MI5 and MI6 push for secret hearings in 'torture' case

[sabra]

Source: Daily Mail UK

Britain's spy agencies began a High Court bid yesterday to keep secret any evidence of their involvement in torture.

In an unprecedented move, MI5, MI6 and Ministers asked a judge to hear a case brought by seven former Guantanamo inmates behind closed doors.

It immediately brought accusations of a cover-up from lawyers acting for the ex-detainees, including Binyam Mohamed, who are suing the Government claiming they were abused by the CIA with the help of British intelligence.

The Government's attempt to construct secret hearings for the case was branded 'extreme and unprecedented' by the men's lawyers.



Read more: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1223391/Spy-agencies-launch-High-Court-bid-alleged-involvement-torture-secret.html

[JohnyCanuck]

1. I'll bet there's a whole bunch of skeletons the spooks would like to remain in the closet.

How a Torture Protest Killed a Career

We built up an overwhelming dossier of evidence, and I complained to London about the conduct of our ally in rather strong terms including the photos of the boy being boiled alive.

I received a reply from the British Foreign Office. It said, this is a direct quote, “Dear Ambassador, we are concerned that you are perhaps over-focused on human rights to the detriment of commercial interests.”

I was taken aback. I found that extraordinary. But things had gotten much worse because while we were gathering the information about torture, we were also learning what people were forced to confess to under torture.

People aren’t tortured for no reason. They’re tortured in order to extract some information or to get them to admit to things, and normally the reason you torture people is to get them to admit to things that aren’t actually true. They were having to confess to membership in al-Qaeda, to being at training camps in Afghanistan, personally meeting Osama bin Laden.

At the same time, we were receiving CIA intelligence. MI-6 and the CIA share all their intelligence. So I was getting all the CIA intelligence on Uzbekistan and it was saying that detainees had confessed to membership in al-Qaeda and being in training camps in Afghanistan and to meeting Osama bin Laden.

One way and another I was piecing together the fact that the CIA material came from the Uzbek torture sessions.


http://www.consortiumnews.com/2009/102409b.html