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MI5
faces Bangladesh torture claims: report
LONDON
(AFP) - A Briton who claims he was tortured in Bangladesh
with the complicity of MI5 intelligence agents is to take
legal action against the Home Office, The Guardian reported
on Wednesday. Jamil Rahman says he faced repeated beatings
by Bangladeshi agents over more than two years while MI5
officers turned a blind eye, the paper said.
A
demonstration against torture in Washington, DC last year.
A Briton who claims he was tortured in Bangladesh with the
complicity of MI5 intelligence agents is to take legal action
against the Home Office, a newspaper has reported.
Intelligence
agents from Britain have been accused of collusion in torture
of British nationals in many countries including Pakistan
and Egypt, and human rights group Amnesty International
wants an independent probe into such claims.
Police
said in March they would investigate claims that MI5 was
complicit in the torture of former Guantanamo Bay detainee
Binyam Mohamed in Pakistan. In the latest allegations, Rahman
said he was arrested in 2005 by police in Bangladesh, where
he settled after marrying a Bangladeshi woman. He suspects
two Europeans were present when he was detained, directing
local officers.
Over
three weeks of interrogation, he agreed to make taped confessions
to terrorist offences, including that he was the mastermind
behind the July 2005 suicide bombings in London, which killed
52 people. He was then questioned by two MI5 agents called
Liam and Andrew and told them the confessions were false,
the paper said. Shortly after, they left the room and he
was beaten and told his wife would be raped.
After
his release, he was frequently summoned for fresh interrogations
by MI5 and Bangladeshi officials over the next two years,
it was reported. The Guardian said lawyers for Rahman, who
now lives in Britain, claim to have evidence including eyewitness
testimony and medical information. A spokeswoman for the
Home Office confirmed Rahman's lawyers had written to Home
Secretary Jacqui Smith and the government would respond
"in due course".
"The
government unreservedly condemns the use of torture as a
matter of fundamental principle and works hard with its
international partners to eradicate this abhorrent practice
worldwide," she said. "The security and intelligence
agencies do not participate in, solicit, encourage or condone
the use of torture or inhumane or degrading treatment.
"For reasons
both ethical and legal, their policy is not to carry out
any action which they know would result in torture or inhuman
or degrading treatment." The Guardian said Smith was
being accused of complicity in assault, unlawful arrest,
false imprisonment and human rights breaches.
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