[Cross-posted from European Tribune – where dissent is NOT troll rated!]
Secretive court orders GCHQ to destroy stolen documents | Reprieve – April 2015 |
The UK’s Investigatory Powers Tribunal (IPT) has today ordered intelligence agency GCHQ to destroy illegally collected communications of a Libyan rendition victim.
Today’s decision marks the first time in the IPT’s fifteen-year history that it has upheld a complaint against the security services. It is also thought to be the first time the secretive tribunal has ordered an intelligence agency to give up surveillance material.
The messages to be destroyed are legally privileged communications belonging to former Gaddafi opponent Sami al-Saadi. Mr al-Saadi was kidnapped in a joint MI6-CIA operation and ‘rendered’ to Libya in 2004 – with his wife and four children between the ages of six and twelve. The same month his colleague Libyan politician Abdul-Hakim Belhaj was also seized and delivered to Gaddafi, along with his pregnant wife Fatima Boudchar.
Both families have brought civil claims against the then-Foreign Secretary Jack Straw, former MI6 counter-terror head Sir Mark Allen, and the UK Government for their kidnap. The al-Saadi family settled their civil claim in December 2012 for 2.2 million pounds; the Belhaj claim comes before the Supreme Court this year. A Metropolitan Police investigation into both kidnappings, Operation Lydd, is thought to be near conclusion and with the CPS for a charging decision.
○ Abdel Hakim Belhaj gets £500,000 compensation as May apologises ‘unreservedly’ for UK’s conduct on rendition and torture in Libya
○ UK government trying to block release of files exposing Gaddafi links
From my recent diary …
○ CIA Heinous Crimes – A Trail of Blood
