POTUS, That Bald-Faced Liar

by sarabeth at 7:00 am on October 15th, 2006 in Bush Man Date, War on Terror

Once upon a time the President of the United States was, ex-officio, the Leader of the Free World. Now a Spanish newspaper is calling George Bush a bald-faced liar.

Remember when Bush dramatically went before the American people and announced that all 14 high-value terrorist-suspect detainees held in secret CIA pisons had been transferred to Guantanamo Bay?

Spain’s El Pais newspaper is reporting today that Mustafa Setmarian, an al-Qaeda leader implicated in both the 9/11 attack and the 2004 Madrid train bombings, was captured in May and continues to be held in a secret CIA jail:

A suspected al Qaeda leader, accused of being involved in September 11 and planning the 2004 Madrid train bombings, has been imprisoned in a secret U.S. jail for the past year, Spain’s El Pais newspaper reported on Sunday.

Mustafa Setmarian, 48, a Syrian with Spanish citizenship, was captured in Pakistan in October 2005 and is held in a prison operated by the U.S. Central Intelligence Agency, Pakistani and European security service officials told El Pais.

A spokesman for the U.S. embassy in Spain declined to comment on the report.

Setmarian’s 2005 capture was reported in May of this year after the United States put a $5 million bounty on the head of the alleged founder of al Qaeda’s Spanish network.

A photograph of the red-haired Setmarian has been removed from the U.S. Federal Bureau of Intelligence’s most-wanted Web page.

Pakistan has not answered requests from Madrid about the whereabouts of Setmarian, wanted in Spain for allegedly training September 11 hijackers in Afghanistan and ordering Madrid commuter train attacks that killed 191 people, according to El Pais.

Apparently, one of the benefits of these secret CIA prisons is that not only are we unable to screw up TWAT by prosecuting alleged terrorists, but we are also able to prevent our friends and allies and fellow-victims-of-terror from screwing up TWAT.

Spain’s high court is unable to request his extradition as he has not been officially imprisoned, the newspaper reported.

Spanish high court officials were not immediately available to comment.

Spanish judge Baltasar Garzon in June complained U.S. officials were concealing information on his whereabouts.

Amnesty International has reported Setmarian’s disappearance. The human rights organization says dozens of Islamic radicals captured in Pakistan are held in clandestine jails operated by the United States and other countries.

Comments

  1. joel hanes wrote:

    If I recall correctly, Bush only claimed that all 14 “high-value” prisoners
    were being moved to Guantanamo.
    He didn’t say that *everyone* in the secret rendition prisons
    were being moved, did he?

    Posted 15 Oct 2006 at 10:28 pm

  2. sarabeth wrote:

    Probably not, but whatever his exact words were, and whatever their legal parsing turns out to be, there is no doubt he gave the American people the distinct impression that the CIA secret prisons had in fact been emptied. That although he wasn’t shutting down the secret prison program itself, that was only in order to reserve the right to use them again in the future, should a suitable high-value detainee present himself.

    Most of the media reports at the time were written based on this interpretation of his words.

    There were no administration clarifications that Bush’s words had been misconstrued.

    Under the circumstances, I am pretty comfortable accusing him of being a liar.

    Besides, there can’t be much doubt that Mustafa Setmarian qualifies as a high-value detainee. So if Bush did indeed say that “all 14 high-value detainees” had been moved when there were actually 15 or more high-value detainees in the secret CIA prison program, that constitutes a direct lie.

    Posted 16 Oct 2006 at 12:48 am

  3. matt wrote:

    actually, you’re both right.

    ABC News:

    Sept. 6, 2006 — President Bush announced that 14 “high-value” detainees, who were held at secret CIA prisons, were transferred to the Department of Defense at Guantanamo Bay and granted protection under the 1949 Geneva Conventions. It is the first time the administration publicly acknowledged the existence of the prisons.

    but there is also no doubt that the coverage went a bit further:

    The Bush administration had to empty its secret prisons and transfer terror suspects to the military-run detention centre at Guantánamo this month in part because CIA interrogators had refused to carry out further interrogations and run the secret facilities, according to former CIA officials and people close to the programme.

    The former officials said the CIA interrogators’ refusal was a factor in forcing the Bush administration to act earlier than it might have wished.

    When Mr Bush announced the suspension of the secret prison programme in a speech before the fifth anniversary of the September 11 terror attacks, some analysts thought he was trying to gain political momentum before the November midterm congressional elections.

    what did the President actually say?

    The current transfers mean that there are now no terrorists in the CIA program. But as more high-ranking terrorists are captured, the need to obtain intelligence from them will remain critical — and having a CIA program for questioning terrorists will continue to be crucial to getting life-saving information.

    Some may ask: Why are you acknowledging this program now? There are two reasons why I’m making these limited disclosures today. First, we have largely completed our questioning of the men — and to start the process for bringing them to trial, we must bring them into the open. Second, the Supreme Court’s recent decision has impaired our ability to prosecute terrorists through military commissions, and has put in question the future of the CIA program. In its ruling on military commissions, the Court determined that a provision of the Geneva Conventions known as “Common Article Three” applies to our war with al Qaeda. This article includes provisions that prohibit “outrages upon personal dignity” and “humiliating and degrading treatment.” The problem is that these and other provisions of Common Article Three are vague and undefined, and each could be interpreted in different ways by American or foreign judges. And some believe our military and intelligence personnel involved in capturing and questioning terrorists could now be at risk of prosecution under the War Crimes Act — simply for doing their jobs in a thorough and professional way.

    it’s not hard to see why the media fell for it. after re-reading that speech, it’s not difficult to see why Bush’s poll numbers went up for a few days around 9/11. as agitprop, the speech is a classic.

    Posted 16 Oct 2006 at 6:27 am

  4. sarabeth wrote:

    So if the Mustafa Setmarian story is true, Bush did indeed tell us a direct lie in so many words.

    (I also want to mention that I’m on an extended vacation, with somewhat painful internet access, which is why I didn’t do myself the basic research that Matt ended up doing.)

    Posted 16 Oct 2006 at 7:09 am

Post a Comment

Your email is never published nor shared. Required fields are marked *

*

*


« Time for a New Brush
POTUS, That Bald-Faced Liar (Part 2) »