Blair defiant on terror tactics

UPI
Feb. 25, 2006

The British government is under increasing pressure over tactics used in the fight against terrorism. A series of reports have raised questions over its role in the U.S. practice of rendition and policies relating to terror suspects.

Prime Minister Tony Blair went on the defensive at his monthly press conference Thursday, accusing critics of Britain`s human rights record of having 'the world the wrong way round.'

His defiance came in the face of widespread protests over his support for U.S. rendition flights, his failure to call openly for the closure of Guantanamo Bay and other measures against terrorism suspects and extremists which human rights group say flout international law.

A damning report published Thursday by the parliamentary Foreign Affairs Committee condemned ministers for failing in their duty to investigate allegations that U.S. rendition flights passed through British airspace. The flights are suspected of carrying terror suspects to countries for interrogation using torture. Washington acknowledges the practice of rendition but claims it is conducted entirely in accordance with international law.

The government has consistently resisted calls for a full investigation into the allegations, insisting there is no evidence of any illegal activity.

Earlier this week, however, the National Air Traffic Service reported that around 200 CIA flights had passed through Britain`s commercial airspace and airports since 2001. Further flights may have used airspace and bases controlled by the Ministry of Defense, it said.

But Blair dismissed the report, saying: 'Again there is talk about these 200 flights. There is no evidence that I know of that any of these 200 flights have been used for rendition.'

Britain had an arrangement with the United States that it had to seek permission to use British territory for prisoner transfers, he said. Ministers had already disclosed to Parliament that permission had been sought on four occasions, all under the Clinton administration, and granted only twice, he added.

However that assertion, made in testimony by Foreign Secretary Jack Straw to the Foreign Affairs Committee, has already been called into question. A government memo written by an official in Straw`s office days before his committee appearance suggested ministers knew there may have been more such rendition requests.

The document, leaked to the New Statesman magazine in January, states: 'The papers we have unearthed so far suggest there could be more such cases... We cannot say that we have received no such request for the use of U.K. territory.'

It also suggested that the government was aware that rendition was rarely legal. Foreign Office lawyers had advised that the practice 'is almost certainly illegal' and any British co-operation 'would also be illegal,' it said, before going on to question whether the U.S. definition of torture was consistent with that under international law.

The foreign secretary has now been recalled to the Foreign Affairs Committee, which said there were 'serious concerns' over the rendition allegations. Ministers had a duty to investigate the claims and to 'make clear to the USA that any extraordinary renditions to states where suspects may be tortured is completely unacceptable,' its report stated.

Committee Chairman Mike Gapes said: 'The bottom line is that we have not had the full story, the full facts.

'My select committee has been pursuing this for some time and gradually, bit by bit, we get more and more pieces of the jigsaw but we haven`t got the whole picture yet.'

The FAC report also criticized ministers for failing to 'make loud and public (their) objection' to the existence of the U.S. detention camp at Guantanamo Bay, which diminished the moral authority of the United States and hindered the struggle against terrorism.

It also condemned government attempts to export terror suspects and extremists to countries known to practice torture, by obtaining 'memoranda of understanding' from recipient nations that returned individuals would not be mistreated. Such memoranda were legally 'questionable' and must not be used as 'a fig leaf to disguise the real risk of torture,' it said. There were also 'serious concerns' that monitoring to ensure deportees were not mistreated after their return would be inadequate, the report added.

But Blair said: 'I think we have got the world the wrong way round. You cannot have a situation where we are expected to keep people in this country without any limit at all, irrespective of the disharmony, disunity and, in some cases, acts of violence that they are inciting.'

He added: 'I totally understand the issues raised in respect of Guantanamo but the reports of the Foreign Affairs Committee and Amnesty International are far broader and were talking about deportation cases here. I think we have the whole thing upside down. I do not see why we should not be able to deport people from this country, who are not nationals, who have come to this country just to cause trouble.'

Asked why he had failed to openly call for the closure of Guantanamo Bay like many of his parliamentarians and one of his ministers, Peter Hain, Blair reiterated his view that the camp was 'an anomaly' but added: 'I also think it is important we never forget the context in which this has happened: the war in Afghanistan and the reason for that; the slaughter of 3,000 innocent people on Sept. 11.'