Marty CIA report: governments showing no honour among thieves?

11.10.06am UTC (GMT +0000) Tue 24th Jan 2006

Council of Europe investigator Dick Marty has published his preliminary report into CIA extraordinary rendition and torture allegations.

He notes the proved cases of European territory being involved in abductions, transport and delivery to torturing countries, with hundreds of CIA-chartered flights and likely rendition of over 100 people through Europe. He finds it 'highly unlikely that European governments, or at least their intelligence services, were unaware' of this. Furthermore, he finds 'indications from various sources which must be considered reliable', even though no formal irrefutable evidence, about secret detention centres in European countries.

ALDE group nominee for 1st vice-president of the European Parliament investigation committee Baroness Sarah Ludford MEP said:

"Dick Marty's important findings put an onus on our governments to come clean: EU membership imposes a positive obligation on Member States to uphold human rights and turning a blind eye will not do."

"He has been impeded by the refusal of governments like Poland, Italy and Switzerland to fully share information with him, while in the UK there was an official policy to 'avoid getting drawn into detail'. The delay in supply of Eurocontrol and European Satellite Centre data is a bad omen. MPs, MEPs and public opinion across Europe must turn up the heat in order to get the truth."

"Dick Marty is particularly intrigued that media interest only exploded last November after revelations from 'probably well-informed official sources' in Washington. The possibility that these were a 'stop being hypocritical' warning from the Bush administration to its European allies would indicate that there is no honour among thieves."