,
and reassurance to the public on it, in a number of specific ways:
(a) We need a search of US files to be undertaken
for a large number of flights. The search that discovered the
two flights mentioned by the Foreign Secretary was carried out
only in relation to Diego Garcia.[272]
If, as Legal Advisor to the Secretary of State John Bellinger
puts it, "a new and even more exhaustive search" is
the only way to obtain accurate information sufficient to establish
whether or not US rendition flights have gone through UK airports
or airspace, then the UK should request that a similar search
be carried out with respect to all suspected US rendition flights
through UK territory since 11 September 2001. On the basis of
the Foreign Secretary's Statement, he appears to have agreed to
request this of the US. This search should include flights through
UK airspace of planes alleged to have been on the way to or from
carrying out a rendition, and not limited to those carrying detainees
at the time of their transit through UK airspace. Specific flights
that may need to be investigated include, but are not limited
to:
(i) the 73 flights named by Alistair Darling
in an Answer to a Question by Michael Moore MP on 17 March 2006;[273]
(ii) the four `ghost flights' referred to
in the Intelligence and Security Committee Report into Rendition;[274]
(iii) the flights cited in the Reprieve report
"Enforced Disappearance, Illegal Interstate Transfer, and
Other Human Rights Abuses Involving the UK Overseas Territories";
and[275]
(iv) the 170 CIA flights highlighted by the
Temporary Committee of the European Parliament's Final Report.[276]
I hope that your Committee will feel able to
request that the Foreign Secretary ask for a search of US records
to be undertaken for the above flights.
(b) We need more information relating to
the fate of the two individuals rendered through Diego Garcia.
US assurances that neither of the detainees were tortured or held
in secret detention are insufficient. As you know, the UK and
the US have different interpretations of their obligations under
the Convention Against Torture.[277]
In 2002 the US Deputy Assistant Attorney General stated that to
constitute torture, the following test had to be met: "[w]here
the pain is physical, it must be of an intensity akin to that
which accompanies serious physical injury such as death or organ
failure".[278]
The Foreign Affairs Committee could elicit more detail about the
two specific rendition flights and the individuals transported.
This can include:
(i) the countries in which they were held
and interrogated;
(ii) the interrogation methods used;
(iii) what permissions were sought by the
US administration from the UK government regarding these two renditions;
and
(iv) the plans of the US administration for
the detainee who was flown to Guantanamo, including whether he
will face a Military Commission, and if so, whether he will face
the death penalty.
(c) The checking mechanisms currently in
place need improvement. The Foreign Secretary's Statement confirmed
the concerns that many organisations, including the Intelligence
and Security Committee, have expressed about the UK government's
policy of reliance on US assurances. You might want to examine
what more detailed checking mechanisms or procedures could be
introduced to ensure that the UK fulfils its legal obligations,
or whether the measures outlined by the Foreign Secretary, including
providing a list of flights to the US administration for checking,
will be sufficient for this and any future cases.
(d) We need more information about the role
of Diego Garcia. The Committee is now well placed to use its investigative
powers to try and establish the full extent of the involvement
of Diego Garcia in the US rendition programme, in the course of
its inquiry into the Overseas Territories. Questions that could
be addressed include:
(i) what prompted the US administration to
re-examine its records in relation to Diego Garcia;
(ii) what specific legal obligations were
breached by the UK in relation to the two rendition flights of
January and September 2002 which refuelled at Diego Garcia;
(iii) whether other rendition flights have
refuelled at Diego Garcia;
(iv) whether allegations that detainees have
in the past been held on or in the vicinity of Diego Garcia are
accurate; and[279]
(v) what, if any, legal and/or procedural
safeguards need to be introduced in order to ensure that the UK
adheres to its international obligations relating specifically
to Diego Garcia and other dependent territories.
(e) Your Committee may wish to consider contacting
the Foreign Relations Committees in the US Senate and House of
Representatives in order to ensure that a thorough job is done
by the US administration in examining their records.
I am placing this letter in the public domain.
27 February 2008
http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=6582948.
http://www.publications.parliament.uk/pa/cm200405/cmselect/cmfaff/36/3607.htm#a14,
para 98.
http://www.publications.parliament.uk/pa/cm200506/cmselect/cmfaff/573/57305.htm#a5,
para 58.
http://www.state.gov/r/pa/prs/dpb/2008/feb/101214.htm
http://www.cabinetoffice.gov.uk/intelligence/
www.europarl.europa.eu/sides/getDoc.do?type=REPORT&reference=A6-2007-0020&language=EN&mode=XML
http://www.humanrightsfirst.org/us_law/etn/gonzales/memos_dir/memo_20020801_JD_%20Gonz_.pdf
264 Council of Europe Committee on Legal Affairs and
Human Rights, "Secret detentions and illegal transfers
of detainees involving Council of Europe member states: second
report", 7 June 2007, para 70.http://assembly.coe.int/CommitteeDocs/2007/Emarty_20070608_NoEmbargo.pdf Back
265
http://web.amnesty.org/library/index/engamr511772005; http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/4924989; Back
266
Source: Reprieve flight logs. Back
267
http://www.publications.parliament.uk/pa/cm200708/cmhansrd/cm080221/debtext/80221-0008.htm08022198000007 Back
268
Ibid. Back
269
Foreign Affairs Committee Sixth Report 2004--05, Back
270
Ibid. Back
271
Foreign Affairs Committee Fourth Report 2005-06, Back
272
Daily Press Briefing, US Department of State, 21 February 2008, Back
273
http://www.publications.parliament.uk/pa/cm200506/cmhansrd/vo060317/text/60317w02.htm60317w02.html_sbhd2 Back
274
Intelligence and Security Committee Report into Rendition, 25
July 2007, Para 187, Back
275
http://www.extraordinaryrendition.org/component/option,com_docman/task,cat_view/gid,30/Itemid,27/ Back
276
Temporary Committee on the alleged use of European countries by
the CIA for the transportation and illegal detention of prisoners,
Report on the alleged use of European countries by the CIA for
the transportation and illegal detention of prisoners (2006/2200(INI)),
30 January 2007, para 78, Back
277
Department of Defense Memo, 11 October 2002, http://www.defenselink.mil/news/Jun2004/d20040622doc3.pdf Back
278
Memo from Deputy Assistant Attorney General John Yoo to the White
House Counsel, 1 August 2002, Back
279
Reprieve, "Enforced Disappearance, Illegal Interstate Transfer,
and Other Human Rights Abuses Involving the UK Overseas Territories",
www.reprieve.org.uk Back
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