Former British Spy Boss Slams US Torture Tactics

Mar 13, 2010

The former head of Britain's domestic security service has attacked U.S. intelligence agencies for keeping their allies in the dark about the mistreatment of suspected terrorists.  "The Americans were very keen that people like us did not discover what they were doing," Eliza Manningham-Buller said during a lecture on intelligence gathering at the Houses of Parliament. Despite Britain's being a key partner in the war on terror (a phrase she doesn't approve of), she said that it was only after her retirement in 2007 that she discovered alleged 9/11 mastermind Khalid Sheikh Mohammed had been waterboarded by U.S. agents. Manningham-Buller -- who served with MI5 for 33 years -- said that in 2002 and 2003 she asked her colleagues how the Americans were extracting so much information from Mohammed, as her previous experience in Northern Ireland suggested that terrorism suspects reveal little under interrogation.                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                       "I said to my staff, 'Why is he talking?' because our 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." She added that the British government had lodged "protests" with the United States over this mistreatment, but didn't provide further details. "Nothing -- not even the saving of lives -- justifies torturing people," she said. A Foreign Office spokeswoman told the BBC that it could not find any record of complaints sent by the British government to the U.S. during Manningham-Buller's five years as MI5 chief.

Although the ex-spy boss -- who now serves in the House of Lords, Parliament's upper chamber -- opened up about the torture of Mohammed, she refused to be drawn in by questions of U.K. involvement in the apparent mistreatment of British resident and former Guantanamo inmate Binyam Mohamed. Last month, a British court revealed that MI5 had been told by the CIA that Ethiopian-born Mohamed had been shackled, threatened and deprived of sleep while in U.S. custody. He is now fighting a legal battle to prove that he was tortured and that U.K. authorities were complicit in his abuse. Jonathan Evans, MI5's current director general, has denied Britain colluded in torture.
Manningham-Buller did admit, though, that these accusations had tarnished the reputation of MI5 and MI6, the country's foreign intelligence service. "The allegations of collusion in torture and lack of respect for human rights will wound [the 3,500 staff] personally and collectively and, in some respects, whether proven or not, will make it harder for them to do their job," she said.
However, the one-time spy chief added it was important for people to remember that the "men and women of different backgrounds, beliefs and ethnicity" who work for the agencies do so "without any chance of personal fame, or recognized success, because they believe in the U.K., its rights and freedoms, and because they wish to protect it against threats."
She praised British spies for their pride in being quietly effective, and for not attempting to emulate the "gung-ho" intelligence agents portrayed in popular TV shows. Manningham-Buller was less kind about the type of espionage endorsed by the former Bush administration, saying, "One of the sad things is [Dick] Cheney, [Donald] Rumsfeld and [George W.] Bush all watched '24.' "

SR

AOL