Democratic Accountability: A Tale of Two Countries
Oct 18th, 2009 | 10 responses
Glenn Greenwald tells us about an important turn of events in a lawsuit filed by Binyam Mohamed, a former Guantanamo detainee (emphasis is in original):
There is a vital development — a new ruling from the British High Court — in a story about which I’ve written many times before: the extraordinary joint British/U.S. effort to cover up the brutal torture which Binyam Mohamed suffered at the hands of the CIA while in Pakistan and while he was “rendered” by the U.S. to various countries. While Mohamed, a British resident, was in American custody, the CIA told British intelligence agents exactly what was done to him, and those British agents recorded what they were told in various memos. Last year, the British High Court ruled that Mohamed — who was then at Guantanamo — had the right to obtain those documents from the British intelligence service in order to prove that statements he made to the CIA were the by-product of coercion.
The High Court’s original ruling in Mohamed’s favor contained seven paragraphs which described the torture to which Mohamed was subjected. It has been previously reported that those paragraphs contain descriptions of abuse so brutal that not even our own American media could dispute that it constitutes “torture”:
The 25 lines edited out of the court papers contained details of how Mr Mohamed’s genitals were sliced with a scalpel and other torture methods so extreme that waterboarding, the controversial technique of simulated drowning, “is very far down the list of things they did,” the official said.
But before the decision was released, the Court decided to redact those seven paragraphs. And in February, 2009, it issued a new ruling explaining its reason to conceal those paragraphs: the Bush administration had issued what the Court called a “threat” that the U.S. would reduce or even eliminate intelligence-sharing with the British if those paragraphs were made public.
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In that February ruling, the High Court issued an angry denunciation of the U.S. for issuing these threats, but nonetheless concluded that the danger to British citizens compelled the Court to keep those paragraphs concealed[.]
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Throughout 2009, Mohamed’s lawyers, as well as various international newspapers, repeatedly petitioned the British High Court to re-visit its decision on the ground that the Obama administration had replaced the Bush administration, and surely the anti-torture Obama would never embrace or maintain the same threat. But, obviously in conjunction with British officials, the Obama administration took numerous steps to convey to the British High Court that they were indeed re-iterating the same Bush threats[.] …
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Until yesterday, all of that caused the British High Court to continue to conceal those paragraphs based on the insistence from the British Foreign Minister that the Obama administration was re-iterating the same threats made by the Bush administration. Yesterday, in a 38-page decision (.pdf), the Court reversed itself, and ruled that these paragraphs detailing Mohamed’s torture should be publicly disclosed. It did so by making clear that, in essence, it simply did not believe that the U.S. would meaningfully reduce intelligence sharing; understood the Obama statements to be made at the request of British officials as a meaning of justifying ongoing concealment; interpreted the Obama administration to say only that disclosure “could” lead to reductions in intelligence-sharing, not that it “would“; and, most of all, that there are vital public interests that outweigh the minimal risk that the U.S. would withhold evidence of a terrorist plot from Britain as punishment for disclosure[.]
[...]The Court, using [a] very revealing rationale, also rejected the British Government’s suggestion that it ought to leave the decision to American courts:
As a result, the British High Court — pending the results of one final appeal — will release to the world those seven paragraphs, detailing what the CIA itself told British intelligence agents was done to Binyam Mohamed.
That famous dry British humor can be devastating.
10 Responses to “Democratic Accountability: A Tale of Two Countries”
Glenn's always got his shorts twisted in a bunch about something. Most Americans don't share his unhealthy interest in how mean we are to terrorists. The self-righteous crusade to protect terrorist rights creates a great deal of smoke, noise, and flashing lights but nothing of value under Bush or Obama. I can't help but wonder about the moral bankruptcy of those who would have us treat these murderous rogues with kid gloves. There may have been a few cases mishandled. So what? Next.
First you had to be crazy to believe that we would do anything that broke Geneva. Then you had to be crazy to believe that it wasn't just a few bad apples that were justly punished. Then yes, it might have been ordered from the top but you had to be crazy to believe that what was ordered was actually torture — despite the government referring to the exact same acts as torture for over 60 years. Now it doesn't matter because yeah there might have been a few* cases of extreme torture, but who cares they are terrorists**. And if you disagree you're a terrorist lover or at least not serious, also.
* Discounting the over one hundred people that have died in custody.
** Discounting that the majority of people in Gitmo were determined to not be terrorist threats, and numerous examples of foreign nationals being kidnapped and tortured that later turned out to be innocent. But hey no biggie.
They've mastered propaganda techniques beautifully and it's worked.
As to the comment regarding 'how mean we are to terrorists', I would say that your opinion is not shared with the majority of Americans who clearly do not believe that anyone should be tortured.
Secondly the issue with this revealing of intelligence from the US by the UK without permission.
Why won't the US give permission?
I mistakenly hit 'like' when I meant to hit 'reply'. Is there an 'unlike'?
@TT
How can anyone oppose the Obama Administration's stand on this matter? Obama got the Nobel Peace Prize, so obviously it is the correct one! Not only that, it's the same position as George W Bush took. Nobody is in favor of torture in the abstract; when faced with the reality of stopping a terrorist attack or saving lives, fewer people come down on the side of keeping themselves morally pure and allowing innocents to die. Those professing to assume this position in the abstract find it to be a self-congratulatory refuge from the world as it is. We should be glad that they are seldom allowed to be in positions of power outside of academia.
I shall always cherish your “like”, but don't worry. I won't tell anyone where it came from
I would not be so sure about that, there is obviously a large contingent of NeoCons and Republicans who have no issues with torture, there is obviously a large number of self-defined moderates who have no problem with it and there is the great unwashed who has not given it much thought but would not lose any great amount of sleep over it.
If Torture were put to a referendum, I am not sure that it would lose…
When we sacrifice our hono rby lying, concealing and covering up… when we sacrifice the Bill of Rights and allow our privacy to be invaded by the government and habeas coorpus to be conveniently dispensed with… when we sacrifice our humanity by engaging in barbaric acts of torture… when we sacrifice our integrity by threatening our friends and allies in order to hide our illegal conduct… the terrorists have already won and we have lost, if not our physical nation, our nation's soul.
fewer people come down on the side of … allowing innocents to die.
Turning a blind eye to torture would certainly prevent the deaths of innocents…by making them guilty.
@DaMav
I would think that the people that come down on the side of torture are the ones kidding themselves.
The reliability of the information would be continuously suspect and the damage that it would do to the people directly and indirectly participating in torture would not be worth any dubious information that could be gained. What happens when they pick up the wrong person at the airport and spirit them away to a foreign country to be tortured? oops, our mistake we'll just give you a lift home?
It sounds quite dramatic, hidden bomb will kill tens of thousands, clock is ticking, etc. but the reality is, as usual much more mundane. Excellent and reliable information has been gained using non-torture interrogation techniques. The sort of techniques where we get to be the good guys, the ones that *don't* do things like disappearing and torturing people.
Thank you for cherishing my 'like', even if it was a mistake.
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