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29.03.06

The All Party Parliamentary Group (APPG) held a public hearing on 28 March 2006 to gather information. Various witnesses were called, including G. Brent Mickum (US lawyer for Mr. Al-Rawi and Mr. El-Banna); Gareth Peirce (UK lawyer for Mr. Al-Rawi and Mr. El-Banna); Wahab Al-Rawi, brother of Bisher Al-Rawi, who was arrested and detained in The Gambia with Bisher and Jamil; and Sabah El-Banna, wife of Jamil El-Banna.

New evidence has come to light concerning:

• Mr. Al-Rawi's work for British intelligence
• British assurances that the men could safely go to The Gambia to set up a peanut processing plant,
• telegrams that indicate direct British involvement in their seizure once they arrived
• the identity of the CIA plane that was used to render them,
• promises subsequently made (and betrayed) by the British intelligence services to Mr. Al-Rawi and Mr. El Banna

British involvement from the beginning

Bisher and Jamil were arrested in The Gambia on 8 November 2002. They had traveled there with another business partner named Abdullah to meet Bisher’s brother Wahab, and help him to set up a mobile peanut-processing plant.

British authorities were well aware of the details of Bisher and Jamil’s business trip to The Gambia, and had assured them they were safe to travel. In unclassified statements to his lawyer, Jamil reports that in the last week of October 2002, around 10 days before he left the UK, two MI5 agents came to his house and told him that that they knew all about his planned trip. When Jamil asked them if this was okay, they told him it was, and good luck with it.

Jamil’s wife, Sabah El-Banna, also remembers this and, if there were any doubt at all, the documents from MI5 reveal a reference to a visit by the security services to Jamil El-Banna at home, a few days before he left the first time round for The Gambia. This 31 October 2002, memo corroborates everything that Jamil has told U.S. military investigators in this respect, and this should have been provided to Mr. El-Banna’s attorneys three years ago in support of his challenge to his confinement. Not only did the two agents reassure Mr. El-Banna that he could travel safely with his documents, but they offered him a new life in an Islamic country if he cooperated with them. He replied that his wife and children were now settled in the UK, and he would rather remain here.

On the afternoon of 1 November 2002, Bisher and Jamil first went to Gatwick airport. They didn’t get very far: as they were checking in, the men were detained on the grounds of a supposedly suspicious electronic device in Bisher’s hand luggage.

Falsehoods and half-truths

That very day, a telegram sent from MI5 informed U.S. intelligence that Bisher and Jamil were detained at Gatwick under the Terrorism Act 2000. Most damaging in the 1 November 2002, telegram to the US was the suggestion that Bisher was an “Islamic extremist” (for which there is no evidence, and never has been any), and the fact that “[a] search of their baggage revealed some form of home-made electronic device. Preliminary inquiries including X-ray suggest that it may be a timing device or could possibly be used as some part of a car-based Improvised Electronic Devise (IED) (1 November 2002 telegram)

Bisher and Jamil were held briefly pending a hearing. 48 hours later, when the “suspicious device” was finally examined, it was no “IED”; it was determined by the police to be a battery charger available from Dixons, Argos, Maplins and any number of other standard electrical stores in the UK. The battery charger belonged to Bisher, and he also had a number of rechargeable batteries. In other words, it was a totally innocent incident blown out of all proportion. Bisher had offered this explanation immediately when he had been detained, as well as later in Paddington Green police station in London. British lawyer Gareth Peirce’s notes from the time record that the police had found the electrical item to be “an innocent device”, and at 5:22 pm on 4 November 2002 Bisher and Jamil were released.

This central conclusion to the episode of the battery charger – that there was absolutely nothing suspicious about it - was communicated to other British authorities in an internal memo from MI5 to the British Foreign Office. (11 November 2002 telegram) Sadly there is no evidence to suggest that this information was ever communicated to the U.S. to correct the earlier falsehood.

The battery charger incident would be comic if it were not still a critical reason for Bisher’s and Jamil’s detention in Guantanamo Bay. Despite the fact that the item was deemed entirely “innocent,” and they were released without charge, allegations concerning it appear in their CSRT’s (Combatant Status review Tribunals) as “evidence” that they are enemy combatants.

Meanwhile Bisher and Jamil returned home on 4 November 2002, and arranged to fly out to Gambia four days later. During this period, unknown to them, a number of telegrams were sent to the Americans by MI5 about Bisher and Jamil, saying that they knew Abu Qatada, and that Jamil El-Banna was Abu Qatada’s financier.

In truth, Bisher and Jamil did know Abu Qatada. However, it was rubbish to say that Jamil was any kind of financier (indeed the U.S. military has now got it totally muddled, and suggests that Bisher was the financier). Furthermore, the U.S. military has extrapolated the mere fact that Bisher and Jamil were friends with Abu Qatada (unsurprisingly, as all had previous links with Jordan), to the false assertion that Bisher and Jamil were somehow in an al Qaida “cell” in London.

In contrast, Bisher had been helping MI5 effect Abu Qatada’s peaceful arrest, with the full knowledge of all the parties. Jamil El-Banna assisted this, and the British officers had thanked both men.

On 8 November 2002, the day that Bisher and Jamil flew to The Gambia, a telegram was sent by MI5 to the Americans giving the exact spellings of their names at check in and giving their flight details, noting the delay in takeoff, and giving the estimated time of arrival. On that telegram it was written that “this communication should be read in light of earlier communications”. Further, the 8 November 2002 telegram lacked entirely the header included in earlier telegrams regarding the men, namely that the information “may not be used as the basis for overt, covert or executive action.” Instead, the 8 November 2202 telegram merely states: “This information has been communicated to the recipient government in confidence and shall not be released without the agreement of the British government.”

This time there would be no problems boarding the plane. Bisher, Jamil and British citizen Abdullah El Janoudi were met at Banjul airport by Bisher’s brother Wahab, who had flown out 8 days before the others. They were immediately detained upon arrival.

Arrest and Detention by the Gambians

After Jamil arrived in The Gambia, his wife Sabah heard nothing for 10 days to 2 weeks. At the airport, all four had been detained. They were taken to a house on the outskirts of Banul, and held together for a short period. Somehow, Abdullah managed to phone his wife and tell her what had happened. Bisher’s brother Numann went to see his MP Edward Davey, who contacted the Foreign Office.

The arrests were noted by Amnesty International, who appealed to The Gambian Government, saying they were seriously concerned for the safety of Bisher Al-Rawi and Jamil El-Banna, and expressing concern that Jamil may not have had access to the medication he needs as a diabetic.

Meanwhile, the men had been split up into two groups and moved to different locations. Wahab would never see his brother Bisher again, as Wahab was held first with Abdullah and then with Jamil. Over those following days the Americans were very much in evidence, but Bisher, Jamil, Wahab and Abdullah never once saw a British official. When they did ask to see British officials, both the Gambians and the Americans left them in no doubt that they were being detained at the request of British intelligence:

Wahab recalls: “I asked once more for a lawyer and to see the [British] High Commissioner. One of the CIA officers told me I should not ask for the assistance from the British. ‘Who do you think ordered your arrest?’ the CIA officer asked. He implied to me that it had clearly been the British who had wanted us all detained.”

Abdullah says: “The interrogations by the Americans took place every couple of days. * * * I told them the entire truth the whole time: we were there to set up a peanut oil factory and nothing more. Our trip to The Gambia had absolutely nothing to do with terrorism…When I was being interrogated alone by Mr. Lee and one of his colleagues, Mr. Lee told me that the British had “sold you out” to the Americans, indicating that the British had instigated our arrest.”

Jamil El-Banna remembers that when he would express anger towards the Americans, his interrogators would repeatedly tell him:

“Why are you angry at America? It is your government, Britain and the MI5, who called the CIA and told them that you and Bisher [Al-Rawi] were in Gambia and to come and get you. Britain gave everything to us. Britain sold you out to the CIA.”

When Bisher Al-Rawi demanded to see the British consular officials, both the Gambians and the Americans told him that the British were the ones who had asked for him to be detained.

The telegrams between the UK and the US provoke more questions than they answer

The telegrams prove beyond doubt that the UK was passing information to the US to facilitate the detention of the men in The Gambia. The UK told the US of the precise arrival time. The UK FCO denies that the UK knew that the men would be rendered. What did the UK suppose the US was going to do with them on sovereign Gambian soil? Surely it was obvious that they would be taken elsewhere, and the UK denials ring false.

The telegrams reflect some remarkable assumptions on the part of the UK officials. A telegram dated 11 November 2002, sent from MI5 to the Foreign Office, suggests that Bisher had come “to the attention of the police” because of his “enthusiasm for extreme sports”. In March 2001, for example, he and two other friends had climbed the M4 flyover at Brentford. “He is also a qualified diver, a keen dinghy sailor and parachutist.” (Telegram of 11 November 2002) Apparently, this information was meant to suggest that he was the kind of man who was equipped for dangerous pursuits, yet the notion that a secret terrorist was somehow practicing for his crime by publicly clambering over the Brentford flyover seems hard to accept.

It is clear from the various telegrams that far more information has been shared with the U.S. Indeed, MI5 does not customarily conduct its work with U.S. intelligence by telegram. Various of the telegrams refer to other communications (e.g., “Further to our telephone conversation”; “our telephone call today”; “we have spoken at length about this operation”; “we will forward further relevant information in due course”). It is clear from the context of the telegrams that at least some of them provide a carefully edited version of evidence (e.g., the telegram to the U.S. government: “The following form of words can be passed to the Gambian liaison”).

The circumstantial evidence strongly suggests that the U.K. shared far more information with the U.S. For example, it appears from its face that the 11 November 2002, was an internal U.K. telegram, yet this information has clearly made it across the Atlantic to Guantanamo Bay. The U.S. military has been sporting the theory that the peanut processing plant was a front for terrorist activities, the clear implication that would be drawn from the telegram: “Secret and reliable reporting has indicated that Wahab was taking the lead in plans for setting up the peanut oil factory.” (Telegram of 11 November 2002) Yet this was absolutely false. As counsel for Bisher Al-Rawi has made patently clear, there is plenty of documentation concerning the legitimate nature of the project. Bisher was only going to be there to help his brother for a month, and the idea that he was actually coming into the country with various peanut crushing machines to set up a terrorist training camp is fantastical.

Thus, the important question remains: What was said in these communications that have not been disclosed?

Wahab comes home, Bisher and Jamil are rendered to the Dark Prison

There was no real news for the families in Britain until Wahab arrived back on 5 December 2002, after 27 days. Before he left, Wahab had been shown a letter from Bisher – a letter Bisher has subsequently told his lawyer that he was forced to write by his CIA interrogators - saying that everything was going to be alright, and that he (Bisher) was going to co-operate with the Americans.

Everything was not alright. On a Sunday early in December, 2 or 3 days after Eid al Fitr (which was on 6 December that year), Bisher and Jamil were rendered to the Dark Prison in Kabul. It was very late at night, after midnight. In unclassified statements, both Bisher and Jamil recall that the plane was a military jet, large enough for you to stand up straight. There were more than 40 seats on it. It seemed to be camouflaged. There were at least 7 or 8 U.S. personnel on the flight. One was a female medical doctor. There were at least two women. The men were big people in black balaclavas. The plane stopped to refuel roughly four hours into the flight, and then flew roughly the same distance again.
Bisher recounts that he was dressed in nappies (diapers), hooded, ear muffs placed on his head, his legs shackled, and his arms shackled behind his back. Bisher was placed on a stretcher, shackled, and Jamil El-Banna was on the floor. Jamil asked for water, but this was refused. Bisher was in great pain because of the cuffs on his wrists being too tight. He was desperate to use the toilet, but asked three times and received no response. He tried to hold it. When they stopped briefly, he thought he would get some relief but did not. He later learned that they had put nappies on him for this reason.
“This was the hardest moment in my life,” Bisher said. “You could hear them eating and drinking. There was a snap of a soda can. There was a door that would open and close to another section of the aircraft.”
They arrived in Kabul in the morning. It was a short, bumpy drive of less than 15 minutes to the Dark Prison.

The Dark Prison

Bisher described his arrival at the Dark Prison: “They picked us up like sacks. They dragged me, and threw me onto the floor. I expected a beating. It was a cell, but I did not know this at the time. There was a terrible noise, a drone like some kind of music, with sounds mixed in. It was indistinct, something sort of satanic worship music. It was very cold.”

“I did not move. I did not want to provoke them. I desperately wanted the toilet. I moved a little thinking that perhaps with a small movement they would not kick me. Nothing. I worked the nappy down, and wriggled to the edge of the room. I peed. It seemed to go on for ages.”

“They came back in. They moved the cuffs to the front. They came in a second time. They took the hood off, and the ear muffs. Then the handcuffs. They left the feet always shackled.”

“It was totally dark. I could see nothing. They used a very dim torch when they came in.”

“I could touch both sides of the cell. It was a bit longer than it was wide. It was horribly cold. I huddled to myself for the first few days. Then I began to creep about. I started trying to pace up and down the cell. I could see nothing. ‘Wow, Bisher,’ I said to myself, ‘It’s really not that small.’ Then I walked into the wall.”

Later, there was a bucket in the room. He had a water bottle. He was passed things through one of two small hatches. Food was rare, sometimes once a day, sometimes once every second day. It was generally bread or rice, but Bisher could not actually see what he was eating. “I would feel through it to check for any crawling beast. It was all dirty, and I was all dirty.”

Bisher would divide the food into two. He would put some under the mat in the cell, saving a little for later.

“One time they gave me a pill. I thought to myself, maybe they are going to use this to kill me. But I took it anyway.”

The smell was not too bad as it was to very cold. “Constipation was a marvellous thing in the Dark Prison. I would need two days’ preparation to use the bucket for a toilet. There was no way to wash. You wash, you don’t drink. There was no top on the bottle, and I knocked it over one time.

I was desperate. I learned to move my hands very, very slowly in the dark. When it came to the bucket, you would have to practice how you could use it. I tore up one of my nappies and kept the other spare, hidden in the hatch at the top of the cell, just in case, you never know. The bucket was about a foot high, ten inches in diameter.”

Bisher had a thin blanket to sleep on. Jamil El-Banna had nothing. Bisher was never allowed to shower or bathe while he was at the Dark Prison. He was never interrogated there. He was just left. All day and night – whatever those meant in the darkness – there was noise. Loud noise. Every now and then there would be a short break when they changed a tape, or whatever they were doing. He would hear people talk in Pashtu then, and once he heard Jamil El-Banna call. But Bisher never spoke, as he did not want to provoke the guards. “I stayed quiet. I did not want trouble.”

Bisher wondered whether this was an old Russian prison. Across the ceiling of the room was a steel bar. “I was glad I was not hanging from it.”
Bisher tied the shackles with a pair of socks so that he could move without noise. To begin with he did not move much, as he would get disorientated if he did. Then he began trying to get up on the bar. He began to do pull ups on the iron beam, which was about seven feet off the ground. He pulled himself up, and found that there was a barred opening for air up there. The roof was another four feet or so above the bar.

“I tried to get the shackles off. The hatch in the ceiling had a wire mesh, and I got some. I wriggled it inside the shackles, like you see in the movies. But then I lost my nerve. I worried that some wire would get stuck in the shackles, and they would see and I’d be beaten up.”

In unclassified statements, Jamil El-Banna says that he spent 2 weeks in the Dark Prison. Whilst there he was punched, dragged along the floor and kicked. The cell was seemingly underground and it was very cold for Jamil as he was held only in shorts and a t-shirt, with no blanket. He was held in leg shackles 24 hours per day, and was shackled at the wrists for the first 3 days. There was no access to a bathroom, only a drum in the corner of the cell. 24 hours per day there was a cacophonous noise so that it was impossible to sleep.

Transfer to Bagram Airforce Base

Bisher and Jamil were transferred to Bagram by helicopter.

Two Americans came with some Afghanis, and cuffed Bisher’s hands behind him. The cuffs were plastic and sharp. They put a hood on him, and threw him in a vehicle. He was lying on his side, and Jamil El-Banna was there – they could feel each other’s hands.

Jamil groaned, as he was punched. Then it was Bisher’s turn, as he was hit in the eye. “I saw starts. Ironically, that was about the first thing I had seen for a while. My eye was bad, it gave them concern at Bagram.” Somewhere the U.S. has a photograph of him with a badly injured eye, as they showed it to Ali (ISN 1001). They piled half a dozen more people on top of Bisher and Jamil. It was hard to breathe. (From Bisher ARB Submission)

This is corroborated by Jamil who told his lawyer that when he was taken out of the Dark Prison he was taken to a helicopter. Bisher Al-Rawi was there and he was punched in the eye. Jamil himself was repeatedly punched in the stomach by US troops. (05.06.09UnclassAlbanna)

Bisher recounts that when the helicopter took off. “I thought I was going to be thrown out.” But they got to Bagram, where they were dragged along, until Bisher’s feet bled. The plastic cuffs were very tight and Bisher lost feeling, his wrists were numb for seven or eight months.

Bagram Airforce Base

On 23 January 2003, Edward Davey wrote urgently again to Baroness Amos. He had been contacted by Bisher’s family, who had just been informed by the Red Cross that Bisher “and the colleague with him”, had been transferred to Bagram airfield in Afghanistan. Mr. Davey wrote, “assuming the British government is not responsible for his detention, please could it be ascertained who is?”

In Bagram, they were imprisoned and tortured for another two months. They were beaten, starved, and sleep deprived. What is particularly noteworthy is the fact that the only information the interrogators were interested in was information about Abu Qatada. Over the years, CIA and military interrogators have repeatedly attempted to suborn testimony from both men, linking Abu Qatada to al Qaida. Mr. El-Banna has repeatedly refused offers of freedom, money, and passports in exchange for false testimony.

Jamil El-Banna says that at Bagram: “I was interrogated by the Americans almost exclusively about Abu Qatada. They wanted me to say that Abu Qatada was linked to Al-Quaida, and that he was linked to some bombing in Jordan. I repeatedly said I knew no such thing. They offered me $5m to say this, and gave me 2 days to think about it.” [Unclassified El-Banna 19/06/05 at 002]

“Then they came back and told me I could be a ‘secret witness,’ and told me what they wanted me to say about Abu Qatada,” Jamil continues. “This time they offered me $10m and a U.S. passport, and said that if I did not co-operate, not only would I continue to be held, but my wife would never get a British passport either. They gave me another 2 days and told me to think about it. Before they even left that time though, I said, if you give me $100 million, I will not bear false witness against Abu Qatada or anyone else.”

“Then the interrogator came back with 2 others, and said: ‘I am going to London. You know why? I am going to FUCK your wife! Your wife is going to be my BITCH! Maybe you’ll never see your children again,’” Jamil recalls. “I was very upset about this. I have five children, and I have never even laid eyes on my youngest, as I have been locked up in the United States all that time. I am afraid I spat at him. I was very angry. He slapped me. So I spat at him. He slapped me some more. He was a big guy. There was blood running down my mouth. By this time I was so angry, there were tears of anger running down my face.”

“After about 5 minutes of this beating, the interrogator told me I would have 2 weeks to think about being a witness, and then he would come back. If not, I would get the Dark Prison again, perhaps for a year. Then I would get 5 or 10 years in Cuba. ‘In 10 years you will have no family. Your wife will be a bitch, your children will be into drugs.’ But actually 2 weeks later they just took me to Cuba.”

It was sometime during this period that Sabah El-Banna received a letter through the Red Cross from Jamil, saying “I am in Afghanistan…I don’t know what the next station will be.”

And finally…Guantanamo Bay

Two or three months later, Mrs. El-Banna received a letter from her husband saying “I am now in Guantanamo”.

Ultimately, both Bisher and Jamil were transported to Guantanamo. They were forced to wear darkened goggles, face-masks and earphones, chained at the ankles, handcuffed behind their backs with thin plastic that caused incredible pain, and, in some cases, lasting damage, starving and sick prisoners who had been deprived of sleep were forced to maintain a sitting position, legs forward and chained without moving for nearly 24 hours.

If they moved they were beaten, kicked, hit with blunt objects. During the first month at Guantanamo in which both were kept in strict solitary confinement, Bisher and Jamil were interrogated six hours per day and kept in the interrogation room for 14 hours per day, sometimes in freezing temperatures to induce hypothermia. In some cases they were short-shackled, hands behind heels, for the entire time.

Visits by British Agents

Bisher Al-Rawi has met with MI5 agents on numerous occasions in Guantanamo Bay, and he has met perhaps 10 different CIA agents. One agent who went by the name “Elizabeth” told him: “Don’t think that leaving here will come without a price.” Bisher said: “She asked me whether I would work with them, and I said no. [She] suggested, ‘How about working with MI5?"

He first met an MI5 agent in the early autumn of 2003, fully shackled. After some perfunctory questions and answers that confirmed his work with MI5, the agent said he knew Bisher, but Bisher did not know him. This person was apparently with the British detail who had worked with Bisher previously, but whom Bisher had not ever met. The man offered him an oblique, belated apology: “Sorry about all this”, and asked Bisher where he would like to go when he leaves Guantanamo. Bisher replied “Buy me a ticket to the moon”.

During that period, Jamil was in the cell next to Bisher, and he was also taken to interrogation with this man. When Jamil returned to his cell, he told Bisher that the interrogator had asked him where he would like to go when he leaves Guantanamo and he (Jamil) had replied “to the moon,” and that the interrogator had looked at him strangely when he said that. Bisher laughed, and told Jamil it was probably because he (Bisher) had just said the same thing.

In January 2004, two British agents calling themselves “Martin” and “Matthew” came to see Bisher on two consecutive days. They asked Bisher if he would work with the MI5 any more when he got out. Bisher said he would, if what he was asked to do would help bring about peace. They seemed happy with this response, and said it would take them between one month and six months to get Bisher home to Britain.

Several months later, also in 2004, Alex, the MI5 agent with whom Bisher worked in London, came to visit Bisher in Guantanamo with a pretty female MI5 agent. Among other things, Bisher told Alex the Americans wanted him to work for US intelligence. Bisher has only seen Alex once in Guantanamo. According to what Bisher was told by Matt and Alex, “Martin was the ranking individual.” (CSRT at 23) The CIA clearly knew all about Bisher’s involvement with the MI5 before Bisher’s CSRT process. Yet when it came time to discuss this at his CSRT, Bisher was able to find nobody willing to tell the truth.

Former Guantanamo interrogators report that all prisoner interviews with foreign intelligence officials are videotaped. The trial judge in charge of both men’s cases granted them motion to preserve that specific evidence along with copious other evidence we have managed to identify.

At the tribunal, Bisher testified under oath about his relationship with MI5 and his role as a liaison between MI5 and Abu Qatada. He informed the tribunal that MI5 had expressly approved of his role: “During a meeting with British Intelligence, I had asked if it was OK for me to continue to have a relationship with Abu Qatada. They assured me it was.”

Bisher requested that the MI5 agents Alex, Matt, and Martin appear before the tribunal to confirm his work with MI5 and Abu Qatada. Very much out of character, the tribunal president recognised the obvious importance of such testimony and “determined that these three witnesses were relevant”. He instructed the military prosecutor to make inquiries and to determine whether the British Government would make the witnesses available. The British Government not only refused to allow the witnesses to appear, it refused to confirm the accuracy of Bisher’s account, thereby ensuring both men’s fate and consigning them to indefinite imprisonment.

“Assuming I lied about MI5, why approximately one year ago did a young man from MI5 come and talk to me? He asked me a few questions about a few people here in GTMO. He asked me if I were released, where would I like to go?”

What now?

Despite repeated requests to help the men, for three years the British government consistently refused to do so, on the basis that they are not British citizens. In the face of High Court litigation, the government last week agreed to intercede on Bisher’s behalf, effectively conceding that he had been assisting British intelligence. Clive Stafford Smith, Legal Director of Reprieve, who represents both men in the U.S., said: “It is very sad that the British government, which has repeatedly expressed its opposition to the inequities of Guantanamo, has to be dragged kicking and screaming towards lending basic assistance to two men who have lived in this country for many years, and who have actively helped this country. Many questions remain unanswered, but it is obvious that the British betrayed these men and caused their rendition. It is long past time for the government to allow their return.”

The government remains steadfast that Jamil not be helped, but be allowed to be returned to Jordan to face persecution, despite the fact that his wife and five British children remain here in London.

Many other unanswered questions stand out:

1. It seems clear that the two men were seized solely because of the misinformation provided to the U.S. – is there any other explanation?
2. What role did the British government really play in the rendition?
3. Why has British intelligence not corrected the misinformation provided to the U.S. concerning the battery charger that was misidentified as an IED?
4. Was it British intelligence that fed the false information to the U.S. that Mr. Al-Rawi and Mr. El-Banna were linked to some “al Qaida cell” in London?
5. Why did the British government refuse to “confirm or deny” for the U.S. that Bisher Al-Rawi had, indeed, been helping British intelligence as he honestly told them?
6. Of course, MI5 does not conduct its work with U.S. intelligence by telegram. Various of the telegrams refer to other communications (e.g., “Further to our telephone conversation”; “our telephone call today”; “we have spoken at length about this operation”; “we will forward further relevant information in due course”). It is clear from the context of the telegrams that they are a carefully edited version of evidence (e.g., the telegram to the U.S. government: “The following form of words can be passed to the Gambian liaison”). What was said in these communications that have not been disclosed?
7. When will Bisher Al-Rawi be home, reunited with this family?
8. Why will the British government not intervene on behalf of Jamil El-Banna, whose wife and five small British children have been without him for three years?
9. When will the Government announce an official inquiry with the power to compel the attendance of witnesses to get to the bottom of these questions?