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Letter to the Editor
Nottingham Evening Post - Monday, 5th February 2007 Dear Sir, Peter Valentine (Letters, January 26th) praises the European parliament (EP) for investigating the issue of CIA "rendition flights", and criticises our parliament for failing to do so. I know a little about this, as I am a member of the EP's CIA Committee. I have attended many of its meetings, including a three-day visit to Washington, and heard much of the "evidence". The EP investigation was a "me-too" exercise following the earlier report by the Council of Europe under Swiss senator Dick Marty. A British Labour minister described the earlier report: "As full of holes as a Swiss cheese". And the EP attempt was not much better. It found some evidence of flights which may have been associated with the CIA, but little evidence of clandestine movement of terrorist suspects. After all the CIA will have all sorts of reasons for flying staff and equipment around the world. The Committee assembled large numbers of press cuttings. And they interviewed various people and a few alleged victims, but obtained no substantial evidence. Halfway through the EP "investigation", the US admitted that a small number of suspects had been moved between countries in the immediate aftermath of the 9/11 outrage. Wrong, but understandable in the circumstances. The committee was only interested in piling up anti-US propaganda -- and criticising member-state governments at the same time. I rarely spring to the defence of Geoff Hoon MP, but Baroness Sarah Ludford MEP, a Vive-Chairman of the Committee, treated him in a very disparaging way, clearly concerned more about point-scoring than finding the truth. In short, the EP's efforts amount to crude propaganda -- and a waste of tax-payers' money. Roger Helmer Conservative MEP for Nottinghamshire |