Mr Marty warns that the inquiry has still not established the whole truth

Mr Marty warns that the inquiry has still not established the whole truth. But he condemns what he calls a “spider’s web” of US rendition flights as “utterly alien” to the concept of basic human rights. Allegations that special American flights transported terrorist suspects to Europe to be questioned were first raised in the Washington Post last November. Now, at the end of a seven-month inquiry, the final report says it is now clear that “authorities in several European countries actively participated with the CIA in these unlawful activities”. A preliminary report by Mr Marty earlier this year said European governments were almost certainly aware of the CIA’s secret prisoner flights via European airspace or airports. A report from Swiss MP Dick Marty for human rights watchdog the Council of Europe says a group of countries acted as “staging posts” in the transfer by American authorities of men wanted for questioning.
They include Britain, Germany, Spain, and Turkey, who co-operated in the running of so-called “rendition” flights – the covert transport of prisoners for questioning in countries where, it is claimed, many faced torture.

Britain was named today as one of 14 European countries which colluded with the CIA in the operation of secret flights delivering terrorist suspects for interrogation. While as recently as last year faraway countries such as Brazil, Chile, Peru, Cuba and Japan figured high on the wish-list of places that adventurous travellers wanted to visit, a new survey reveals that old favourites such as Greece, Spain, Italy and India are now prime destinations.. He was found out in 2004 after a new security system was introduced.Mackenzie of Belgrave Gardens, Edinburgh, also pleaded guilty, at the High Court in Edinburgh, to stealing £37,170 between 15 May 2000 and 14 April 2004 He has been remanded in custody to await sentencing.. Britain’s backpackers are playing it safe in their quest for adventure by swapping off-the-beaten-track destinations for tried and tested favourites.

Donald Mackenzie spent five years at the Royal Bank of Scotland operating, in effect, a bank within a bank as he opened an intricate web of false accounts with names similar to existing customers, drew down massive unauthorised loans and defeated complex security measures.
As a senior member of staff at the bank’s flagship branch in Edinburgh, Mackenzie, 45, spent almost 30 years working his way up to a position of trust.Such was the complexity of his fraud that the bank thought he was generating more business and gave him bonuses of £35,000. A bank employee who was three times named business manager of the year yesterday admitted embezzling £21m. It was regarded as “minimum force” in the circumstances.Last year, seven British soldiers were cleared of murder when their trial collapsed because the judge concluded the Iraqi witnesses were unreliable.A case against another seven British soldiers accused of killing an Iraqi hotel receptionist is due to be heard later this year.. He just raised his hand, but then he was under the water and then he raised them again. Both arms were stretched out of the water, but there was no sound from him Then he vanished. There was nothing I could do, because I could not swim well.”Kareem’s body was found two days later.The court heard there was a policy of “wetting” looters in rivers and canals, in an attempt to make them feel uncomfortable and persuade them to go home. ”There was bombing by Bush at the time, there was a curfew, we could not work It was a catastrophe We were very hungry.

It [stealing] was wrong but we had no other option.” He said he was arrested with the teenager and two other men and severely beaten before being forced into the Shatt al-Basra canal at gunpoint.He watched as the youngster, who could not swim, struggled to stop himself being swept away by the tide “There was mud beneath our feet, it was slippery There was a tide. The British headquarters had “just enough time to prepare for war, never mind the occupation itself,” he said, adding: “Whatever the reason, there was a total failure to plan for the occupation of Iraq, which was subsequently described as a ’strategic failure’.”Jerry Hayes, barrister for Guardsman McGing, said that, without planning, the difficult task of transition from war to peace-keeping was placed in the hands of young soldiers, such as his client, who was 19 at the time.The court martial heard that in the days after the initial invasion, looting had reached “epidemic proportions”, with no real guidance as how best to deal with it.A witness, Aiad Salim Hanon, a 25-year-old welder, conceded that he was reduced to looting, as he tried to support his family on the equivalent of 15p a day. The soldiers’ families wept with relief after hearing the verdict. Shaking with emotion, Guardsman McCleary said: “Justice was served.”The court martial heard from Lt-Col Nicholas Mercer, who conceded that there had been insufficient planning as UK forces became an army of occupation for the first time in modern conflicts. The asthmatic youngster immediately began to struggle before vanishing under the water as the soldiers drove away.Sgt Selman, 39, Guardsman McCleary, 24, and Guardsman McGing, 22, all denied manslaughter but declined to give evidence during the five-week hearing at Colchester Barracks.Yesterday a panel of seven officers found them not guilty after deliberating for five hours. Guardsman Martin McGing, along with a fellow Irish Guard, Guardsman Joseph McCleary, and Sgt Carle Selman, then of the Coldstream Guards and now serving with the Scots Guards, were on their last day of duty in Basra in May 2003 when they caught four Iraqis looting a garage.
The servicemen were accused of forcing the suspects – including 15-year-old Ahmad Jabbar Kareem – into a muddy, tidal canal on the outskirts of town to “teach them a lesson”.

A British soldier criticised his lack of training last night as he was cleared, along with two other servicemen, of killing an Iraqi teenager. Mr Kahar was shot in the shoulder shortly after police broke in.. I am quite sure you cannot solve some of these law and order problems unless you are prepared quite profoundly to change and rebalance the system of criminal justice so that you have more summary justice, more summary powers, more ability for quick and effective action to be taken, even if it will cross the line that most people normally think of as there in terms of civil liberties.”Police are expected to apply today for more time to question Mohammed Abdul Kahar and his brother Abul Koyair, who were arrested in the dawn raid in Forest Gate. He said: “There is an ugly side to today’s crime that is different from when we were growing up.”Organised crime is far more vicious. The issue of drugs in crime makes for a sense of lawlessness that is far more profound than before and you have got a general disrespect on the part of certain groups of people. You can only imagine if they fail to take action and something terrible happened what outcry would be then, so they are in an impossible situation.”
The Prime Minister also insisted that combating crime will have to take precedence over civil liberties.