War on Terror Reminder: Torture is Also a British Thing

 

In recent weeks, we've paid close attentions to allegations of abuse by Iranian authorities in the post-election conflict. Perhaps as a timely reminder, Duncan Gardham writes in The Daily Telegraph on Tuesday that "torture" is not the exclusive practice of Tehran:

 

[Britain's] Parliamentary Joint Committee on Human Rights said the structures for supervision were woefully deficient and accused ministers of refusing to give adequate answers to its detailed questions about torture.

It said "ministers are determined to avoid Parliamentary scrutiny and accountability" over allegations of complicity in torture, and concluded: "In view of the large number of unanswered questions... there is now no other way to restore public confidence in the intelligence services than by setting up an independent inquiry."

The committee urged ministers to publish the instructions given to security service officers on the detention and interviewing of detainees overseas.

Ministers have refused to give oral evidence to the committee on allegations of torture or have given only general answers to detailed questions about the treatment of individual detainees.

Seven former Guantanamo detainees, including Binyam Mohamed, are suing MI5, MI6, the Attorney General, the Foreign Office and the Home Office over their treatment.

The BBC, freed from its caution by the Parliamentary report, is adding a claim by Craig Murray, the former British Ambassador to Uzbekistan: he was told in March 2003 that Britain had accepted torture as part of its campaign in the War on Terror.