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by Gaelan 2603 days ago
Has the US ever “snatched up” someone from the middle of London?
3 comments

Not in London, but GP linked two examples (one in Macedonia and one in Italy). There are also many other examples of CIA-run extraordinary rendition[1].

However in these cases they were both done with co-operation from the local police (or military) and government as part of the US "war on terror" (abductions without local government approval have also happened in the past -- Mossad did this in the 1960s[2] -- but I don't recall a US example).

[1]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Extraordinary_rendition [2]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Adolf_Eichmann#Capture

Going to throw out there that they've done the same in Sweden as well.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Repatriation_of_Ahmed_Agiza_an...

Where is the cooperation here? https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Abu_Omar_case I really fail to see it.
In the second sentence:

> The case was picked by the international media as one of the better-documented cases of extraordinary rendition carried out in a joint operation by the United States' Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) and the Italian Military Intelligence and Security Service (SISMI) [emphasis added]

A joint operation implies there was co-operation. I'm not saying the US has never conducted extraordinary rendition without local government involvement, just that the two examples aren't like that.

You are right then. I missed it because I was focusing on the way the Italian judiciary handled the case afterwards, which indicates the clandestine nature of the co-operation.
They've done it in countries to which they are way less "aligned" than the UK [0] and the UK has historically been the US's strongest partner on all things "national security/terrorism".

In that context, I wouldn't really be surprised if it's happened before, tho the blowback potential, if it should become public, would be massive so it will probably be kept under extremely tight wraps.

[0] https://www.opensocietyfoundations.org/voices/20-extraordina...

For whatever reason, the UK has been extremely against extraordinary rendition despite being aligned with the US.

It was a decent sized scandal that rendition flights had even just refueled in Diego Garcia (a UK territory).

These sorts of things can't be looked at in terms of broad 'alignment'.

Word, I didn't see that last year.

So yes, even just refueling is something the MSPs demand action over.

Not sure why that's worthy of "come on" like it invalidates my point.

>even just refueling is something the MSPs demand action over.

Yep, Members of the Scottish Parliament have been pissed off. Scottish police were blocked from doing anything however. Westminster unfortunately rides roughshod over both of them and has been a supporter of the rendition flights, as noted in the article from The Times.

>"The CIA has been accused of using Scottish airports to facilitate the transfer of terrorism suspects to overseas black sites for interrogation and torture.

>A report by Westminster’s intelligence and security committee (ISC) says that MI5 or MI6 was involved in at least 50 rendition operations."

Yes, it's contentious and causes a huge deal everytime it hits the media, but ultimately they allow refueling.

They don't allow extraordinary rendition starting from the UK.

[redacted]