EU slams FF over "Guantanamo Express" flights

national | anti-war / imperialism | news report Tuesday January 23, 2007 14:25 by dublin joe

Report says Ireland violated its own human rights obligations

An EU report wants a Dáil investigation of CIA rendition flights through Shannon airport. It also criticizes Bertie Ahern for trusting President Bush's personal assurances that no torture suspects were aboard the "Guantanamo Express" planes that landed in Ireland.

"I looked at the great President Bush and I said to him, you know, 'I want to be sure to be sure' and he assured me."

More heat for Fianna Fáil Tuesday over the use of Shannon Airport for the Bush administration's rendition programme nicknamed the "Guantanamo Express."

A European Parliament committee says thousands of "torture flights" have travelled through EU airspace and landed at EU airports in recent years. Ireland is considered to be one of the worst offenders.

147 stopovers in Ireland by CIA planes are suspected to be involved in the rendition scheme, in which alleged Islamic militants are kidnapped in countries across the world and transported to other countries that sanction torture as a method of interrogation.

The report says Fianna Fáil Minister for Foreign Affairs Dermot Ahern failed to answer all the questions put to him by the committee.

Late last year, Taoiseach Bertie Ahern said "I looked at the great President Bush and I said to him, you know, 'I want to be sure to be sure' and he assured me."

Today's report says Ahern breached the Irish government's own human rights obligations by simply accepting President Bush's assurances that no terrorism suspects were on board any flights that landed in Ireland.

The EU committee passed a resolution by Labour MEP Proinsias De Rossa that calls for an investigation of previous Irish rendition flights and a complete ban on all future CIA flights unless a system of random searches is put in place.