CIA Global Renditions Exposed

Stephen Lendman
Activist Post

Extraordinary renditions include arbitrary abductions and extrajudicial transfers from one country to another. Targeted individuals are called terrorists.

Corroborating evidence isn’t needed. What Washington says goes. Rogue hegemons operate that way.

International, constitutional, and US statute laws don’t matter. They’re spurned. Victims are guilty by accusation. It’s official US policy.

Before leaving office in January 1993, a classified GHW Bush National Security Directive (NSD 77) established the rendition process.

Bill Clinton’s June 1995 Presidential Directive (PDD 39) authorized “all legal means available to exclude from the United States persons who pose a terrorist threat and deport or otherwise remove from the United States any such aliens.”

Post-9/11, GW Bush authorized “war on terror” abductions and renditions. He did so to CIA and Pentagon-run torture prisons. A global network was established. It exists in numerous countries.

It includes US ships at sea. Special ones are staffed and equipped for that purpose. They’re out of sight and mind. Ghost prisoner survivors call them worst of all.

On May 22, The Rendition Project (TRP) announced its “Global Rendition System” database and interactive map.

It’s a collaborative UK-based University of Kent Dr. Ruth Blakeley/Kingston University Dr. Sam Raphael research project.

Its purpose is to provide “a detailed analysis of its component parts and a clearer understanding of how they fit together.”

Focus is on tracking global CIA flights. They’re used to transfer detainees “between secret prisons for continued detention and torture.”

Washington’s post-9/11 “war on terror” launched it. Extrajudicial detention was authorized. So were lawless renditions and torture.

Overall, this system has involved the detention and torture, in secret, of hundreds of detainees, in scores of detention sites around the world. 

Renditions between detention sites in a range of countries have been carried out using a variety of aircraft supplied by private contractors, and states allied to the US (including several European states) have been actively involved, or passively complicit, in the crimes committed.

Blakeley and Raphael work closely with Reprieve. It “delivers justice and saves lives, from death row to Guantanamo Bay.”

It uses law to enforce human rights. It does so for prisoners. It investigates, litigates, educates, and “work(s) on the frontline. (It) provide(s) legal support to prisoners unable to pay for it themselves.”

It promotes rule of law justice. It’s rarer than ever today. Western-sponsored state terror represents a heavy challenge. The Rendition Project (TRP) said Reprieve “led the way in investigating secret prisons and representing victims of rendition and torture.”

It’s also involved in discovering “where people were held, how they were treated, and who was responsible for the human rights abuses they suffered.”

Users can now search TRP’s Rendition Flights Database. Doing so lets them “access comprehensive analyses” of prisons and aircraft used. They can track detainee movements.

They can explore vital issues. They can understand more about rendition, secret detention, and torture. They can learn how they violate fundamental human rights law.

They can read firsthand victim accounts. A “huge repository of primary documents” is maintained. They include “government memos, court papers, flight data and past investigative reports.”

Evidence for each case is available. Reprieve’s web site highlighted TRP’s Global Rendition System project.

Data comes from FOIA requests, legal cases, firsthand accounts, NGO investigations, and authentic news reporting. Washington maintains a global “black site” network.

Thorough analysis deconstructs what’s going on. Information is provided on more than 11,000 flights by over 120 aircraft. They’re linked to more than 50 private companies.

Complicity of numerous countries is revealed. Companies tried covering their tracks. They filed false flight plans. They switched aircraft from point of origin to final destination.

They knew they acted lawlessly. They tried concealing it. The more known exposes them. It’s the first step to accountability. None so far exists.

Rendition/detention/torture co-conspirators remain free from prosecution. Sunshine is the best disinfectant. Justice is long overdue. Countless numbers of innocent victims still suffer. Many more will unless something’s done.

Anyone called a terrorist for any reason or none can be locked away in gulag hell. Most victims are innocent. Perhaps they all are. Due process and judicial fairness are denied. Guilt by accusation is policy.

What remains ongoing is appalling. Most everything exists out of sight and mind. Media scoundrels are largely silent. What they know isn’t disclosed. Occasional reports are sanitized. It’s standard practice.

According to Raphael:

The sheer scope of the CIA’s rendition and torture system is brought to light as never before by our work, which shows in painstaking detail how terror suspects were kidnapped and transported to secret prisons across the globe for ‘enhanced interrogation.’ 

Reprieve’s Crofton Black added:

This unprecedented database shows how false route filings, tarmac transfers, shell companies and the plausible deniability of executive jets masked a systematic programme of secret detention and torture run by the US with the active complicity of the UK and other European countries.

America’s war on terror continues. Waging it reveals its dark side. It’s lawless. There’s no end in sight. Ending it requires public outrage. Arousing it depends on exposing what’s too unconscionable to tolerate.

Not in our name means all of us. Everyone today is vulnerable. It’s no time for complacency. Fundamental freedoms are assaulted. They’re eroding and disappearing.

Regaining lost rights requires mass action. It won’t happen any other way. Today is the most perilous time in world history.

The time to fight for what’s right is now. Failure to do what’s vital endangers everyone. If that’s not incentive enough to act, what is?

Songwriter/satirist/lyricist Tom Lehrer once wrote “we’ll all go together when we go.” He meant possible nuclear annihilation. It remains an ominous threat. So does losing freedom. It’s dying in plain sight.

Stephen Lendman lives in Chicago and can be reached at [email protected]. His new book is titled How Wall Street Fleeces America: Privatized Banking, Government Collusion and Class War. Also visit his blog site at sjlendman.blogspot.com and listen to cutting-edge discussions with distinguished guests on the Progressive Radio News Hour on the Progressive Radio Network Thursdays at 10AM US Central time and Saturdays and Sundays at noon. All programs are archived for easy listening. http://www.progressiveradionetwork.com/the-progressive-news-hour/