CIA's EXTRAORDINARY RENDITION finally comes to the NY Times - sort of

Nothing Without Hope

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Wed Jun-01-05 02:35 AM
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CIA's EXTRAORDINARY RENDITION finally comes to the NY Times - sort of

Edited on Wed Jun-01-05 02:37 AM by Nothing Without Hope

This is an utterly chilling issue that, like the tortures and murders themselves, is about a vast, secret, and totally illegal but routine practice of the CIA. Targetted citizens are kidnapped, whisked away in "ghost planes" and taken to where they can be disappeared or tortured without overview by those pesky people who give a damn about human rights or international law. Information about this has come from interviews with ex-CIA agents and ex-prisoners, among others.

For earlier work including background and extensive links and documentation, see this earlier thread on extraordinary rendition, making sure to go through the whole thread as links continued to be added as it was updated and expanded:
http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=132x1740193

Although Stephen Grey has published prominent articles on this issue in places like the Sunday Times (UK) and had his findings broadcast in a BBC documentary (full transcript available - see links in my earlier DU thread on extraordinary rendition), his work is much less widely known in the US. This is, of course, a pattern that parallels that for all aspects of the torture and other criminal acts of the Bush Administration and suggests active suppression by the corporate media of facts embarrassing to the Bush Administration.

Stephen Grey is a respected UK investigative journalist who has been specializing in this subject area for some time. I have greatly regretted that his work was not widely known in this country, so imagine my surprise and delight to find a HUGE New York Times article on extraordiary rendition - FOUR web pages long PLUS multimedia coverage - in which he is a co-reporter. Upon reading the article, however, I found that there was no statement about the illegality of the practice and that it was framed as "fighting terrorism" and really rather glamorous. Secret flights, all those dangerous terra-ists, mysterious shell companies - hey, how about a movie deal?

I imagine Mr. Grey is not wholly pleased with what the NYT media machine made of his investigative reporting on extraordinary rendition. Note that this practice of kidmapping people and taking them to places where they can be interrogated under torture is not only TOTALLY ILLEGAL UNDER GENEVA CONVENTIONS but has been VEHEMENTLY DENIED by the Bush Administration. (I will get quotes and and links for this later.)

For shame, New York Times.

Here are excerpts from this NYT article on the criminal practice of extraordinary rendition. I've tried to select the paragraphs that are the LEAST full of glamorizing sensationalism. But you still get lines like "Aero's pilots are the discreet bus drivers of the battle against terrorism, routinely sent on secret missions to Baghdad, Cairo, Tashkent and Kabul" in the very first paragraph. Yeah, definitely an action hero movie script in there somewhere. Geneva conventions? How quaint.

http://nytimes.com/2005/05/31/national/31planes.html

C.I.A. Expanding Terror Battle Under Guise of Charter Flights

By SCOTT SHANE, STEPHEN GREY and MARGOT WILLIAMS
Published: May 31, 2005
(This article was reported by Scott Shane, Stephen Grey and Margot Williams and written by Mr. Shane.)

(snip)

Some of the C.I.A. planes have been used for carrying out renditions, the legal term for the agency's practice of seizing terrorism suspects in one foreign country and delivering them to be detained in another, including countries that routinely engage in torture. The resulting controversy has breached the secrecy of the agency's flights in the last two years, as plane-spotting hobbyists, activists and journalists in a dozen countries have tracked the mysterious planes' movements.

Inquiries From Abroad:
The authorities in Italy and Sweden have opened investigations into the C.I.A.'s alleged role in the seizure of suspects in those countries who were then flown to Egypt for interrogation. According to Dr. Georg Nolte, a law professor at the University of Munich, under international law, nations are obligated to investigate any substantiated human rights violations committed on their territory or using their airspace.

(snip)

Ferrying Terrorism Suspects
Aero's planes were sent to Fort Bragg to pick up Special Forces operatives for practice runs in the Uwharrie National Forest in North Carolina, dropping supplies or attempting emergency "exfiltrations" of agents, often at night, the former pilot said. He described flying with $50,000 in cash strapped to his legs to buy fuel and working under pseudonyms that changed from job to job.

He does not recall anyone using the word "rendition." "We used to call them 'snatches,' " he said, recalling half a dozen cases. Sometimes the goal was to take a suspect from one country to another. At other times, the C.I.A. team rescued allies, including five men believed to have been marked by Muammar el-Qaddafi, the Libyan leader, for assassination.

(snip)