Aboard Air C.I.A.

The agency ran a secret charter service, shuttling detainees to interrogation facilities worldwide. Was it legal? What's next?

Like many detainees with tales of abuse, Khaled el-Masri had a hard time getting people to believe him. Even his wife didn't know what to make of his abrupt, five-month disappearance last year. Masri, a German citizen of Lebanese descent, says he was taken off a bus in Macedonia in south-central Europe while on holiday on Dec. 31, 2003, then whisked in handcuffs to a motel outside the capital city of Skopje. Three weeks later, on the evening of Jan. 23, 2004, he was brought blindfolded aboard a jet with engines noisily revving, according to his lawyer, Manfred Gnjidic. Masri says he climbed high stairs "like onto a regular passenger airplane" and was chained to clamps on the bare metal floor and wall of the jet.

Masri says he was then flown to Afghanistan, where at a U.S. prison facility he was shackled, repeatedly punched and questioned about extremists at his mosque in Ulm, Germany. Finally released months later, the still-mystified Masri was deposited on a deserted road leading into Macedonia, where he brokenly tried to describe his nightmarish odyssey to a border guard. "The man was laughing at me," Masri told The New York Times, which disclosed his story last month.

NEWSWEEK has obtained previously unpublished flight plans indicating the agency has been operating a Boeing 737 as part of a top-secret global charter servicing clandestine interrogation facilities used in the war on terror. And the Boeing's flight information, detailed to the day, seems to confirm Masri's tale of abduction. Gnjidic, Masri's lawyer, called the information "very, very important" to his case, which is being investigated as a kidnapping by a Munich prosecutor. In what could prove embarrassing to President Bush, Gnjidic added that a German TV station was planning to feature Masri's tale ahead of Bush's much-touted trip to Germany this week.

The new evidence supporting Masri's case will only inflame the debate. According to data filed with European aviation authorities, the Boeing 737 landed in Skopje on Jan. 23, 2004, after a flight from the island of Majorca off Spain (a U.S.-friendly government), and left that night. Masri's passport has a Macedonian exit stamp for Jan. 23. The flight plan shows that the plane landed the next day in Baghdad and then went onto Kabul, Afghanistan, on Jan. 25, which also conforms to Masri's account. According to Federal Aviation Administration records, the jet was owned at the time by Premier Executive Transport Services, a now-defunct Massachusetts-based company that U.S. intelligence sources acknowledge to NEWSWEEK fits the profile of a suspected CIA front.

source:
truthout.org

so how powerful and mighty is the c.i.a.?
above every international law?
if they really wanted to get this guy, why didnt they contact the local authorites, the german authoritites that are responsible for his safety and security?
isnt it illegal to kidnap other countries citizens? i belive that "terrorists" kidnap cirtizens and then torture them.
or is c.i.a. only using "every means necessery" to catch all the bad guys, breaking most of the international laws and conventions in process, ignoring any kind of international critiques, because they were order to do so?

germany strikes again, after accusing donald rumsfeld of war crimes, attacking the c.i.a. for kidnaping german citizens.

but i guess that mister president bush will not discuss this kind of topic on his visit to germany this week. instread he will ask germany and the rest of the europe for their help in "war against terror". and maybe next time c.i.a. will ask germany if they can get and interrogate a german citizen.

Well Souljah, Terrorists dont play by the rules, so people trying to stop terrorists cant either. Maybe that man should keep better company if he wants to avoid these kinds of things in the future.

Its funny, I dont hang out with people suspected of terrorism and I havent been taken in for questioning once. Funny how that works huh?

[edit on 21-2-2005 by skippytjc]

We are Americans, therefore, we are far above the international law. That is the message that Bush clearly sent the rest of the world when he withdrew us form the World Court. It's ok for us to torture people, to invade other nations, to pick one regime over another, play them against each other, supply insurgencies, impose sanctions and run drugs. It's ok becuase we have nuclear weapons and lots of money. Righteousness is subjective, and I guess you opinion depends on which side of the gun your standing on.
These terrorists, wow they just hate the US for no reason huh? They just despise big cars and big macs I guess, it doesn't have anything to do with decade after decade of US manipulation in that reigon, or our unilatteral support for Israel does it? Nah, they just like blowing themselves up and terrorizing people for no reason. It's ok for us to Torture people, as long as we don't do it here, because it's illegal as hell to do it here.

skippytjc

Souljah has an agenda.

Otherwise he would post complaining when EITHER side committed such acts, but he only posts complaining about the USA.

His concern for others stop when they are killed by the insurgents, have you seen him post ONE time complaining about the insurgents blowing up their own? If he posts at all about the subject he is careful not to criticize them.

I am HIGHLY suspicious of people that can only see one side of an issue.


Him and ED are brothers under the skin

Related story?
Air America II: The CIA?s Ghost Civilian Airline: "Premier Executive Transport Service Inc"


seekerof

Originally posted by twitchy
Righteousness is subjective, and I guess you opinion depends on which side of the gun your standing on.

So if you are just trying to be fair here where is your indignation when the insurgents blow up a Mosque?

Or is that just the *Dirty Jews* and Reptilians working to degrade the good name of the insurgents?



[edit on 21-2-2005 by Amuk]

The war against terrorism aint pretty - Amuk pretty much sums it up - we knew this in Belfast in the '70s - sorry guys but there comes a point where killed or be killed is a policy that comes into play - and im afraid human rights goes out the window - try looking at the 1972 Prevention of Terrorism act - we lived with it till the 1990s - i think any american looking at that act would find what is going on mild in comparison. That is the price a nation at war with a terrorist pays.

Originally posted by Amuk
Him and ED are brothers under the skin

hey Amuk,
who's ED?

Originally posted by Souljah

Originally posted by Amuk
Him and ED are brothers under the skin

hey Amuk,
who's ED?

Ed singer

He is the yin to your yang

Both of you will leap on the slightest wrong, real or imagained, from the other side but completly ignore the wrongs done by your own.

At least Ed doesnt claim to be neutral though.

I will send him a link to this thread I dont like to talk about someone behind their back

Originally posted by Amuk


I am HIGHLY suspicious of people that can only see one side of an issue.


Him and ED are brothers under the skin

ouch!

Could it be that I am always right?


Seriously, I am outspoken and hardheaded but I do admit when I am wrong and Amuk you know that. It has happened in here before...

So I post the way I feel and it happens to be Pro US and anti-Leftist-communists-socialist-islamicfundementalist?

Thanks I must be doing the right and sane thing then....

Originally posted by edsinger
Seriously, I am outspoken and hardheaded but I do admit when I am wrong and Amuk you know that. It has happened in here before...

And you dont claim to be impartial.

I can respect that even if I disagree

(I almost choked on the admiting you were wrong part)

Originally posted by Amuk

(I almost choked on the admiting you were wrong part)

Wouldn't be the first time and it wont be the last either...

I thought ED was the one thing men like myself, with better than half a century tenure on this planet fear MORE than death.....Erectile Dysfunction.

Firstly,I don't think the CIA is the only intelligence agency that is so-called above the international law.Other agencies around the globe mimics their actions for example,KGB,they too go to a foreign country to kidnap/kill their target and staging it up as if it was a suicide.

So far,only the intelligence community has yet to have any international intelligence community though I find that to be stupid to have secrets shared among countries in an international level.Therefore,gathering intelligence and having covert operations in another country without their knowledge BUT does not effect that particular country in any way,I can say it's all right.Besides,I believe the CIA has courtesy to at least inform the country's government before doing so but in clandestine manner.

Originally posted by twitchy
We are Americans, therefore, we are far above the international law. That is the message that Bush clearly sent the rest of the world when he withdrew us form the World Court.

why??!!
what for??
what with?
i dont know!!!

Originally posted by magice

Originally posted by twitchy
We are Americans, therefore, we are far above the international law. That is the message that Bush clearly sent the rest of the world when he withdrew us form the World Court.

why??!!
what for??
what with?
i dont know!!!

Well,apparently Bush thinks he's above the law.He's God of the world.He is a great leader right Americans?

Hail Bush.

Originally posted by Heartagram



Well,apparently Bush thinks he's above the law.He's God of the world.He is a great leader right Americans?

Hail Bush.

but my god and u i think different him
ok?

[edit on 22-2-2005 by magice]

I honestly don't have a problem with this for one simple reason. He's not an american citizen.
As the US does not recognise the jurisdiction of the ICC the only law we have to follow is US law. As a foreign citizen he's not protected by US law, has no rights under US law, and quite frankly the CIA can do whatever the hell it wants to foreign citzens as far as I am concerned.

Originally posted by mwm1331
I honestly don't have a problem with this for one simple reason. He's not an american citizen.
As the US does not recognise the jurisdiction of the ICC the only law we have to follow is US law. As a foreign citizen he's not protected by US law, has no rights under US law, and quite frankly the CIA can do whatever the hell it wants to foreign citzens as far as I am concerned.

And in your mind does that also cover American's who are in a foreign land? Does international laws apply to them, can anything be done to them the American's in foreign land. I recently saw a lawyer an expert on international law say that there are laws that applies to this kind of thing and that America is not above them. So you are traveling or living in a foreign land, does that country have a right to ignore internatioonal laws and do anything they want to do to you? What about your kids if the situation might someday apply to them?

Yes goose they do, unless of course they were dumb enough to join the ICC, in which case they don't.
It's what happens when you give up your soveriegnity to a bunch of idiots in beguim.