Posted Friday 27 June 2014
Rendition involves terror suspects being transported from around the globe to secret locations for enhanced interrogation.
It has emerged that Scottish detectives are investigating the 2003 stopover after the alleged September 11 mastermind Khalid Sheikh Mohammed was taken to Poland. They are also probing five other cases which researchers say were part of CIA 'rendition circuits', where terror suspects are moved illegally between secret detention and torture sites.
"The ongoing police investigation needs to leave no stone unturned, so that it gets to the bottom of Scottish involvement in these crimes," Dr Sam Raphael from The Rendition Project, backed by Kingston University, which uncovered the evidence, explained. "We have demonstrated conclusively that CIA aircraft landed at Scottish airports hundreds of times between 2001 and 2006, when the Agency was operating its global system of rendition, secret detention and torture."
The Rendition Project is led by Dr Raphael, a senior lecturer in international relations at Kingston and Dr Ruth Blakeley, reader in international relations at the University of Kent. The database includes profiles of the aircraft used to move detainees from site to site, as well as more than 50 companies involved in operating these aircraft. It is the result of three years of work, funded through the Economic and Social Research Council. Much of the information was obtained through Freedom of Information legislation and the associated website is designed to become a clearing house for the details released through these efforts.
Scotland's Prosecution Service the Crown Office said it would be inappropriate to comment on a live investigation, while Police Scotland confirmed inquiries into the matter were ongoing.
26 November 2024
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12 November 2024