Stripes: Ramstein officials mum about alleged CIA flights

Reports of secret CIA flights allegedly used to transport terror suspects throughout Europe overshadowed U.S. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice’s visit to Germany this week.

The German magazine Der Spiegel reported that German air traffic controllers provided their government a list of 437 flights suspected of being operated by the CIA in German air space. The magazine said the CIA used two planes registered as private aircraft that accounted for 283 flights or landings in 2002 and 2003 in Ramstein, Berlin and Frankfurt.

Ramstein Air Base officials are staying quiet about the alleged CIA flights. Ramstein’s 435th Air Base Wing declined to comment on the matter Tuesday, referring all questions to the CIA.

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Merkel has made improving German-American relations a top foreign policy objective for her newly formed government. But Tuesday’s joint press conference was dominated by questions about U.S. terrorism policies.


http://www.stripes.com/article.asp?article=33510

Misguided policy. I can't believe they stand anywhere along the lines that, Christ, stood for. Very, very wicked, and evil as well. The administration worships money.

...and all other US bases in Europe.

"Once outside the U.S., terrorism suspects would be without American legal protection."

That part there is not entirely accurate. It's against federal law for a US citizen to engage in acts of torture regardless of where they are and to engage in acts that would aid in torture - regardless of where they are -so as long as the CIA agents are US citizens, the prisoners they carry are afforded legal protection from torture simply because the agents themselves are legally barred from engaging or aiding in torture (meaning the CIA can't just drop the prisoners off in Egypt, Jordan etc, and claim they don't know those countries torture without also being guilty of aiding torture themselves.

Now, we all know the CIA both engages in and aids torture - but it is bullshit to claim the prisoners have no US legal protection.

AND - it is reasonable to claim that IF a plane is considered US property, then it is US soil - and ANYONE on US soil is legally entitled to legal protection under US law - it's in the Constitution. Citizens and non-citizens alike.

So if at any time those planes were free from being boarded by foreign governments while in transit at foreign airports because they carried the mark, papers or word of mouth, of US property, (US sovereignty), then those planes ARE US soil.

And a smart lawyer better start making this argument...

I don't understand the status of rendition. Shouldn't it be illegal for a country to kidnap another country's citizen and fly him/her off to who knows where?

by which a suspect is moved from one country to another.

But since the US is torturing and disappearing people and desire no legal constraints or repercussions - they kidnap.

Just re-read what I wrote earlier and I kicked myself. I was so damn hot not to forget about laws (legal protection) applying to citizen and non-citzens alike, I screwed up.

People in the employ of the US - citizen or not - as long as they represent the US - military,CIA, contractors, etc - cannot engage in or aid torture. I wrote as long as they're citizens...when I meant employed/represent etc.


I'm such a bonehead at times.

asking to speaking with Bush's Porter on the Hill).

Folks, this is not just a few cases, but 437 flights!!

In other words "rendition" is a regular practice.

today, the Germans are much more likely to do whatever they can to Spill the Beans about BushCo's secret torture castles in ye Olde Countrye.

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=102x1972372

Condi is another failed BushCo crony appointment, lacking the basic skills of international diplomacy.

By seeing and hearing stories of Brown and Black men being urinated on,

beaten and killed by his hired hoodlums and mercenaries.