Contradictions, anomalies, questions mount in UK terror scare

international | rights, freedoms and repression | other press

Thursday August 17, 2006 15:12

by Terence

So it was all bogus. No evidence.

We were told last week that the 'Terror Plot' was only days away from being implemented. Now it turns out there were no bombs made, they had NOT bought any airline tickets and that some of the so-called plotters didn't even have a passport. That would mean they would not even get pass the check-in desk. In other words there was no plot.

So it is just like all the other scares that had no substance to them and it was purely designed to hype the fear and ratchet up further police state measures and basically intimidate the population.

According to the latest reports on the bogus terror plots, there is no hard evidence whatsoever. The latest blurb from the corporate media is that those arrested are being held for longer periods. Its quite clear this is designed to stretch things out and by next week or so, the story will be dropped when they finally have to let them go free. That way most of the public will think they are still arrested and therefore there was something to it.

The report says:

Indeed, one week on, it seems that the current alert is unravelling, and that it is of a similar type to previous “terror plots” that subsequently proved to involve nothing concrete, with much of the supposed evidence resulting from the activities of police informants working as agent provocateurs.

And interestingly the report (URL below) gives an insight into the total contradictions around the Pakistani link which was one of the main bits of 'hard' evidence.

It is claimed that Rashid, described as the alleged plot’s “mastermind,” was detained late on Wednesday, August 9, causing an accomplice to make a “panicked telephone call to a British suspect, directing him to go ahead with the airliner plot,” several reports said. The government and police, the story goes, had to take urgent measures to avert this disaster.

However, there are numerous conflicting accounts as to the timing of Rashid’s arrest, with several reports that he has been in custody in Pakistan for more than one month. Similarly, the location of his arrest has been given variously as Karachi, Lahore, Bahawalpur and the Afghan border.

Moreover, as of yesterday, Pakistani authorities reported that there had been no request from Britain for Rashid’s return. There is no extradition treaty between Britain and Pakistan, but such a request could be made under international conventions.

The so-called “Pakistan connection” raises even more questions.

Reports of the number of those detained by the Pakistani authorities vary from 7 to 17. The Independent newspaper noted, “Remarkably little information has emerged from Pakistan about the arrests. Well-connected journalists are complaining that their usual sources have dried up, which is unusual in Pakistan, where the intelligence services like to boast to journalists of their successes.”

Any “details” that are supplied by Pakistan must be regarded as suspect. Notorious for its use of torture, it is one of the favoured destinations for CIA “rendition” flights. The Guardian cited Ali Hasan, a researcher for Human Rights Watch, that “torture was endemic and that there was no doubt it would have been used on Mr Rauf.”

The Pakistan government has used its role in the alleged terror plot to curry favour with Washington. Prime Minister Shaukat Aziz told a rally marking Pakistan’s 59th anniversary of independence that his government’s role in disrupting the alleged plot proved it was fighting terrorism “along with the world community.”

This has not stopped government and intelligence agencies of various countries briefing at odds with one another. Pakistan officials have been keen to insist that Rashid was arrested on the Afghan border as he crossed into Pakistan, but this has been flatly rejected by the Afghan authorities and British security sources, who told the Independent that some of the statements from Pakistani officials should be “treated with circumspection.”