Comments on: Government Bans Testimony On Binyam Mohamed And The British Spy

By: Spies, Lies and Threats in Binyam Mohamed’s Case by Andy Worthington « Dandelion Salad

Tue, 26 May 2009 09:30:08 +0000

[...] the revelation last weekend, by David Rose, that a British spy had visited Mohamed in Morocco, and the curious and not altogether reassuring suppression, on Wednesday, of a meeting of the Commons Committee on Foreign Affairs, which was supposed to have [...]

By: Mirele

Mirele — Thu, 21 May 2009 15:00:23 +0000

http://www.cnn.com/video/#/video/politics/2009/05/19/am.intv.bradley.yvonne.cnn

Interview with Binyam Mohamed’s “military commissions” defense counsel Lt. Col. Yvonne Bradley. (21 minutes) She talks about his torture and says his story is consistent while everyone else has lied to her.

By: Andy Worthington

Andy Worthington — Thu, 21 May 2009 13:36:15 +0000

Hi Frances,
I understand your concerns, but I discovered that the Mail‘s withdrawal of the original article was actually a clerical error, in which the edited version for Monday’s edition of the Daily Mail replaced David’s original Mail on Sunday article on the website, However, I’m happy to keep the pressure on until the original is restored.

As for the informant, there’s no doubt that he’s real — though that takes nothing away from HOW he may have been persuaded to “turn” — and we will all be learning more about the story in the weeks to come, but for now the important thing is that the British government is living day by day, and, with quiet desperation, trying to stifle all thought of the future.

By: Frances Madeson

Frances Madeson — Thu, 21 May 2009 13:24:57 +0000

Andy,
On bended knee I urge you to tread carefully on this one. I keep remembering how her fellow prisoners in Bagram spread the despicable lie that Aafia was a government spy or informant or whatever parlance you wish to use. The Mail may have withdrawn and re-written the story because it was flat out wrong. When I think about it–it’s pretty handy to have a mystery informant suddenly materialize to take the heat and deflect the blame. One might even say miraculous (and therefore deeply suspect).

By: Agents Of Bewilderment… « Back Towards The Locus

Agents Of Bewilderment… « Back Towards The Locus — Wed, 20 May 2009 22:27:04 +0000

[...] Of Bewilderment… May 20, 2009, 10:26 pm Filed under: Uncategorized Curiouser and curiouser… Today, I thought that Informant A’s story would be taken up by the media in a big way, as [...]

By: Andy Worthington

Andy Worthington — Wed, 20 May 2009 21:05:45 +0000

Hi TD,
My feeling is that this part of Binyam’s story is primarily a British affair — although obviously one that involves complete US/UK cooperation in terms of Informant A’s use in Bagram and Morocco — and that it came so out of the blue on Sunday that the government has scrabbled around to prevent further exposure, and has caught the committee on the hop.

But as I wrote, it’s only postponing the inevitable, and I suspect more is coming soon …

By: the talking dog

the talking dog — Wed, 20 May 2009 20:30:35 +0000

Curiouser and curiouser. Query what role hardball threats from the Obama Administration over the so-called “special relationship,” as has evidently plagued elements of Binyam Mohammad’s litigation, have played over this proposed submission to parliament? We won’t know for a while, at least as long as matters are sub judice, which, in my lawyer’s parlance (augmented by a year of high school Latin) means simply “before the judge”… odd, that a hearing before the UK’s legislative body should be subject to such a doctrine… but then, everything about GTMO and torture and “the apparent military campaign formerly known as the war on terror” is… odd.

So why stop now? As a non-Brit, I must say it seems most odd that there isn’t some sort of in camera session available to a Commons committee, so that its work can go on, even if national security needs might prevent it from going on publicly… again, most curious… seems so… ad hoc. But then, so are many things in our respective nations, at this “interesting” point in our histories.

The only thing of which we can really be sure of is that while Bush and Blair have been replaced by Obama and Brown, the names may have changed, but we can still count on the same great executive overreach (to the point of tyranny).