Clinton nostalgia? CIA renditions began under Clinton.

Last Update: Thursday, December 29, 2005. 12:35pm (AEDT)

CIA renditions began under Clinton: agent

The US Central Intelligence Agency's (CIA) controversial "rendition"
program was launched under US president Bill Clinton, a former US
counter-terrorism agent has told a German newspaper.

Michael Scheuer, a 22-year veteran of the CIA who resigned from the
agency in 2004, has told Die Zeit that the US administration had been
looking in the mid-1990s for a way to combat the terrorist threat and
circumvent the cumbersome US legal system.

"President Clinton, his national security adviser Sandy Berger and his
terrorism adviser Richard Clark ordered the CIA in the autumn of 1995 to
destroy Al Qaeda," Mr Scheuer said.

"We asked the president what we should do with the people we capture.
Clinton said 'That's up to you'."

Mr Scheuer, who headed the CIA unit that tracked Al Qaeda leader Osama
bin Laden from 1996 to 1999, says he developed and led the "renditions"
program.

He says the program includes moving prisoners without due legal process
to countries without strict human rights protections.

http://www.abc.net.au/news/newsitems/200512/s1539284.htm

or at least that's what the Clinton's told me.

Youre on thin ice here.

family will not be good for America..I think they really have become part of repug family..they had their time and I was happy with Bill especially after seeing what is going on now..But now we need new and fresh leadership..I also have many complaints with hillary..

Bush merely expanded existing covert programs started under the Clinton Administration.

Let's not forget that it was the Clinton CIA that brought Al-Qaeda fighters from Chechnya to fill the ranks of the Kosovo Liberation Army.

Bush changes

He says the program changed under Mr Clinton's successor, President George W Bush, after the attacks of September 11, 2001.

"We started putting people in our own institutions - in Afghanistan, Iraq and Guantanamo," he said.

"The Bush administration wanted to capture people itself but made the same mistake as the Clinton administration by not treating these people as prisoners of war."

He accused Europeans of being hypocritical in criticising the US administration for its anti-terrorism tactics while benefiting from them.

"All the information we received from interrogations and documents, everything that had to do with Spain, Italy, Germany, France, England was passed on," he said.

Still, rendition started under his watch, and Bush merely expanded on the program.

the future is bleak!