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Arising from the latest Wikileaks documents however are three other topics, among many other, that are worthy of comment and reflection but which are barely present in mainstream coverage. They should have been scrutinized more closely and their implications discussed more fully. Two of those three are disturbingly similar.
In 2003 a German citizen by the name of Khalid El-Masri was kidnapped while on holiday in Macedonia. He was taken to Morocco by CIA agents where he was tortured on behalf of the US government. He was then flown via Baghdad to Afghanistan on a so-called "rendition flight" that had originated in Spain. There, El-Masri was held incommunicado, tortured, subjected to experimental drugs, and subjected to prolonged stress amounting to inhuman treatment.
The Americans eventually realised that he was who he had always said he was, an innocent victim of mistaken identity. They were reluctant to release him, despite instructions to do so from US Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice because "he knew too much". At Rice’s apparent insistence he was eventually released, but instead of being returned to Germany was dumped on a roadside in Albania.
Upon his return to Germany El-Masri complained to the German authorities who instituted criminal proceedings against, among others, the CIA officers responsible for his kidnapping, torture and unlawful imprisonment. According to the Wikileaks cables (http://newmatilda.com/http//harpers.org/archive/2010/11/hbc-90007831 - broken link) John Koenig of the US embassy in Berlin pressed the German government to block the investigations as the outcome could have "a negative impact on bilateral arrangements". The German government, to its great discredit, acceded to the request.
The Spanish government, much to the chagrin of the Americans, has shown greater resilience. They took up the issue of El-Masri’s treatment because the CIA agents responsible for the kidnapping, rendition and torture had entered Spain on false United Kingdom passports.
The Spanish also had another inquiry ongoing at the time into the death of a Spanish cameraman Jose Cuoso. Cuoso had been in the Palestine Hotel in Baghdad when it was shelled by an American tank, notwithstanding the American’s knowledge that the hotel was occupied principally by members of the international press. Cuoso died, along with several other civilians, as a result of the shelling.
The Wikileaks cables record (http://newmatilda.com/http/www.democracynow.org/2010/12/1/us - broken link) an extraordinary, large scale and co-ordinated effort by the US State Department, senior politicians, and the US Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano to obstruct the criminal investigation. The Spanish authorities were warned by the Americans that the investigations would "be misunderstood" and would harm bilateral relations. US diplomats sought out and communicated directly with Spanish judges and prosecutors in an attempt to steer the investigation into "friendlier hands."
The third illustration relates to the Chilcott inquiry in the United Kingdom set up by the Brown Labor government "to identify lessons that can be learned from the Iraq conflict." At the same time that the British government was promising transparency in the inquiry Jon Day, the Ministry of Defence’s Director-General for Security was telling US Under Secretary of State Ellen Tauscher that the UK had "put measures in place to protect your interests during the UK inquiry into the causes of the Iraq war."
The cable, dated 22 September 2009 did not disclose what those measures were, but it hardly matters.
All three cases illustrate a pattern of unlawful conduct by Australia’s closest allies.
In the case of the United States it is an ally moreover with whom Gillard is willing to doing anything to co-operate, including presumably avoiding an inquiry into how Australia came to be involved in two illegal wars. Anything furthermore, except observing the rule of law and protecting an Australian citizen from persecution for doing what politicians fear most: exposing their misdeeds, lies and hypocrisy for the entire world to see.
The Nuremberg trials established the principle that political and military leaders would be held accountable for waging wars of aggression. Now however, we have a situation where invasions of other countries on manifestly false and manufactured premises in breach of international law, suspension of habeas corpus, unlawful renditions and detentions, torture and other breaches of law and international conventions are carried out without those responsible being held accountable.
Where attempts are made to investigate the abuses such as those suffered by El Masri the judicial authorities are subjected to unwarranted and unlawful pressures to look the other way. The unasked question in all this is: do we really want Australia to become that sort of society? Unless the answer is a resounding ‘no’ and steps are taken to hold lawbreakers accountable then Australian democracy is under very real threat.
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