Euro Parl dismisses cynical FF whitewash attempt on CIA flights

international | anti-war / imperialism | press release Wednesday February 14, 2007 14:51 by PdeR - labour

In today's marathon vote on the Parliament's inquiry into CIA renditions and secret detention centres in Europe, all the Fianna Fail/UEN amendments were defeated.

Fianna Fail amendment No. 38 which sought to create the fiction that the problem is an outdated Chicago Convention, when in fact the problem is that Ireland has failed to implement article 3 of that Convention in defence of sovereignty, was defeated by a 90% vote against. Indeed both Spain and Portugal have recently introduced new inspection regulations to deal with this scandal in their jurisdictions.

The European Parliament accepted de Rossa's proposal to call on all Member States to ban or implement an inspection regime of CIA flights.

Fianna Fail made strenuous efforts to remove key facts and criticisms from the report relating to Ireland and the other EU states which are known to have colluded with the illegal CIA rendition programme. The report now also includes a new criticism of the UK Secretary of State Margaret Becket who has admitted the UK knew of the illegal rendition programme and secret detention centres before President Bush had made his public admission.

The report maintains its statement of serious concern regarding the 147 landings at Irish airports, of CIA operated planes, and names the 9 men, which were established to have been illegally detained, and transferred for torture to third countries, on planes which have landed in Ireland.

Meanwhile Joe Costello TD (Dublin Central) commented, "The committee hearings that led to this report clearly established that the Irish Government was complicit in the US war effort in Iraq. They totally failed to conduct random searches of these flights, which were subsequently used for the purpose of transferring prisoners for torture. Following the European Parliament vote, the Government has little option but to establish a Dail investigation that could be undertaken by the European Affairs Committee. The public has a right to know what their airports are being used for, the extent of the Government's knowledge of what has been going on, and if they ever either opposed or acquiesced to US demands