Against Torture Flights
An Open Letter to Cecile Shea, Principal Officer at the US Consulate-General in Edinburgh has been provoked after comments she made about protests against American forces using Scottish airports for torture flights as part of the policy of Extraordinary Rendition.
The letter coordinated by Edinburgh Stop The War Coalition & Scotland Against Criminalising Communities states..."We, the undersigned, are writing to you to express our horror at the US government’s practice of “extraordinary rendition”, and at the apparent use of Scottish airports and Scottish airspace by US aircraft involved in this process.
We are dismayed at the public statements you have made on this matter, and in particular at your response to the protests held at Scottish airports on 18 December 2005. You told the Scotsman (19 December) that British officials would not be “allowed” on to US aircraft to check them. We remind you that Britain is a sovereign nation and that it is hardly up to you to rule on who will be allowed onto aircraft parked on Scottish tarmac. We think your remarks amount to an abuse of your position as a diplomat and we look forward to hearing a public apology from you.
You say that there is no “factual basis” for the allegations against the US administration. So let us remind you of just a small part of the growing body of facts:
• Condoleezza Rice and Colin Powell have made it crystal clear that the US uses “extraordinary rendition”
• “Extraordinary rendition” involves sending prisoners overseas for interrogation in countries that are known internationally for practising torture. The British government accepts that many of these countries practise torture. British law prevents people being deported to such countries if they are at risk of being picked up by police there and tortured.
• Conditions and interrogation methods at Guantanamo Bay do not meet international human rights standards, as interpreted by Britain and many other democratic countries. A British High Court judge acknowledged this last year when he said that he would have had no hesitation in quashing the extradition of Babar Ahmad to the US, had there been any risk of Babar Ahmad being sent to Guantanamo Bay. So when we hear that people are being taken out of US jurisdiction so that they can be interrogated more “robustly” than would be possible even at Guantanamo Bay, we can be certain that torture is intended.
We wish to make it clear that the US isn’t the only country that we suspect of involvement in the international crime of torture. It is abundantly clear the British government is complicit in “extraordinary rendition” and in other instances of torture, as has been demonstrated by the testimony of the Pakistani men recently detained in Greece, and by the testimony of Craig Murray, the former British ambassador to Uzbekistan.
Signatures will be collected in Edinburgh on Saturday, then the letter will be delivered the to the consulate in Edinburgh on Monday morning (16 Jan) and also an attempt to try to deliver it to Colin Powell in Glasgow later in the day.
Powell will be at the Jewish National Fund Dinner Charitable Trust at the Hilton Hotel (Glasgow) on 16th January. Powell has tried to cultivate an image as the moderate face of the Pentagon hawks. Yet his record over decades, first in Vietnam and then in lying to the UN about the case for war with Iraq is appalling.
Join the demonstration which starts at 5pm at the Hilton (1 William Street Glasgow G3 8HT). This will go on until about 6.30 so please come along whenever you can, bringing flags and banners.
Send your support for this letter by email to: richard.rh@tiscali.co.uk
While we're on topic here's a first hand account of some great work by US soldiers in Iraq.
2 comments
"The powerful have invoked God at their side in this war, so that we
will accept their power and our weakness as something that has been
established by divine plan. But there is no god behind this war other than
the god of money, nor any right other than the desire for death and destruction. Today there is a "NO" which shall weaken the powerful and
strengthen the weak: the "NO" to war."
- Subcomandante Marcos
left by Geo on 12 January 2006
See here for Straw getting it in the neck:
http://www.theherald.co.uk/politics/54076-print.shtml
left by Dave on 12 January 2006
