[News] Renditions - Secret CIA flight plans reveal how European authorities were duped
Anti-Imperialist News
news at freedomarchives.org
Wed Oct 12 10:55:14 EDT 2011
Secret CIA flight plans reveal how European authorities were duped
New documents exposing well-disguised CIA flights
through Europe demonstrate the need for more
robust inquiries into EU states complicity in
the CIAs secret prisons programme, according to legal action charity Reprieve.
Data focusing on Lithuania, but linked to
suspected CIA activity in a raft of other
countries in Europe, North America, the Middle
East and North Africa, has been identified by
Reprieve investigators and passed to the Lithuanian prosecutor.
Reprieve is now calling on the Lithuanian
authorities to re-open their investigation into
CIA renditions and secret prisons on their own
soil, and to probe the newly-discovered web of
suspicious flight links to other countries.
The new documents show that:
* Lithuanias attempts to establish what the
CIA did in the country between 2004-06 have been
oddly unsuccessful, failing to identify key clues
to several potential rendition flights
* Two flights entered Lithuania from Morocco
and Bucharest known secret prison sites in
February 2005, around the time that High Value
Detainee Abu Zubaydah was transferred to a CIA black site in Lithuania
* A crucial plane identified by the previous
Lithuanian inquiry (registered as N787WH) tried
to disguise its true destination (Lithuania) by
filing a route plan to Gothenburg, Sweden
* Many other European countries now linked
to the CIAs rendition flight programme have
questions to answer, including Austria, Canada,
Germany, Iceland, Jordan, Portugal, Romania and the USA
In a letter to Lithuanias Deputy Prosecutor
General, Darius Rauluaitis, Reprieves Director,
Clive Stafford Smith said: Compelling new
information that has now come to light about the
landings of CIA-connected planes in Lithuania
makes a rigorous and wide-ranging investigation
all the more urgent. It is now clear that
previous efforts to chart the extent of the CIAs
rendition operations in Europe revealed ONLY the tip of the iceberg.
Lydia Medland of Access Info Europe said: Once
information about violations of human rights has
come to light through compliance with the
publics right to know, government have an
obligation both to act on this information and to
ensure that they release all other related documents.
ENDS
Notes to editors
1.
Documents<http://reprieve.us1.list-manage.com/track/click?u=d176b31fc0ccbde9f3f3a6349&id=03b59cf499&e=f8755a10f3>
recently released by
<http://reprieve.us1.list-manage.com/track/click?u=d176b31fc0ccbde9f3f3a6349&id=b663e57c73&e=f8755a10f3>Reprieve
show how US-based conglomerate, Computer Sciences
Corporation (CSC), contracted a Richmor Aviation
plane, N85VM, to perform renditions and other
government missions on behalf of the CIA between
2002 and 2005. Confidential documents in
possession of Reprieve show that the same
corporation contracted two other jets in February
2005 to fly into Lithuania from two other known
secret prison sites: Morocco and Bucharest. The
flight plans of each plane included multiple
stop-offs, and multiple possibilities for
disguising the true provenance and purpose of the
flights. The arrival of these planes in Lithuania
was confirmed by a freedom of information request
made jointly by Reprieve and Access Info Europe.
2. The planes flew into Lithuania within 24 hours
of each other in February 2005 significant
timing in the light of public source accounts
stating that high value detainee Abu Zubaydah
was moved from Morocco to Lithuania around this time.
3. Records collected by a previous Lithuanian
inquiry showed that a plane registered as N787WH
flew from Bucharest, Romania to Lithuania on 18
February 2005. Documents obtained by Reprieve and
the Helsinki Foundation for Human Rights show
that this plane disguised its true destination by
filing a route plan to Gothenburg, Sweden.
Furthermore, it has yet to be disclosed where
this plane stopped prior to Bucharest; in
particular, the question arises as to whether it
shared some of the same stop-off points as
N724CL, which landed in Lithuania en route from Morocco on the previous day.
4. Freedom of Information replies from
<http://reprieve.us1.list-manage.com/track/click?u=d176b31fc0ccbde9f3f3a6349&id=2de8f7d028&e=f8755a10f3>the
Lithuanian Civil Aviation Authority, showing the
landings of N724CL and N787WH in Lithuania;
<http://reprieve.us1.list-manage1.com/track/click?u=d176b31fc0ccbde9f3f3a6349&id=fe328ff31a&e=f8755a10f3>from
Vilnius Airport, confirming the landing of N724CL
in Vilnius; and
<http://reprieve.us1.list-manage.com/track/click?u=d176b31fc0ccbde9f3f3a6349&id=a2eac7ca84&e=f8755a10f3>from
the Polish civil aviation authority showing the
overflight permission for N787WH and its
disguised route plan (to Gothenburg) are available on Reprieve's website.
Reprieve logo
Reprieve
PO Box 52742
London EC4P 4WS
Tel: 020 7353 4640
Fax: 020 7353 4641
Website:
<http://reprieve.us1.list-manage.com/track/click?u=d176b31fc0ccbde9f3f3a6349&id=bdf31a5b4e&e=f8755a10f3>www.reprieve.org.uk
Reprieve is a charitable company limited by
guarantee; Registered Charity No. 1114900
Registered Company No. 5777831 (England)
Registered Office 2-6 Cannon Street London EC4M
6YH; Chair: Ken Macdonald QC; Patrons: Alan
Bennett, Julie Christie, Martha Lane Fox, Gordon
Roddick, Richard Rogers, Ruth Rogers, Jon Snow,
Marina Warner, Vivienne Westwood
Freedom Archives
522 Valencia Street
San Francisco, CA 94110
415 863-9977
www.Freedomarchives.org
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