European Parliament urges Romania to reopen investigations into CIA secret prisons

The European Parliament passed a resolution on Tuesday urging Romania to reopen the investigations into alleged CIA secret detention sites in the country. The resolution also refers to Poland, Lithuania and other countries.

The EP resolution asks "judicial authorities in Romania to resume an independent investigation into CIA secret detention spaces on its territory based on new evidence that revealed CIA flight connections between Lithuania and Romania." In addition, Lithuania and Poland received similar requests. European Parliament also calls on Finland, Denmark, Portugal, Italy, the UK, Germany, Spain, Spain, Ireland, Cyprus, Romania and Poland to disclose all information on suspect planes associated with the CIA on their soil. The resolution was supported by 568 EP members, 34 were against and 77 abstained. "Lack of transparency, classification of documents, prevalence of national and political interests (…) lack of rigorous investigative techniques and of cooperation are among the obstacles," reveals the EP resolution. "Today’s vote is a victory for the European Parliament. It has upheld its insistence on the truth rather than denying and forgetting it. It has ensured that the Union’s democratic roots prevail over national and partisan considerations," said Hélène Fleutre, rapporteur and French Euro-Deputy representing the French green party. “This is an excellent outcome. The report has now been overwhelmingly endorsed by MEPs from all political groups, so it sends a very powerful signal,” said Nicolas Beger, Director of Amnesty International’s European Institutions Office. “We’ve been campaigning for urgent attention to this issue since the last report in 2007. But much remains to be done. We now need to see tangible action by the various governments, and an end to their evasion of responsibility.” ‘The report supports the existence of a vast, secret and illegal system which led to acts of torture and forced disappearances. It is based on new facts revealed, in particular, in aerial databases held by Eurocontrol. An EP study called ‘The Results of Inquiries into the CIA’s Programme of Extraordinary Rendition and Secret Prisons in European States in Light of New Legal Framework Following the Lisbon Treaty’ conducted by Policy Department C shows that : "active and/or passive cooperation with the CIA between 2001 and 2005 is imputed the 12 states under examination, with charges that include hosting a secret detention facility (Romania, Lithuania and Poland); involvement in, or knowledge of, the detention, rendition and/or torture of detainees (all 12 states); collusion with the US to prevent effective investigation (Denmark), mistreatment, organizing dummy flights to conceal other flights and the involvement in, or knowledge of, the use of airspace or airports to transfer prisoners."