British Ex-MI5 Head Maintains Interrogated Irish Stayed Silent

British Ex-MI5 Head Maintains Interrogated Irish were Silent

Thursday, 11 March 2010

A former head of the British Secret service MI5, has accused
intelligence services in the US, of deliberately hiding mistreatment
of terror suspects from their British allies. In the case of Binyam
Mohamed, a British resident, who was held at Guantanamo Bay after the
9/11 attacks and provided his captors with useful intelligence, which
was passed on the the UK security services. She maintains she was
unaware until 2007 that he had been subjected to waterboarding and
torture.

Baroness Manningham-Buller, giving a lecture in London on Tuesday
night, said Britain's experience of questioning suspects during the
Troubles in Occupied Ireland was that they remained silent. "I said to
my staff, 'Why is he talking?' because our experience of Irish
prisoners, Irish suspects, was that they never said anything," she
said. "They said, well, the Americans say he is very proud of his
achievements when questioned about it. It wasn't actually until after
I retired, that I read that, in fact, he had been waterboarded 160
times."

The CIA was "very keen" to prevent Britain learning how they were
getting intelligence. She mentioned the case of Binyam Mohamed, a
British resident, who was held in Guantanamo Bay and provided his
captors with important intelligence, which was passed on to the UK
MI-5 intelligence services. She was unaware until 2007, she said, that
he had been subjected to waterboarding torture.

She was surprised at the amount of information coming from Mr Mohamed,
as Britain's previous experience of torturing suspects during the
Troubles in Occupied Ireland, was that they remained silent. "I said
to my staff, 'Why is he talking?' because experience of Irish
prisoners, Irish terrorists, was that they never said anything," she
said. "They said, well, the Americans say he is very proud of his
achievements when questioned about it. It wasn't actually until after
I retired, that I read that, in fact, he had been waterboarded 160
times."

Her statement follows insistence by British ministers and Jonathan
Evans, the present head of MI5, that there was no collusion by British
security services in the torture of suspects. Lady Manningham-Buller
added at an event organised by the Mile End Group, a political and
historical research body, that proof Britain was complicit in the
torture of suspects could damage MI5's ability to carry out its work,
particularly as they had promised to cease their torture activities,
after they were found guilty by international courts of torture in
Occupied Ireland. It is believed she was ousted as head of MI-5 to
make way for more robust activities, in conjunction with the Israeli
secret service group based in London, known as Kidon who are involved
in international assassinations and the surveillance of political
activists on John Bull's other island. Some of the assassinations of
Irish activist are sub-contracted by the British.


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