UK Gov Approves of Torture Confessions

[size=18]Confidential letters from Ambassador Craig Murray...[/size]

[quote]Letter #1

Confidential

FM Tashkent

TO FCO, Cabinet Office, DFID, MODUK, OSCE Posts, Security Council Posts

16 September 02

SUBJECT: US/Uzbekistan: Promoting Terrorism

SUMMARY

US plays down human rights situation in Uzbekistan. A dangerous policy:

increasing repression combined with poverty will promote Islamic terrorism.

Support to Karimov regime a bankrupt and cynical policy.

DETAIL

The Economist of 7 September states: "Uzbekistan, in particular, has jailed many

thousands of moderate Islamists, an excellent way of converting their families

and friends to extremism." The Economist also spoke of "the growing despotism

of Mr Karimov" and judged that "the past year has seen a further deterioration of

an already grim human rights record". I agree.

Between 7,000 and 10,000 political and religious prisoners are currently detained,

many after trials before kangaroo courts with no representation. Terrible torture

is commonplace: the EU is currently considering a demarche over the terrible

case of two Muslims tortured to death in jail apparently with boiling water. Two

leading dissidents, Elena Urlaeva and Larissa Vdovna, were two weeks ago

committed to a lunatic asylum, where they are being drugged, for demonstrating

on human rights. Opposition political parties remain banned. There is no doubt

that September 11 gave the pretext to crack down still harder on dissent under

the guise of counter-terrorism.

Yet on 8 September the US State Department certified that Uzbekistan was

improving in both human rights and democracy, thus fulfilling a constitutional

requirement and allowing the continuing disbursement of $140 million of US aid

to Uzbekistan this year. Human Rights Watch immediately published a

commendably sober and balanced rebuttal of the State Department claim.

Again we are back in the area of the US accepting sham reform [a reference to

my previous telegram on the economy]. In August media censorship was

abolished, and theoretically there are independent media outlets, but in practice

there is absolutely no criticism of President Karimov or the central government in

any Uzbek media. State Department call this self-censorship: I am not sure that

is a fair way to describe an unwillingness to experience the brutal methods of the

security services.

Similarly, following US pressure when Karimov visited Washington, a human

rights NGO has been permitted to register. This is an advance, but they have little

impact given that no media are prepared to cover any of their activities or carry

any of their statements.

The final improvement State quote is that in one case of murder of a prisoner the

police involved have been prosecuted. That is an improvement, but again related

to the Karimov visit and does not appear to presage a general change of policy.

On the latest cases of torture deaths the Uzbeks have given the OSCE an

incredible explanation, given the nature of the injuries, that the victims died in a

fight between prisoners.

But allowing a single NGO, a token prosecution of police officers and a fake press

freedom cannot possibly outweigh the huge scale of detentions, the torture and

the secret executions. President Karimov has admitted to 100 executions a year

but human rights groups believe there are more. Added to this, all opposition

parties remain banned (the President got a 98% vote) and the Internet is strictly

controlled. All Internet providers must go through a single government server and

access is barred to many sites including all dissident and opposition sites and

much international media (including, ironically, waronterrorism.com). This is in

essence still a totalitarian state: there is far less freedom than still prevails, for

example, in Mugabe's Zimbabwe. A Movement for Democratic Change or any

judicial independence would be impossible here.

Karimov is a dictator who is committed to neither political nor economic reform.

The purpose of his regime is not the development of his country but the diversion

of economic rent to his oligarchic supporters through government controls. As a

senior Uzbek academic told me privately, there is more repression here now than

in Brezhnev's time. The US are trying to prop up Karimov economically and to

justify this support they need to claim that a process of economic and political

reform is underway. That they do so claim is either cynicism or self-delusion.

This policy is doomed to failure. Karimov is driving this resource-rich country

towards economic ruin like an Abacha. And the policy of increasing repression

aimed indiscriminately at pious Muslims, combined with a deepening poverty, is

the most certain way to ensure continuing support for the Islamic Movement of

Uzbekistan. They have certainly been decimated and disorganised in Afghanistan,

and Karimov's repression may keep the lid on for years – but pressure is building

and could ultimately explode.

I quite understand the interest of the US in strategic airbases and why they back

Karimov, but I believe US policy is misconceived. In the short term it may help

fight terrorism but in the medium term it will promote it, as the Economist points

out. And it can never be right to lower our standards on human rights. There is a

complex situation in Central Asia and it is wrong to look at it only through a prism

picked up on September 12. Worst of all is what appears to be the philosophy

underlying the current US view of Uzbekistan: that September 11 divided the

World into two camps in the "War against Terrorism" and that Karimov is on "our"

side.

If Karimov is on "our" side, then this war cannot be simply between the forces of

good and evil. It must be about more complex things, like securing the long-term

US military presence in Uzbekistan. I silently wept at the 11 September

commemoration here. The right words on New York have all been said. But last

week was also another anniversary – the US-led overthrow of Salvador Allende in

Chile. The subsequent dictatorship killed, dare I say it, rather more people than

died on September 11. Should we not remember then also, and learn from that

too? I fear that we are heading down the same path of US-sponsored dictatorship

here. It is ironic that the beneficiary is perhaps the most unreformed of the

World's old communist leaders.

We need to think much more deeply about Central Asia. It is easy to place

Uzbekistan in the "too difficult" tray and let the US run with it, but I think they

are running in the wrong direction. We should tell them of the dangers we see.

Our policy is theoretically one of engagement, but in practice this has not meant

much. Engagement makes sense, but it must mean grappling with the problems,

not mute collaboration. We need to start actively to state a distinctive position on

democracy and human rights, and press for a realistic view to be taken in the

IMF. We should continue to resist pressures to start a bilateral DFID programme,

unless channelled non-governmentally, and not restore ECGD cover despite the

constant lobbying. We should not invite Karimov to the UK. We should step up

our public diplomacy effort, stressing democratic values, including more resources

from the British Council. We should increase support to human rights activists,

and strive for contact with non-official Islamic groups.

Above all we need to care about the 22 million Uzbek people, suffering from

poverty and lack of freedom. They are not just pawns in the new Great Game.

MURRAY[/quote]

[quote]Letter #2

Confidential

Fm Tashkent

To FCO

18 March 2003

SUBJECT: US FOREIGN POLICY

SUMMARY

1. As seen from Tashkent, US policy is not much focussed on democracy or

freedom. It is about oil, gas and hegemony. In Uzbekistan the US pursues those

ends through supporting a ruthless dictatorship. We must not close our eyes to

uncomfortable truth.

DETAIL

2. Last year the US gave half a billion dollars in aid to Uzbekistan, about a

quarter of it military aid. Bush and Powell repeatedly hail Karimov as a friend and

ally. Yet this regime has at least seven thousand prisoners of conscience; it is a

one party state without freedom of speech, without freedom of media, without

freedom of movement, without freedom of assembly, without freedom of religion.

It practices, systematically, the most hideous tortures on thousands. Most of the

population live in conditions precisely analogous with medieval serfdom.

3. Uzbekistan's geo-strategic position is crucial. It has half the population of the

whole of Central Asia. It alone borders all the other states in a region which is

important to future Western oil and gas supplies. It is the regional military power.

That is why the US is here, and here to stay. Contractors at the US military bases

are extending the design life of the buildings from ten to twenty five years.

4. Democracy and human rights are, despite their protestations to the contrary,

in practice a long way down the US agenda here. Aid this year will be slightly

less, but there is no intention to introduce any meaningful conditionality. Nobody

can believe this level of aid – more than US aid to all of West Africa – is related to

comparative developmental need as opposed to political support for Karimov.

While the US makes token and low-level references to human rights to appease

domestic opinion, they view Karimov's vicious regime as a bastion against

fundamentalism. He – and they – are in fact creating fundamentalism. When the

US gives this much support to a regime that tortures people to death for having a

beard or praying five times a day, is it any surprise that Muslims come to hate

the West?

5. I was stunned to hear that the US had pressured the EU to withdraw a motion

on Human Rights in Uzbekistan which the EU was tabling at the UN Commission

for Human Rights in Geneva. I was most unhappy to find that we are helping the

US in what I can only call this cover-up. I am saddened when the US constantly

quote fake improvements in human rights in Uzbekistan, such as the abolition of

censorship and Internet freedom, which quite simply have not happened (I see

these are quoted in the draft EBRD strategy for Uzbekistan, again I understand at

American urging).

6. From Tashkent it is difficult to agree that we and the US are activated by

shared values. Here we have a brutal US sponsored dictatorship reminiscent of

Central and South American policy under previous US Republican administrations.

I watched George Bush talk today of Iraq and "dismantling the apparatus of

terror… removing the torture chambers and the rape rooms". Yet when it comes

to the Karimov regime, systematic torture and rape appear to be treated as

peccadilloes, not to affect the relationship and to be downplayed in international

fora. Double standards? Yes.

7. I hope that once the present crisis is over we will make plain to the US, at

senior level, our serious concern over their policy in Uzbekistan.

MURRAY[/quote]

[quote]Letter #3

CONFIDENTIAL

FM TASHKENT

TO IMMEDIATE FCO

TELNO 63

OF 220939 JULY 04

INFO IMMEDIATE DFID, ISLAMIC POSTS, MOD, OSCE POSTS UKDEL EBRD

LONDON, UKMIS GENEVA, UKMIS MEW YORK

SUBJECT: RECEIPT OF INTELLIGENCE OBTAINED UNDER TORTURE

SUMMARY

1. We receive intelligence obtained under torture from the Uzbek intelligence

services, via the US. We should stop. It is bad information anyway. Tortured

dupes are forced to sign up to confessions showing what the Uzbek government

wants the US and UK to believe, that they and we are fighting the same war

against terror.

2. I gather a recent London interdepartmental meeting considered the question

and decided to continue to receive the material. This is morally, legally and

practically wrong. It exposes as hypocritical our post Abu Ghraib pronouncements

and fatally undermines our moral standing. It obviates my efforts to get the

Uzbek government to stop torture they are fully aware our intelligence

community laps up the results.

3. We should cease all co-operation with the Uzbek Security Services they are

beyond the pale. We indeed need to establish an SIS presence here, but not as in

a friendly state.

DETAIL

4. In the period December 2002 to March 2003 I raised several times the issue of

intelligence material from the Uzbek security services which was obtained under

torture and passed to us via the CIA. I queried the legality, efficacy and morality

of the practice.

5. I was summoned to the UK for a meeting on 8 March 2003. Michael Wood gave

his legal opinion that it was not illegal to obtain and to use intelligence acquired

by torture. He said the only legal limitation on its use was that it could not be

used in legal proceedings, under Article 15 of the UN Convention on Torture.

6. On behalf of the intelligence services, Matthew Kydd said that they found some

of the material very useful indeed with a direct bearing on the war on terror.

Linda Duffield said that she had been asked to assure me that my qualms of

conscience were respected and understood.

7. Sir Michael Jay's circular of 26 May stated that there was a reporting obligation

on us to report torture by allies (and I have been instructed to refer to Uzbekistan

as such in the context of the war on terror). You, Sir, have made a number of

striking, and I believe heartfelt, condemnations of torture in the last few weeks. I

had in the light of this decided to return to this question and to highlight an

apparent contradiction in our policy. I had intimated as much to the Head of

Eastern Department.

8. I was therefore somewhat surprised to hear that without informing me of the

meeting, or since informing me of the result of the meeting, a meeting was

convened in the FCO at the level of Heads of Department and above, precisely to

consider the question of the receipt of Uzbek intelligence material obtained under

torture. As the office knew, I was in London at the time and perfectly able to

attend the meeting. I still have only gleaned that it happened.

9. I understand that the meeting decided to continue to obtain the Uzbek torture

material. I understand that the principal argument deployed was that the

intelligence material disguises the precise source, ie it does not ordinarily reveal

the name of the individual who is tortured. Indeed this is true – the material is

marked with a euphemism such as "From detainee debriefing." The argument

runs that if the individual is not named, we cannot prove that he was tortured.

10. I will not attempt to hide my utter contempt for such casuistry, nor my

shame that I work in and organisation where colleagues would resort to it to

justify torture. I have dealt with hundreds of individual cases of political or

religious prisoners in Uzbekistan, and I have met with very few where torture, as

defined in the UN convention, was not employed. When my then DHM raised the

question with the CIA head of station 15 months ago, he readily acknowledged

torture was deployed in obtaining intelligence. I do not think there is any doubt

as to the fact.

11. The torture record of the Uzbek security services could hardly be more widely

known. Plainly there are, at the very least, reasonable grounds for believing the

material is obtained under torture. There is helpful guidance at Article 3 of the UN

Convention;

"The competent authorities shall take into account all relevant considerations

including, where applicable, the existence in the state concerned of a consistent

pattern of gross, flagrant or mass violations of human rights."

While this article forbids extradition or deportation to Uzbekistan, it is the right

test for the present

question also.

12. On the usefulness of the material obtained, this is irrelevant. Article 2 of the

Convention, to which we are a party, could not be plainer:

"No exceptional circumstances whatsoever, whether a state of war or a threat of

war, internal political instability or any other public emergency, may be invoked

as a justification of torture."

13. Nonetheless, I repeat that this material is useless – we are selling our souls

for dross. It is in fact positively harmful. It is designed to give the message the

Uzbeks want the West to hear. It exaggerates the role, size, organisation and

activity of the IMU and its links with Al Qaida. The aim is to convince the West

that the Uzbeks are a vital cog against a common foe, that they should keep the

assistance, especially military assistance, coming, and that they should mute the

international criticism on human rights and economic reform.

14. I was taken aback when Matthew Kydd said this stuff was valuable. Sixteen

months ago it was difficult to argue with SIS in the area of intelligence

assessment. But post Butler we know, not only that they can get it wrong on

even the most vital and high profile issues, but that they have a particular yen for

highly coloured material which exaggerates the threat. That is precisely what the

Uzbeks give them. Furthermore MI6 have no operative within a thousand miles of

me and certainly no expertise that can come close to my own in making this

assessment.

15. At the Khuderbegainov trial I met an old man from Andizhan. Two of his

children had been tortured in front of him until he signed a confession on the

family's links with Bin Laden. Tears were streaming down his face. I have no

doubt they had as much connection with Bin Laden as I do. This is the standard

of the Uzbek intelligence services.

16. I have been considering Michael Wood's legal view, which he kindly gave in

writing. I cannot understand why Michael concentrated only on Article 15 of the

Convention. This certainly bans the use of material obtained under torture as

evidence in proceedings, but it does not state that this is the sole exclusion of the

use of such material.

17. The relevant article seems to me Article 4, which talks of complicity in

torture. Knowingly to receive its results appears to be at least arguable as

complicity. It does not appear that being in a different country to the actual

torture would preclude complicity. I talked this over in a hypothetical sense with

my old friend Prof Francois Hampson, I believe an acknowledged World authority

on the Convention, who said that the complicity argument and the spirit of the

Convention would be likely to be winning points. I should be grateful to hear

Michael's views on this.

18. It seems to me that there are degrees of complicity and guilt, but being at

one or two removes does not make us blameless. There are other factors. Plainly

it was a breach of Article 3 of the Convention for the coalition to deport detainees

back here from Baghram, but it has been done. That seems plainly complicit.

19. This is a difficult and dangerous part of the World. Dire and increasing

poverty and harsh repression are undoubtedly turning young people here towards

radical Islam. The Uzbek government are thus creating this threat, and perceived

US support for Karimov strengthens anti-Western feeling. SIS ought to establish

a presence here, but not as partners of the Uzbek Security Services, whose sheer

brutality puts them beyond the pale.

MURRAY[/quote]

[url=http://www.blairwatch.co.uk/node/714]BlairWatch[/url]

Slightly Unrelated, but:

[quote="

[url=http://uk.news.yahoo.com/17122005/325/britain-ran-torture-camp-world-wa… News[/url]"][size=18]Britain ran torture camp after World War Two - paper

Reuters[/size]

LONDON (Reuters) - Britain ran a secret prison in Germany for two years after the end of World War Two where inmates including Nazi party members were tortured and starved to death, the Guardian said on Saturday.

Citing Foreign Office files which were opened after a request under the Freedom of Information act, the newspaper said Britain had held men and woman at a prison in Bad Nenndorf until July 1947.

[b]Locals at the time said you could hear prisoners scream at night.[/b]

The Foreign Office files detailed an investigation carried out by a Scotland Yard detective, Inspector Tom Hayward, who found evidence of torture and said at least two inmates had starved to death while another had been beaten to death.

"Even today, the Foreign Office is refusing to release photographs taken of some of the 'living skeletons' on their release," the newspaper said.

Former prisoners told Hayward they had been whipped as well as beaten and any prisoner thought to be uncooperative during interrogation was taken to a punishment cell.

"Threats to execute prisoners, or to arrest, torture and murder their wives and children were considered 'perfectly proper' on the grounds that such threats were never carried out," the paper reported.

Initially, most of the detainees were Nazi members or former members of the SS, rounded up in an attempt to prevent any Nazi insurgency, although a significant number were also businessmen who had done well under Adolf Hitler, the paper said.

One of the men who starved to death, Walter Bergmann, had offered to spy for the British and fell under suspicion because he spoke Russian.

"There seems little doubt that Bergmann, against whom no charge of any crime has ever been made, but on the contrary, who appears to be a man who has given every assistance, and that of considerable value, has lost his life through malnutrition and lack of medical care," Hayward wrote in his report.

The Guardian said the then Prime Minister Clement Attlee had been briefed about the camp and was told guards were instructed "to carry out physical assaults on certain prisoners with the object of ... making them more amenable to interrogation".

Three men were court-martialled following the report. Two were acquitted and another found guilty of neglect of inmates and dismissed from the service.[/quote]

[url=http://uk.news.yahoo.com/17122005/325/britain-ran-torture-camp-world-wa… News[/url]

Are there any situation where torture is an acceptable method to gain info?