CIA prison accusations surface again

VILNIUS - Representatives of the non-governmental organizations (NGO) Amnesty International, Reprieve and Redress are visiting Lithuania, reports ELTA. The representatives of the NGOs, along with Lithuania’s Human Rights Monitoring Institute, are encouraging the Prosecutor’s Office to renew the investigation into the relocation of the Central Intelligence Agency’s (CIA) prisons.

On Sept. 13, the Redress and the Lithuania’s Human Rights Monitoring Institute lodged a complaint with the Lithuanian Prosecutor General on behalf of Mustafa al-Hawsawi, a Saudi national currently detained at Guantanamo Bay who Redress claims was held in secret detention in Lithuania sometime between 2004 and 2006.
“The Lithuanian government has said time and again that if fresh information is presented, it will consider re-opening the previous investigation. Well, here it is,” said Julia Hall, Amnesty International’s expert on counter-terrorism and human rights.

“But let’s be clear: this new case is not the only one that requires the Prosecutor General’s attention. Any and all victims of these practices have the right to effective redress for the violations they suffered as a result of being illegally transferred, tortured under interrogation and disappeared into secret prisons.”

Amnesty International is in Lithuania this week, with NGOs Reprieve, Redress, and the Human Rights Monitoring Institute, to meet with government and civil society actors to call for accountability for Lithuanian collaboration with the U.S. counter-terrorism operations.