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British businesses participated in interviewing detainees on the United States holding facility Guantanamo Bay
The UK tolerated "inexcusable" therapy of US detainees after the 9/11 assaults, MPs have discovered.
The Intelligence and Security Committee stated British businesses continued to provide intelligence to allies regardless of realizing or suspecting abuse in additional than 200 instances.
Committee chairman Dominic Grieve stated businesses knew of incidents that have been "plainly unlawful".
The findings have sparked fresh requires an impartial, judge-led inquiry.
The two parliamentary reviews, revealed following a three-year investigation, look at how far Britain's intelligence businesses have been conscious of the mistreatment of terrorism suspects.
The ISC stated it was "beyond doubt" that the UK knew how the United States dealt with some detainees and rejected claims by intelligence businesses that the instances detailed have been not more than "isolated incidents".
But the committee discovered no "smoking gun" to recommend a coverage of intentionally overlooking such instances.
Lord Falconer, who served as Labour's lord chancellor on the time, informed the BBC that the UK authorities didn't act shortly sufficient after studying of British complicity in torture.
Prime Minister Theresa May stated British personnel labored in "a new and challenging operating environment" which some have been "not prepared" for.
She added "it took too long to recognise that guidance and training for staff was inadequate", and stated British intelligence and the Army have been "much better placed to meet that challenge".
'No questions requested'
Speaking to the BBC's World at One, committee chairman Dominic Grieve stated UK renditions have been organised to international locations "with very dubious human rights records, where it would have been very likely that the person would be in fact tortured or ill-treated".
He stated British brokers working within the United States reported issues about behaviour by their American colleagues, however there "was no response at the London end" and "no questions were asked" till 2004.
The reviews come a month after the UK authorities issued an unprecedented apology to Abdul Hakim Belhaj and his spouse, who say they have been kidnapped and brought to Libya after a tip-off from MI6.
Mr Belhaj, a Libyan dissident, was tortured and spent six years in jail.
Abdul Hakim Belhaj after the apology: "I hope that it is a new page in history"
Speaking on Thursday, Mr Belhaj's lawyer Sapna Malik stated there appeared to be a "real deference" to the United States.
"In a way, this report shows that that [Belhaj case] was not an individual, isolated case, there was a wider pattern of co-operation by the UK," she stated.
The report confirmed no proof of direct mistreatment by British intelligence businesses, however there have been 13 instances the place spies witness first-hand a detainee being mistreated by others, BBC safety correspondent Gordon Corera stated.
UK involvement in US rendition programme
- The UK participated in interviewing between 2,000 and three,000 US detainees after 2002
- British businesses recommended, deliberate or agreed to a rendition operation in 28 instances
- MI6 and MI5 provided to assist fund a rendition operation thrice
- The UK knew or suspected detainees have been abused in 232 instances
- In 198 instances British businesses obtained data from interrogations the place they knew detainees had been mistreated
- British personnel threatened detainees in 9 instances however there isn't a proof they carried out abuse
Former Foreign Secretary Jack Straw, who was chargeable for overseeing GCHQ and MI6 between 2001 and 2006, stated he was not conscious of the actions or method of the businesses, including: "Many lessons... have since been learnt".
Ken Clarke, who chairs the parliamentary group on extraordinary rendition, renewed requires an impartial inquiry into the UK's position, "to get to the full truth".
He stated the ISC report's findings have been "not small issues which can now be swept under the carpetand the government must address them urgently".
Speaking to BBC's Newsnight programme, Lord Falconer stated: "We took much too long as a country to work out what our red lines were."
He known as for the inquiry into UK complicity in torture abroad to be reopened.
Labour's shadow lawyer common, Baroness Chakrabarti, and human rights marketing campaign group Reprieve additionally known as for a judge-led inquiry, saying the ISC's report was too restricted.
Baroness Chakrabarti stated within the interval after 9/11 the United States was "dabbling in these most horrific practices andto some extentthe UK government went along for the ride".
The ISC launched its investigation after plans for the impartial judge-led Gibson Inquiry collapsed. It studied paperwork, interviewed former detainees and three ex-officials.
But the federal government denied the committee entry to officers who have been concerned on the time of the UK's involvement in rendition, the report says.
Did the ISC get to the entire reality?
Today's ISC reviews come six years after a judge-led inquiry was scrapped and court docket battles didn't unravel all allegations that the UK acquired its fingers soiled after 9/11.
But did the committee get to the entire reality?
By its personal account, most likely not, as a result of it was barred from talking to some key officersand it may possibly't solely set up whether or not all classes have been learnt.
Today, if a international company is understood to be torturing a detainee of curiosity to the British intelligence businesses, ministers should be knowledgeablethat's steerage that has been revealed.
These new guidelines are being consulted greater than 570 instances a 12 monthshowever the ISC would not know what number of of these instances are being flagged to ministers.
Secondly, the ISC was astonished there's nonetheless no coverage on whether or not and the way UK personnel may be concerned in rendition.
Ken Clarke was the justice secretary who scrapped the unique judge-led inquiry when new allegations of criminality took authorized precedence.
Today he is known as for a new inquiryand different critics have lengthy acknowledged that any various investigation won't ever uncover all of the wrongdoing.
British citizen Moazzam Begg, beforehand held in Guantanamo Bay, criticised the inquiry's scope as insufficient, saying "we still don't know the process of accountability".
Moazzam Begg: "I was hooded, shackled, and had a gun to my head"
Speaking about his personal detention, he stated British brokers "were there watching as I was hooded, shackled, with a gun to my head" and claimed they knew he had been led to consider his spouse was being tortured.
The ISC report stated in a single case, Ethiopia-born UK resident Binyam Mohamed was held in Pakistan in 2002and that MI5 and MI6 have been knowledgeable by US brokers he had been subjected to sleep deprivation.
The report stated MI5 didn't act on that data earlier than its personal officer arrived to interview Mr Mohamed.
The United States then secretly moved Mr Mohamed to Morocco, the place he was tortured. MI5 requested its American allies what was occurring to himhowever was rebuffed.
Despite this, the ISC report says, the businesses gave inquiries to the United States to be put to him. Mr Mohamed was later returned to the UK.
What is rendition?
Rendering or rendition includes sending a particular person from one nation to a different for imprisonment and interrogation, most likely by strategies similar to torture, that might be unlawful within the nation doing the rendering.
US intelligence businesses used the method of "extraordinary rendition" to ship terror suspects for interrogation by safety officers in different international locations, the place they don't have any authorized safety or rights beneath American regulation.