By Craig S. Smith The New York Times
TUESDAY, JANUARY 24, 2006
Dick Marty, a Swiss lawmaker, is expected to issue his second interim report on the CIA's clandestine transport network of suspected terrorists with a request for more time to pursue his investigation. On Monday, he told The Associated Press that the report would not contain any new information about the locations of detention centers in Europe. The Strasbourg-based Council of Europe, which is composed of 46 countries, has been pressing governments to provide information, but many have not responded and the investigation has been hamstrung by a lack of deep resources, according to a person familiar with the review. The council started pursuing the issue after allegations emerged in The Washington Post in November that American agents detained terrorist suspects in clandestine prisons in Eastern Europe. The New York-based Human Rights Watch singled out Poland and Romania as detention center locations, a charge those nations have denied. Last week, the European Parliament announced that it would pursue an investigation of its own, starting hearings in late January with ambitions to summon government officials such as former Chancellor Gerhard Schröder of Germany, Gijs de Vries, the EU's coordinator for anti-terrorism measures, and leaders of countries whose nations have been accused of hosting detention facilities. Members of the European Parliament on the investigating committee said their aim is also to call on American officials to testify. Jan Marinus Wiersma, a lawmaker from the Dutch Labor Party, said that he was not expecting dramatic results from Marty's report. "If there was a smoking gun, it would have already been there," said Wiersma, who is on the Parliament's committee investigating the same issue. He added that the European body expects to commit more resources to their effort, including a team of full-time researchers. "We have different working methods. The Council of Europe appointed one rapporteur who has to do all the work. Our basic weapon is the public hearings." John Swift, an anti-terrorist researcher for Human Rights Watch in the United States, said the public airing of the Council of Europe report in Strasbourg on Tuesday is likely to underscore one critical theme. "Cooperation is going to be needed if this investigation is going to succeed. European governments are at a crossroads. They can decide to cooperate with this investigation and uphold European traditions of human rights, or they can continue their romance with the CIA. But they can't do both." STRASBOURG A European investigation into alleged CIA detention centers will be publicly reviewed Tuesday by the Council of Europe, amid indications that the latest report for the Continent's human rights monitoring agency will not offer any new evidence of secret prison facilities, but will explore several widely reported cases of kidnapping.Dick Marty, a Swiss lawmaker, is expected to issue his second interim report on the CIA's clandestine transport network of suspected terrorists with a request for more time to pursue his investigation.On Monday, he told The Associated Press that the report would not contain any new information about the locations of detention centers in Europe.The Strasbourg-based Council of Europe, which is composed of 46 countries, has been pressing governments to provide information, but many have not responded and the investigation has been hamstrung by a lack of deep resources, according to a person familiar with the review.The council started pursuing the issue after allegations emerged in The Washington Post in November that American agents detained terrorist suspects in clandestine prisons in Eastern Europe.The New York-based Human Rights Watch singled out Poland and Romania as detention center locations, a charge those nations have denied.Last week, the European Parliament announced that it would pursue an investigation of its own, starting hearings in late January with ambitions to summon government officials such as former Chancellor Gerhard Schröder of Germany, Gijs de Vries, the EU's coordinator for anti-terrorism measures, and leaders of countries whose nations have been accused of hosting detention facilities.Members of the European Parliament on the investigating committee said their aim is also to call on American officials to testify.Jan Marinus Wiersma, a lawmaker from the Dutch Labor Party, said that he was not expecting dramatic results from Marty's report."If there was a smoking gun, it would have already been there," said Wiersma, who is on the Parliament's committee investigating the same issue. He added that the European body expects to commit more resources to their effort, including a team of full-time researchers."We have different working methods. The Council of Europe appointed one rapporteur who has to do all the work. Our basic weapon is the public hearings."John Swift, an anti-terrorist researcher for Human Rights Watch in the United States, said the public airing of the Council of Europe report in Strasbourg on Tuesday is likely to underscore one critical theme."Cooperation is going to be needed if this investigation is going to succeed. European governments are at a crossroads. They can decide to cooperate with this investigation and uphold European traditions of human rights, or they can continue their romance with the CIA. But they can't do both."
CIA seal.
The Council of Europe is pressing member governments to provide information concerning CIA prisons operating secretly in Europe.
 
In an interim report by the human rights council rapporteur, Swiss senator Dick Marty made public the 42-member nation's preliminary conclusions regarding CIA activity on European Union soil. 

Marty reported, "Individuals have been abducted, deprived of their liberty and transported to different destinations in Europe, to be handed over to countries in which they have suffered degrading treatment and torture." The report estimates the rendition of "more than a hundred persons." 

But when it comes right down to it, no irrefutable evidence exists to confirm allegations that the CIA operated secret detention centers in Europe. "There is a great deal of coherent, convergent evidence pointing to the existence of a system of 'relocation' or 'outsourcing of torture'," the report stated while further noting that, "It is highly unlikely that European governments, or at least their intelligence services, were unaware."

"Our aim is to find out the truth that is being hidden from us today", he said. He adds that he is afraid of "the pressure put on the media in the United States not to report on this affair."

A researcher for Human Rights Watch, John Swift, said; "Cooperation is going to be needed if this investigation is going to succeed. European governments are at a crossroads. They can decide to cooperate with this investigation and uphold European traditions of human rights, or they can continue their romance with the CIA. But they can't do both."

The report has also been criticized for appearing to lack new content and to be incomplete. Former minister for Europe and British member of parliament Denis MacShane has said that Marty's report "has more holes than a Swiss cheese." US State Department spokesman Sean McCormack has rejected the report and stated that it was an example of the "same old reports wrapped up in some new rhetoric. There's nothing new here." 

US Department of Homeland Security secretary Michael Chertoff has stated regarding the US government that "the government acts in accordance with the law and with respect to the sovereignty of host countries in which it operates," and further stated that "The authorities are free to investigate what they want to investigate but we should not allow ourselves to be distracted from the need to identify, prevent and protect against terrorist acts of violence."

The group Amnesty International USA is calling for the US Congress to create a commission to investigate detention and interrogation practices. The United States neither confirms nor denies the existence of secret detention centers.