Ex-Leader: Poland Agreed to CIA Site, Not Torture

[herding cats]

Source: Associated Press/ABC

After years of denials, two former Polish leaders acknowledged Wednesday they had allowed a secret CIA prison to operate on their territory but insisted they never authorized the harsh treatment or torture of its inmates.

Former Polish President Aleksander Kwasniewski, 60, and former Prime Minister Leszek Miller, 68, spoke to journalists in Warsaw after a U.S. Senate report condemning CIA practices at secret prisons was released Tuesday in Washington. The report did not identify the host countries.

"The U.S. side asked the Polish side to find a quiet site where it could conduct activity that would allow to effectively obtain information from persons who had declared readiness to cooperate with the U.S. side," Kwasniewski said. "We gave our consent to that." He said Poland demanded that people who would be held in the country should be treated humanely as prisoners of war, according to their rights.

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Kwasniewski said Wednesday that the prison, which he referred to as a "site," was part of "deepened" intelligence cooperation with the U.S. in the fight against terrorism after the Sept. 11 attacks, and he insisted he had no knowledge of what took place inside it.

Read more: http://abcnews.go.com/International/wireStory/leader-poland-agreed-cia-site-torture-27494436

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As the repercussions of the report spread around the world, Poland’s president, Bronislaw Komorowski, said it would be critical for an inquiry underway on the running of a secret US prison “black site’’ on Polish soil. “I think the American report will revive that inquiry. I also think that it will provide, if not new information, then guidance as to the conduct of the investigation in Poland.”

Former Polish president Aleksander Kwasniewski admitted on Wednesday that there had been a secret CIA interrogation site in the country, but insisted he tried to convince US President George Bush to close it.

“I told Bush that this cooperation must end and it did end,” Kwasniewski said.

Polish prosecutors have asked for access to the full Senate report, which is 10 times longer than the 500-page declassified version published on Tuesday. That version said that 119 detainees in the “war on terror” were held at black sites around the world. The names of the countries were redacted but they are thought to include Afghanistan, Poland, Romania, Thailand and Lithuania. Lithuanian prosecutors have also asked to see the full report.

http://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2014/dec/10/cia-report-prosecutions-international-law-icc

[KamaAina]

1. Looks like someone forgot Poland

was a civilized country.

[herding cats]

2. Komorowski is currently wishing Bush would have just forgotten about him.

The question now is will the Polish prosecutors believe his claims of not knowing what was taking place there, or not?

[cosmicone]

3. Poland, Romania and Lithuania are in a soup

They are EU members and thus subject to EU war crimes and torture regulations which are extremely strict. The prosecutors there are obligated to prosecute these charges. Denying knowledge or "just following orders" is not going to be enough -- it wasn't good enough for the Nazis either and now the laws are far more stringent.

This thing has legs and many CIA operatives will be indicted and tried in absentia -- because we never hand over our terrorists to anyone just like Pakistan.

[TBF]

4. Well Poland has allowed such things historically ...

very sad that our government is the guilty party this time.

[tandrasz]

7. May I ask when and how?

>>Well Poland has allowed such things historically ...

I hope you are not referring to WWII, when Poland was brutally occupied by Germany and the Soviet Union, and had as much freedom to "allow" anybody set up camps on her territory as much as a rape victim "allows" the rapist to do whatever he likes.

In the case of this CIA site, I think the government of Poland simply trusted Americans when it shouldn't. After 50 years of communism forced on Poland by the Soviet Union, the USA was seen as a liberator, ally, and a friend in need after 9/11 attacks.

[War Horse]

5. Of course they knew

Probably not the entire scope of it, but they knew. Lots of European countries both had their govts. take part in it while their media reported on it relentlessly at the same time. Sweden is a good example. It was a safe haven for renditions, but the media (even the state run) were all over it and blew this case wide open.