Yesterday an article appeared in the Washington Post which dealt with this sordid story:

President Bush has been summoning newspaper editors lately in an effort to prevent publication of stories he considers damaging to national security.

The efforts have failed, but the rare White House sessions with the executive editors of The Washington Post and New York Times are an indication of how seriously the president takes the recent reporting that has raised questions about the administration's anti-terror tactics.

Leonard Downie Jr., The Post's executive editor, would not confirm the meeting with Bush before publishing reporter Dana Priest's Nov. 2 article disclosing the existence of secret CIA prisons in Eastern Europe used to interrogate terror suspects.

But the meetings were confirmed by sources who have been briefed on them but are not authorized to comment because both sides had agreed to keep the sessions off the record. The White House had no comment.

"When senior administration officials raised national security questions about details in Dana's story during her reporting, at their request we met with them on more than one occasion," Downie says. "The meetings were off the record for the purpose of discussing national security issues in her story." At least one of the meetings involved John Negroponte, the director of national intelligence, and CIA Director Porter Goss, the sources said.

I love the use of the word "summoned", which brings to mind once again how kings deal with subjects rather than how public servants interact with journalists in a country based on freedom and justice and human rights. In fact, the dictionary says "to summon" implies the exercise of authority.

Exactly what "authority" does the White House have over the publication of news stories? Not to say that I'm suggesting that newspapers (or bloggers for that matter) routinely publish details of intelligence operations which jeopardize people's lives or those important for preserving national security. But then again, what exactly constitutes "national security"?

If you construe that phrase one way, just about anything could be important for national security. Publishing how much the Pentagon pays for tires for its Humvees might be national security in the sense that the "enemy" might learn that they cost $1000 apiece and that putting nails in the streets could cause a major financial drain on the military. And so on and so forth.

The story that this series deals with however is whether or not secret prisons exist. Not exactly who was held there, not about exactly where they were, not exactly about which American government officials operated them. It's about whether or not they existed at all.

It's quite easy to brush anything under the carpet in the name of "national security". That's how they do it in dictatorships such as Egypt, which has been under martial law for 20 plus years. In a democracy, with a representational government, the public is supposed to have a watchdog role. After all, the government is working for us and we should be informed about what it's doing.

And what the government is always supposed to do is follow the law. That's a simple, non-negotiable rule. Obey the law, from the president down to the lowest bureaucrat. Sometimes the government might engage in some unsavory behavior, or be forced to take harsh measures. Sometimes the government sends in the military to blow up buildings, which might accidentally kill innocent children. But no matter what it does, it should always follow the law.

Operating secret jails is not in conformance with the law. I don't see how it can get any simpler than that. There's no point in justifying the lack of reporting on them (in the name of "national security") if they are in fact unlawful. That's because nothing undermines national security than the government breaking the law.

They can lean on all the journalists they like, they can spy on them and put their names on secret no-fly lists and FBI files, they can mutter about how "shameful" their news reports are, but the underlying REAL problem is that the U.S. government has been breaking the law. Their own laws. Perhaps even the laws of the European Union and against the principles of basic human rights. That is what matters most of all.

Despite what Bush, Rice and just about every other official has said in recent years, their number one duty is to uphold the Constitution. Not to "protect the citizens", not to "protect America from evildoers", not to fight terrorism, not anything else. Their first duty is to the Constitution - in other words, the law.

Wobblie over at Daily Kos has a good article showing how connected these major media institutions are with the big corporate interests, and ultimately the government. Certainly they are far from being unbiased reporters of the facts and events happening around the world. That's how we get redacted stories about the CIA prisons, not naming the countries where they are hosted. And yet we're supposed to be "grateful" that they released the story at all after sitting on it for over a year!

The American media isn't the only one sitting on stories, the Polish government has decided to follow Bush's lead and keep the silence:

The Polish government has decided not to make public the results of an inquiry into the possible existence of US Central Intelligence Agency prisons on Polish soil, a spokesman said Friday.

"The report should not be made public," Jan Dziedziczak told AFP, refusing to give details and saying that the matter was considered closed by the authorities.

"The minister with responsibility for the intelligence services, Zbigniew Wassermann, submitted the results of the inquiry to the supervisory parliamentary commission," he said.

"All the members of the commission said they were satisfied with his explanations and considered the matter closed."

So we've got the Polish parliament "satisfied" with non-public explanations, the German Reichstag "satisfied" with non-public explanations, and NATO member foreign ministers "satisfied" with Rice's non-public explanations. Yet all these democracies forget that it's the people who must be satisfied...

If you're fortunate enough to speak Polish, click here for a related article. As best as I can tell, a few Polish parliamentarians aren't satisfied (yet) either.

Meanwhile the story continues to burn brightly, especially after a gaffe from the American ambassador to Britain:

Robert Tuttle told Radio 4's Today programme last Thursday that there was no evidence that US forces had sent suspected terrorists for questioning in Syria, a practice known as "extraordinary rendition".

The US embassy issued a statement yesterday acknowledging that there had been claims that a suspect arrested in New York had been sent by the CIA for torture in Syria.

It is the second time in recent weeks that Mr Tuttle has had to correct misleading statements about the actions of US forces, and provoked a fresh outcry from Labour MPs over the practice of extraordinary rendition.

Andrew Mackinlay, a senior Labour member of the foreign affairs committee investigating the use of UK airports for rendition by the CIA, said: "It is troubling that they are contradicting their own assurances. We have no confidence in the denials that they have issued. Increasingly, a number of us ... don't believe what the US administration states any more. Nobody believes that this is not going on."

The US ambassador provoked the row after he said on the Today programme that he did not think there was any evidence of renditions of suspects for questioning to Syria.

Mr Tuttle said: "I don't think there is any evidence that there have been any renditions carried out in the country of Syria ... I think we have to take what the Secretary [Condoleezza Rice] says at face value ... she has said we do not authorise, condone torture in any way, shape or form."

Yesterday the embassy moved to correct his statement. A statement, read out on Radio 4, quoted an embassy spokeswoman as saying: "... the ambassador recognised that there had been a media report of a rendition to Syria but reiterated that the United States is not in a position to comment on specific allegations of intelligence activities that appear in the press."

So dear old Tuttle says "let's all believe everything Rice says" without even acknowledging that there is ample evidence that the U.S. has "rendered" at least one man to Syria to be tortured. Here's a picture of Tuttle grinning his way into idiocy.

Meanwhile over in Italy, a judge has finally dropped a long-awaited bomb:

An Italian court has issued Europe-wide arrest warrants for 22 suspected CIA agents accused of helping to kidnap a Muslim cleric in Milan in 2003.

The suspects are accused of abducting Osama Mustafa Hassan, also known as Abu Omar, without Italian permission, and flying him to Egypt for interrogation.

The new warrants allow for the suspects' detention anywhere in the 25-nation EU, a prosecutor said.

The authorities had already issued arrest orders within Italy.

Judges in Italy are much feistier and independent of the government than in many other democracies, but this seems to be a fairly convincing case of the CIA operating without the knowledge and/or permission of the Italian government. And that directly contravenes what Rice said during her recent European tour about respecting the sovereignty of other nations.

So we've got Maher Arar being "rendered" unto Syria (via fun-loving Jordan), Abu Omar being "rendered" from Italy to Egypt and poor old Khaled al-Masri "rendered" from Macedonia to Afghanistan, all for the purposes of being tortured. Absolutely despicable behavior, not to mention completely useless in fighting terrorism.

I can understand unpleasant moves being made in order to further national security, I really can. I'm not such a naive fool to think that there aren't nasty, violent people out there who aren't going to renounce terrorism simply because someone asks them sweetly to do so. But how many times do I have to say it and prove it? Torture does not work. I wrote an entire article about it. It not only doesn't work, it's actually counterproductive.

Kidnapping a man off the streets in Italy without cooperating with the Italian authorities? Counterproductive. Deporting an innocent software engineer to Syria to be tortured? Counterproductive. Snatching a German citizen off the streets of Macedonia and beating the crap out of him for months because he had the wrong name? Insanely counterproductive. Counterproductive means it's actually making the situation worse, and yet it's somehow "shameful" to disclose these acts?

And these are just three well-known stories. There are hundreds of other people who have been "disappeared" and moved throughout a secret network of jails and interrogation centers which we know nothing about. There are families out there who wonder where their son is, and have no way of finding out. And since these people are never tried in a court of law (unlike the renditions Condi Rice likes to talk about in the past), nobody will ever know their fate until they accidentally die while incarcerated or are set free years later to denounce the U.S. and whip up more anti-American sentiment.

Anytime the Bush administration goes on and on about how the "rules" are different because the "war on terror" is different, I am reminded of the story of Ahmed Ressam.

In short, he was a terrorist, a real bad guy, who wanted to do harm to Americans. When this was discovered, he was arrested, read his rights, and taken to jail. He was interrogated without violence and agreed to share information with the government, including information on Al-Qaeda. Yep. And then he was convicted in a court of law, in which he was granted all his rights as a defendant including having a confidential relationship with an attorney.

The case of Ahmed Ressam is a real success story in the war on terrorism. He was apprehended, arrested, given his rights and questioned so skillfully that he agreed to cooperate. He was then given a public trial and is now housed in a non-secret facility. That is how it should be done. Of course that was set in motion under a different administration...

Need I mention that information divulged by Ressam was included in the famous 8/6/2001 PDB given to Bush entitled "Bin Laden Determined to Strike in the U.S."? So how much more relevant can this case be?

Anyway, two more NGO's in Europe have filed a lawsuit in France:

Two European human rights groups say they have lodged a lawsuit over alleged CIA flights landing in France while carrying terror suspects. The Paris-based International Federation for Human Rights and the League of Human Rights say they want more information on at least two incidents when they believe the CIA used French airports.

"On at least two occasions aircraft reportedly landed at French airports ((Brest-Guipavas et Paris-Le Bourget) in suspect circumstances, without the destinations being clearly stated" the two groups said, adding that there were major fears that these were prisoners being transported by the CIA.

The rights groups are demanding "all neccessary investigations by the judicial authorities to shed light on these events in the swiftest time possible"."

So now we can include France for sure in the list of countries where possible CIA flights landed. And if the Italy case above is anything to go by, it looks increasingly unlikely that the respective governments were consulted. In fact, my guess is that permission to fly rendered prisoners around Europe was taken "for granted" since the countries were all "partners and friends" of the high and mighty U.S. and mentioning the dodginess of the operation might've upset their sensitive stomachs, too fragile for instance to support an illegal war in Iraq to cleanse the region of ghost weapons.

And last but not least, a senator in Ireland is raising a ruckus:

The CIA is using Baldonnel airport as a stop-over for planes carrying terror suspects, it was claimed today.

Independent Senator David Norris also told an Oireachtas Committee that the Defence Department was sending fuel bills from the Air Corps headquarters in west Dublin to CIA shadow companies in central Africa.

Mr Norris also branded US president George Bush and Secretary of State Condoleeza Rice as liars on the issue.

The Joint Oireachtas Committee on Foreign Affairs earlier heard submissions from the Mid-West Alliance against the War which claimed Shannon Airport was facilitating the stopover of CIA military planes carrying prisoners en route to alleged torture camps elsewhere.

Mr Norris told the committee: “There is now speculation that the CIA is using Baldonnel for these rendition flights and that the Department of Defence is sending bills for the fuel to CIA shadow companies at post office box numbers in Central Africa.

“This is the extent to which our involvement is mired further in this appalling filth.”

Mr Norris said Mr Bush and Ms Rice has misled the public on the rendition flights issue.

“George Bush and Condleeza Rice are confirmed, consistent and deliberate liars. They have lied and we know this perfectly well.”

Ouch!

As always, the investigation continues...

Peace