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Guantánamo Bay detainees to be paid compensation by UK government

The government will announce today that it will pay millions of pounds in compensation to former Guantánamo Bay detainees following weeks of negotiations between lawyers for the government and the former prisoners.

Ministers appear to have decided on the advice of the security services that they could not afford to risk the exposure of thousands of documents in open court on how the US, with the co-operation of the UK, undertook illegal acts such as extraordinary rendition to interrogate terrorist suspects, including some alleged to have links with the Afghan Taliban.

The high court, according to ITN, has been notified that a settlement had been reached between the lawyers, but the exact amounts may never be known. The government will announce simply that the payments are to be made and that it is in the national interest that the cases are not brought to court so as to protect the security services' methods from scrutiny.
The Guardian, Tuesday 16 November 2010

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Claims of state secrecy must not be used to shield governments and individuals from scrutiny for their involvement in serious human rights violations

In order to ensure that such abuses do not occur in the future, European governments must implement reforms for the civilian oversight of national intelligence and security agencies and of foreign intelligence agencies operating on their territories

Amnesty International has called on the EU - including EU countries like the United Kingdom - to deliver justice for the victims of the CIA's unlawful rendition and secret detention programmes.

Open Secret - Mounting evidence of Europe's complicity in rendition and secret detention

Published by Amnesty International Monday 15th November, download the full report here . . . .

Introduction:
We have to acknowledge that those past human rights abuses existed. And we can't go forward without looking backwards ...   US President Barack Obama in March 2010 responding to a television interviewer's question as to whether he is satisfied with military reform and the resolution of past human rights abuses in Indonesia!

So today I want to set out how we will deal with the problems of the past ... [T]here are questions over the degree to which British officers were working with foreign security services who were treating detainees in ways they should not have done. This has led to accusations that Britain may have been complicit in the mistreatment of detainees. The longer these questions remain unanswered, the bigger the stain on our reputation as a country that believes in freedom, fairness and human rights grows.  UK Prime Minister David Cameron in July 2010 announcing the establishment of an inquiry into allegations that the UK security services were complicit in the torture of UK nationals and residents detained overseas at Cuantanamo Bay or by foreign intelligence services in the aftermath of the 11 September 2001 attacks on the usN

The words of US President Barack Obama and UK Prime Minister David Cameron would seem to indicate a degree of common ground in relation to truth and accountability for past human rights abuses. After nearly a decade of widespread impunity and absence of remedy for human rights violations - including enforced disappearance and torture - that have occurred in the context of US-led counter-terrorism operations, however, the legal obligation to look back and ensure full accountability for such violations has been ignored by these governments for too long.

And yet to date, the actual policy responses of the US and UK administrations to accountability for their own involvement in past human rights violations are very different.

Whereas Prime Minister Cameron has announced an inquiry into credible allegations that UK state actors were involved in the rendition, secret detention, and/or torture and other ill¬treatment of a number of detainees held abroad, the US government has failed to initiate any such comprehensive investigation." By resorting to secrecy and arguing that disclosure of information would threaten national security, the US government has consistently blocked attempts by individuals to obtain a remedy for the human rights violations they claim to have suffered at the hands of US actors, including agents of the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA).4

In contrast to the USA's systematic failure to meet its international obligation to address these past violations, there has been some notable progress toward accountability for European governments' roles in the CIA-operated rendition and secret detention programmes. Such progress has come without the co-operation of the US government and in some cases, in spite of the lack of political will and outright obstruction by some European governments. Although this report includes a short section on the USA, it focuses primarily on the "state¬of-play" with respect to accountability for European states' complicity in these abusive practices." The report highlights key developments in Germany, Italy, Lithuania, Macedonia, Poland, Romania, Sweden, and the United Kingdom - countries where inquiries into state complicity or legal processes aimed at individual criminal responsibility have occurred, or are currently in process.


In a June 2008 report titled State of Denial: Europe's Role in Rendition and Secret Detention, Amnesty I nternational stated that" I nternational law leaves no place to hide for European states that are legally responsible for their part in facilitating renditions and secret detention" and called on European governments implicated in US-led global counter¬terrorism operations post-Ll September 2001 to: "immediately open full, effective, independent and impartial investigations into the role of European officials and use of state territory in connection with renditions, secret detention and enforced disappearance, and the involvement of state agents in serious human rights abuses abroad, and make the findings and results public"." While the overall "scorecard" to date regarding the establishment of investigations in Europe that are truly independent and effective, as well as sufficiently public, has been disappointing, progress toward accountability gained some momentum between 2008 and 2010 as evidence of European complicity mounted - and indicated that Europe remains fertile ground for accountability.

The key impediment to onward progress in Europe with respect to holding governments accountable, bringing perpetrators to justice, and achieving redress for victims is the oft¬repeated "need" for "state secrecy" in order to protect national security, which remains a serious threat to genuine accountability. Europe, however, must not become yet another "accountability-free zone", with governments eager and enabled simply to forget the past or to whitewash inquiries into their involvement in these egregious practices. If such collective amnesia or exoneration by perfunctory investigation is not challenged, Europe will be complicit in a profoundly damaging overarching violation of international law in relation to what the USA previously called the "war on terror": creating an environment of impunity for grave human rights violations and denying victims the redress to which they are so clearly entitled. Any such impunity would constitute a serious failure to respect international human rights law, with the ripple effect of undermining efforts to encourage respect for human rights by governments elsewhere in the world.

Amnesty International urgently calls on European governments to reject such impunity, to capitalize on the momentum in Europe toward accountability, and to commit in full to justice for the victims of rendition, enforced disappearance, and torture and ill-treatment in the context of the fight against terrorism in the aftermath of the 11 September 2001 attacks in the USA. Claims of state secrecy must not be used to shield governments and individuals from scrutiny for their involvement in serious human rights violations. Moreover, in order to ensure that such abuses do not occur in the future, European governments must implement reforms for the civilian oversight of national intelligence and security agencies and of foreign intelligence agencies operating on their territories. This combination of accountability, effective redress for victims and reform will help re-establish respect for human rights law and responsibility of states under that law to provide human rights protection to all persons entitled to it.

Amnesty International November 2010

Last updated 10 November, 2011