UK government attempts to conceal its involvement in rendition and torture
By Robert Stevens
9 August 2014
The British government is seeking to cover up its role in the illegal “extraordinary rendition”—kidnappings and torture—programme run by the United States.
Ahead of the delayed release of a US Senate report on the Central Intelligence Agency’s (CIA) torture system ...
[...]
The war crimes carried out by British troops during the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan in which the UK was the main partner of the US, continue to come to light. Last week Reprieve cited the case of Yunus Rahmatullah, a Pakistani citizen who was captured by British forces in Iraq in February 2004 and subsequent rendered to Afghanistan later that year. He was held at the US-run prison at Bagram Airbase in Afghanistan for ten years without charge, trial, or access to a lawyer.
He was initially seized despite having no involvement with any of the fighting in Iraq and was only in the country in order to find work on real estate projects after the initial US invasion, resulting in the fall of the Saddam Hussein regime, had ended. According to Reprieve, UK troops raided a house where he was staying with friends, “blindfolded Yunus, punched and kicked him, and hit him with the butt of their rifles. He was thrown in the back of a military vehicle and driven to a camp. On the way, the vehicle stopped and Yunus was taken out. UK forces again violently assaulted him.”
Reprieve adds, “He was detained in Iraq at the now-notorious Camp Nama, where UK forces were also present, and possibly also in Abu Ghraib prison.” The US-run Abu Ghraib was the site of horrifying and systematic torture, abuse and murder of prisoners by US military personnel in Iraq.
http://www.wsws.org/en/articles/2014/08/09/rend-a09.html
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This is the tail end of the British trying to hide their collusion story (in WSWS above).
I thought this guy might deserve his own post.
Never having paid attention to what's going on beyond my own narrow range of interests, this stuff is new and mind-boggling to me.
How can someone be kidnapped and basically gaoled for a DECADE -- without charge -- or lawyer or trial?
Wikipedia on Rahmatullah - here.
Check this out:
... because he was captured in Iraq by British Forces the UK justice system had standing to rule on his detention
"a substantial case for saying that the UK government is under an
international legal obligation to demand the return of the applicant,
and the US government is bound to accede to such an request."
The Court of Appeal agreed Rahmatullah's detention was "unlawful" and
ordered Britain to pursue his release until January 18, 2012. [wikipedia]
