Strasbourg, 07/09/2006 (Agence Europe) - MEPs reacted strongly on 7 September to the declarations made by President Bush in which he admits that “a small number of terrorist suspects” had been detained in the context of a CIA “special programme” outside the United States. Claudio Fava (PES), Rapporteur for the temporary committee set up by the EP to probe CIA detention and kidnapping as part of counter-terrorism measures, comments in a press release: “If it were possible, I would immediately invite Mr George W. Bush to speak to our committee as he is now our best witness”. Hearings in coming months and missions programmed in the United Kingdom, Poland and Romania “will be a key moment for getting to the truth on the excess and violation committed also in Europe”, he said. Regarding the Abu Omar affair, the Imam kidnapped in Milan by the CIA, who was then passed on to the Egyptian authorities, Mr Fava announced that, after the hearing of the La Repubblica journalist, Carlo Bonino, the temporary committee will hear in coming days the Italian Under-Secretary Enrico Michel and Deputy Prosecutor Armando Spataro. German Social Democrat Wolfgang Kreissl-Dörfler says that “the location of these prison camps must be made public”. In the same way, German Green member Cem Özdemir, says: “the surprising thing is that the president of the United States made this admission before the governments of countries where the camps were located”. With his declaration, President Bush “exposes not only his own previous lies. He also exposes to ridicule those arrogant government leaders in Europe who dismissed as unfounded our fears about 'extraordinary rendition'”, said British Liberal Democrat Sarah Ludford.
Terry Davis, Secretary General for the Council of Europe, said during a press conference in Strasbourg on Thursday on the proposals he made after his inquiry into this affair, that there is currently a gap between the provisions of the European Convention on Human Rights and the implementation of these provisions in countries belonging to the organisation. “I want to bridge this gap”, he said. The inquiry conducted under Article 52 of the Convention consisted in discussing how to most effectively eliminate the failings discovered. Mr Davis said there are three main failings. With just one or two exceptions, the member nations of the Council of Europe do not have the right to control the activities of security services in “friendly” countries on their territory. When it comes to the extraordinary rendition of persons, procedures applicable to civil aircraft and the immunity of State aircraft do not allow a member nation to establish whether a plane travelling through its airspace or using its airports is used for activities that run counter to human rights. Finally, persons who carry out serious violations of these rights should not be able to take refuge behind immunity (which, in some cases, was “impunity”, he deplored). “What I do not understand is why it was necessary to put persons in secret detention centres”, Mr Davis admits.
On the subject of George W. Bush' admission that secret prisons do exist, Mr Davis stressed that the US president did not specify whether these prisons were located in Europe. Thus, the question of having tangible proof of the existence of such prisons has been settled once and for all, Mr Davis said. He also recalled the comments made by Condoleezza Rice who said that all action carried out by her country in Europe was done so with the agreement of the governments concerned.