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Yard to investigate MI5 torture claims
Joe Murphy26.03.09
Scotland Yard has been called in to investigate whether British agents colluded in the torture of Binyam Mohamed.
The probe means MI5 and MI6 officers could be prosecuted if they turned a blind eye to abuse carried out by foreign allies.
Met Commissioner Sir Paul Stephenson has been asked by ministers to assemble a team of senior detectives to carry out the inquiry, the Evening Standard understands. Officers will be given access to secret papers and allowed to question spies about what they knew and whether they could have stopped any torture.
Mr Mohamed, who lives in south-west London, claims he was tortured repeatedly while detained as a suspected terrorist. He says that while held in Morocco his chest and penis were slashed, and that he was “routinely humiliated” when held for more than four years at the American detention camp at Guantanamo Bay.
Sources close to the intelligence world insist officers were right to consider Mr Mohamed a terror suspect because he was allegedly stopped while trying to fly from Pakistan to London using a false passport. However that would not justify torture under British law.
He alleges UK secret service agents knew about, and co-operated in, his torture because, he claims, 70 per cent of the questions put to him while in American custody in Morocco came from sources in Britain.
He said: “If it wasn't for the British involvement at the beginning of the interrogations in Pakistan, and suggestions that were made by MI5 to the Americans of how to get me to respond, I don't think I would have gone to Morocco.”
An announcement of the police investigation was being made by Attorney General Baroness Scotland who was asked to review the claims. She was given access to papers from the security and intelligence agencies, the Home Office and the Foreign Office. Critics will see her decision as a strong suggestion that there is high-level concern about the handling of the case.
A judicial inquiry into the claims has been urged by the former director of public prosecutions, Sir Ken Macdonald. He said if true the torture allegations would “undermine to a shocking degree repeated statements by very senior ministers, including to Parliament”.
Ministers from the Prime Minister down have given assurances the UK does not practise or condone torture. But the US has admitted using “waterboarding” — where suspects are made to feel as though they are drowning — as a form of interrogation.
Mr Mohamed is Ethiopian born and came to Britain as an asylum seeker in 1994. He went abroad in 2001, apparently heading for Chechnya before allegedly diverting to Afghanistan and Pakistan.
He was accused by US authorities of planning a “dirty bomb” attack and being trained at a terrorist camp. He denied the allegations and says he was trying to shake off a drug addiction.
Reader views (13)
This enquiry has all the hallmarks of a red herring to distract people from the disaster that this government has created. If the trail leads to the top then it is going to be Blair not Brown. It is a pathetic attempt to keep on side the "Not In My Name@ protestors, win over those muslims that believe in democracy ( although not for their wives) and generally try to persuade us that we have mistaken this Brown for one of the same name who used be in the government and looked very much like the current PM but of course wasn't.
- Gazza, london.england
An innocent man was tortured for no gain and people on this site seem to be able to justify this based on his immigration status and religion. Shame on you!!!!
It is the people with attitudes like this that are the real threat to this country
- Stuart, UK
Keith Lonsdale... I couldn't agree more. It's time this country stopped listening to the bleeding liberals... this man is not British...and if we are ‘at war’ on terror we should all realise that war’s are not won by the use of harsh words or by playing by ‘the rules’... there are no rules
- Ade, London
Oh, so it`s OK to torture anyone who isn`t born British...
That is a terrifing thought and I remind everyone that traditional English values include being equal under the law. That means everybody, including Binyam Mohammed and any other victim of such a vicious smear campaign.
- Clive Allen, Brighton, UK
Kick this waste of space back to an Islamic country. I have no problem with British forces using whatever means necessary to protect our country. Binyam Mohamed is obviously building his case to claim compensation ... what a surprise.
- Shirley, London
Just what the hell is this country of ours doing? Giving oxygen to the rnsid bleatings of a UK citizen who was at a Training Camp for terrorists and travelling under a flase passport?
It drives me mad reading this tripe - we are more concerned about 'the rules' than we are about the bigger picture of terror and destruction of our nation.
Our enemy would seek our destruction by any means and yet we want to play by the rules. Get real and fight fire with fire.
- Chris Williams, Cardiff
Which Ministers have called on the Met to investigate this? I’d like to call on these nameless meddlers to reveal themselves and explain why this is a better way for the police to spend their time than being out on the streets stopping rapists and muggers.
- St, London
why is he still in the UK? if we are so bad go home
As every day goes by I detest our Prime Minister even more
- L Parker, london
The BBC are still insisting on referring to this man as "British resident Binyam Mohamed" in a deliberate attempt to fool people into thinking that he is British. He is not. He is an illegal immigrant whose asylum claim was rejecte as groundless, yet he was not removed. He decided that Britain was not Islamic enough for him so he went to Chechnya and then Afghanistan, both hotbeds of Islamist terrorism, before being caught in Pakistan with forged documents.
He is more likely than is not an enemy of Britain and personally I don't care what happened to him as a result of that, nor what happens to him in the future.
I just want him booted out of this country immediately.
- Keith Lonsdale, Doncaster
What a shocking waste of public money.
- Ben Farrell, London
If they find the guy, they should give him a medal for doing what is necessary to defend the UK from Islamist terror.
Pity they didn't take the same attitude with Irish Nationalist and Loyalist terrorists in Northern Ireland over the past 30 years.
- Eoin Mcgreeghan, Derry, NI
What an unbelievable waste of money. Whilst real British citizens, who do not wish the destruction of our society, are being turned out of their homes onto the streets.
- Frank, Home Counties, England.
Why waste their precious time on this bloke?
- Steve, London
