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28th August 2009, 04:19 AM
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BBC NEWS | Europe | Lithuania probe into 'CIA prison'
Four years after the Council of Europe announced its parliamentary inquiry into the US-CIA's kidnapping & torture program and the member states' complicity in it, and three years after Mr. Marty published his report Lithuania is launching an inquiry into allegations that it hosted a secret CIA prison for al-Qaeda suspects.
The truth has a way of finding daylight. Dick Marty: time for Europe to come clean once and for all over secret detentions Strasbourg, 21.08.2009 – Dick Marty (Switzerland, ALDE), the rapporteur of the Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe (PACE) on secret detentions, made the following statement today:
“With yesterday’s report that Lithuania hosted a secret CIA prison, as well as other recent revelations regarding the ‘black sites’ in Poland and Romania, the time has now come for Europe to account in full for its involvement in this shameful episode.
I have always believed that the ‘dynamic of truth’ would prevail in the face of state secrecy. But European credibility is damaged by these repeated leaks of only partial truths every few weeks or months. Let us draw a line under this, once and for all, and come clean.
My own sources seem to confirm yesterday’s news report that US ‘high-value detainees’ were held in Lithuania. The authorities should now carry out a full, independent and credible investigation. Furthermore, an unjustified use of the ‘state secrets’ doctrine should not act as a barrier to full disclosure of what occurred on the outskirts of Vilnius.
Denial and evasion are no longer credible: European countries must come clean.”
Indeed. It's no good to wag finger and preach human rights when one's own house is no cleaner. Hypocrites have zero credibility.
__________________
One achieves little honour if one invades another country, which has done us no harm, with force and injustice, if one rapes and burns, kills and pillages those who only wished to live in peace. It would do us greater honour if our forefathers had always been peaceful and meek, if they had been content with all the things God had given them, instead of robbing and raping others. -- Olaus Petri
I am resolving now never to hold rancor, however justified it might be, toward a group of people, whatever their race, religion, conviction, prejudices, errors. -- Irčne Némirovsky
Cannons and fire-arms are cruel and damnable machines; I believe them to have been the direct suggestion of the Devil. If Adam had seen in a vision the horrible instruments his children were to invent, he would have died of grief. -- Martin Luther |
29th August 2009, 11:48 AM
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| | Join Date: 3rd February 2005 Location: Glasgow
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Reps: 308,806,707,732,847 (power: 308,806,707,746) | | Originally Posted by Kalevalatar 
I'd love to see a Europe with more integrity, I just don't know how you turn it round, I look at the media in this country and imagine what they would say if any politician suggested putting anything other than British self interest at the heart of our foreign policy. There is an acceptance which runs from the Prime minister all the way down to a large portion of the electorate that you we look out for ourselves first and anyone who is hurt by us, well it is their bad luck. It is so deeply ingrained in our country, and most other countries, and it is this attitude which leads to either acceptance of disgracefull practices or a refusal to acknowledge their existence.
It will take more than a few investigations. It will take a root and branch change of culture, and a for huge numbers of people to decide that profit, influence and power are not more important than integrity. I'd like to see it happen, but even voicing that desire opens one up to mockery.
Another thought which has just struck me is that it would also require paying off huge debts. Countries which rely on extensive borrowing are not truly independent when it comes decision making. The creditors always have a way of bringing pressure to bear.
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Last edited by ScottishJohn; 29th August 2009 at 11:54 AM.
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21st October 2009, 10:09 AM
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| | Join Date: 5th July 2005 Location: Pohjola
Posts: 3,250
Blessings: 1,302,209
Reps: 45,454,215,510,743,368 (power: 45,454,215,510,753) | | UPDATE: Lithuanian leader suspects her country hosted CIA jail "The West is waiting for answers from us and will look at us with suspicion as long as Lithuania cannot clear away the shadows which hang above Lithuania or, if it is confirmed, to take responsibility and to apologize to the international community for human rights (abuses)," Lithuanian President Dalia Grybauskaite said Tuesday.
She also said a request had been sent to the United States for cooperation in a probe. The US-run kidnap & torture program was part of the former US President George W. Bush's efforts to undermine wolrdwide human rights.
Grybauskaite underscored that, and said it was not just up to Vilnius to refute the claims.
"Both Lithuania and the United States should give answers to these questions," she said.
My, my. A tiny former Soviet colony leads the way and advices the United States of America how to make right and take responsibility of one's past wrongful actions.
Tsk, tsk.  for Ms. Grybauskaite for being the one with the real balls.
__________________
One achieves little honour if one invades another country, which has done us no harm, with force and injustice, if one rapes and burns, kills and pillages those who only wished to live in peace. It would do us greater honour if our forefathers had always been peaceful and meek, if they had been content with all the things God had given them, instead of robbing and raping others. -- Olaus Petri
I am resolving now never to hold rancor, however justified it might be, toward a group of people, whatever their race, religion, conviction, prejudices, errors. -- Irčne Némirovsky
Cannons and fire-arms are cruel and damnable machines; I believe them to have been the direct suggestion of the Devil. If Adam had seen in a vision the horrible instruments his children were to invent, he would have died of grief. -- Martin Luther |
22nd December 2009, 10:47 AM
| | Veteran
| | Join Date: 5th July 2005 Location: Pohjola
Posts: 3,250
Blessings: 1,302,209
Reps: 45,454,215,510,743,368 (power: 45,454,215,510,753) | | UPDATE: Lithuania hosted secret CIA prisons
The CIA used at least two secret detention centres in Lithuania after the 11 September 2001 terror attacks on the US, a Lithuanian inquiry has found.
The report by a Lithuanian parliamentary committee says that in 2005 and 2006 CIA chartered planes were allowed to land in Lithuania.
It says that no Lithuanian officials were allowed near the aircraft, nor were they told who was on board.
Poland and Romania hosted similar CIA "black sites", media reports say.
In Lithuania, at least eight terror suspects were held at one centre on the outskirts of the capital Vilnius, the investigation found.
__________________
One achieves little honour if one invades another country, which has done us no harm, with force and injustice, if one rapes and burns, kills and pillages those who only wished to live in peace. It would do us greater honour if our forefathers had always been peaceful and meek, if they had been content with all the things God had given them, instead of robbing and raping others. -- Olaus Petri
I am resolving now never to hold rancor, however justified it might be, toward a group of people, whatever their race, religion, conviction, prejudices, errors. -- Irčne Némirovsky
Cannons and fire-arms are cruel and damnable machines; I believe them to have been the direct suggestion of the Devil. If Adam had seen in a vision the horrible instruments his children were to invent, he would have died of grief. -- Martin Luther |
22nd December 2009, 07:21 PM
|  | Senior Member
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Posts: 3,057
Blessings: 64,270
Reps: 242,185,112,465,767,904 (power: 242,185,112,465,778) | | | May God bless Lithuania for aiding in the war on terror.
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23rd December 2009, 04:36 AM
| | Veteran
| | Join Date: 5th July 2005 Location: Pohjola
Posts: 3,250
Blessings: 1,302,209
Reps: 45,454,215,510,743,368 (power: 45,454,215,510,753) | | Given Lithuania's sore past, it is all the more sad that the Bush administration elbowed Vilnius to forsake the high European standards in favour of the old Soviet-era ways of human rights abuses and state-sponsored terror. 
__________________
One achieves little honour if one invades another country, which has done us no harm, with force and injustice, if one rapes and burns, kills and pillages those who only wished to live in peace. It would do us greater honour if our forefathers had always been peaceful and meek, if they had been content with all the things God had given them, instead of robbing and raping others. -- Olaus Petri
I am resolving now never to hold rancor, however justified it might be, toward a group of people, whatever their race, religion, conviction, prejudices, errors. -- Irčne Némirovsky
Cannons and fire-arms are cruel and damnable machines; I believe them to have been the direct suggestion of the Devil. If Adam had seen in a vision the horrible instruments his children were to invent, he would have died of grief. -- Martin Luther | |
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