Police hand Libyan abduction evidence to Crown Prosecution Service

http://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2014/oct/31/met-libya-abduction-rendition-cps

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Police investigating MI6’s involvement in the secret abduction of Libyan suspects and their forced return to Tripoli have handed over a file of evidence to the Crown Prosecution Service.

The latest development in the inquiry comes the day after Abdul Hakim Belhaj, one of the men who was returned to Muammar Gaddafi’s intelligence services, won the right to sue the British government in court over his treatment.

The Metropolitan police investigation, codenamed Operation Lydd, into the rendition of Libyan opposition activists in 2004 is considering the role of British officials in the combined MI6/CIA operation at a time when relations between Libya and the west had temporarily improved.

Belhaj and another dissident, Sami al-Saadi, spent six years in jail and were, they say, frequently tortured. Saadi’s wife and four children – the youngest a girl aged six – were also rendered and imprisoned. Belhaj’s pregnant wife was also abducted.

A Metropolitan police spokesperson said: “[We have] submitted an initial file to the CPS for their consideration. The submission of the file is part of the ongoing investigative process and should not be taken to indicate that the police investigation is yet concluded.”

A CPS spokesperson confirmed: “We have received some initial material from the Metropolitan Police Service in relation to this matter. This is being considered, but the police investigation is ongoing and we have not been asked to make a charging decision at this stage.”

Britain’s central role in the renditions emerged after the fall of Tripoli in the 2011 revolution when correspondence from a senior MI6 officer, Sir Mark Allen, was found in office of Gadaffi’s spy chief Moussa Koussa.

Cori Crider, a director of the legal charity Reprieve and member of the legal team for the al Saadi and Belhaj families, said: “This is a welcome sign that Met investigators are treating the abuse of pregnant women and children by the state with the seriousness it deserves – we wish the same could be said for the government’s approach to the Belhaj civil case.

“Up to now, the gears of British justice have ground slowly for the men, women and children who were subjected to UK-sponsored rendition and torture. But these families still have hope that, one way or another, a UK court will get to the bottom of their case. Let us hope the approach to this case vindicates the principle that no one – however high he may be – stands above the law.”

Whitehall officials insist the rendition of Belhaj, al-Saadi, and their families to Tripoli was done at the behest of ministers. MI6 was following “ministerially authorised government policy”, officials insist. Ministers gave the green light to the Libyan renditions, they say.

Jack Straw, foreign secretary at the time, has repeatedly said he will say nothing about the affair until the police investigation is over.

In an interview with the BBC at the time of the original disclosures about the abductions, Straw said the Labour government had been opposed to unlawful rendition.

“We were opposed to any use of torture or similar methods. Not only did we not agree with it, we were not complicit in it and nor did we turn a blind eye to it.”

But Straw added: “No foreign secretary can know all the details of what its intelligence agencies are doing at any one time.”

Tony Blair said at the time the story first emerged: “Our security services do a very difficult job in very difficult circumstances … about the Belhaj case, I don’t have any recollection at all.