Civil Liberties
Update:Eurocontrol suggests asking governments to get it to release flight data
23 December 2011 – In response to Access Info's ongoing investigation into illegal "war on terror" rendition flights, the Director General of the European air traffic management body Eurocontrol, has written to Access Info researcher Lydia Medland stressing its readiness to release the data it holds if asked to do so by if Member States and that it does "try to be as transparent as possible."
Access Info and human rights group Reprieve recently criticised Eurocontrol for its refusal to release the data it holds about specific flights to the public (read more here).
In the 16 December 2011 letter, Eurocontrol's Director General David McMillan notes that the agreements by which it receives air traffic data prevent it from providing that information to the public, but that "we have, since 2006, provided data on specific flights hat have been investigated as 'rendition flights' [to Member States]. We would, of course, be happy to do so again, if requested by our Member States."
Access Info's Director Helen Darbishire today responded to Eurocontrol welcoming its commitment, in principle, to transparency, and noting that it will raise the matter with the Member States, particularly those which have proved most cooperative in the release of rendition flight data, as documented in Access Info's 19 December 2011 report Rendition on Record.
Letter from Eurocontrol
Response from Access Info
Rendition on Record
Report reveals Europe’s cover-up of CIA rendition-to-torture evidence
London/Madrid, 19 December 2011 - Just days after new details emerged of a secret CIA prison in Romania used to torture terrorism suspects, a report by two international human rights organisations shows that many European countries are suppressing evidence of their role in the USA’s notorious rendition programme.
The report, Rendition on Record, produced by open government specialists Access Info Europe and legal action charity Reprieve reveals how 28 countries have responded to a total of 67 requests for information about specific rendition flights carried out between 2002 and 2006.
While six European countries and the USA responded by releasing data, 16 others have either refused or failed to respond to questions about their complicity in the CIA’s illegal detention operations. The European air traffic management body Eurocontrol also refused on the grounds that it has no transparency obligations to the public.
» Read the Rendition on Record report 
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Current Results of Rendition on Record Research
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Information Released
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Information Not Held
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Administrative Silence
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Information Denied
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Denmark
Finland
Germany
Ireland
Lithuania
Norway
USA
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Bulgaria
Czech Republic
Estonia
Slovenia
UK
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Albania, Austria, Azerbaijan, Cape Verde, Georgia, France, Iceland,
Italy, Latvia, Romania, Russia, Spain, Turkey
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Canada
Portugal
Sweden
+ Eurocontrol
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Information Request Finds New CIA Flights Showing Previous Rendition Inquiries Failed
New documents indicating the movements of CIA flights through Europe demonstrate the need for new inquiries to be made into EU states’ complicity in the CIA’s secret prisons programme, according to legal action charity Reprieve.
Data focusing on Lithuania, but linked to suspected CIA activity in a raft of other countries in Europe, North America, the Middle East and North Africa, has been identified by Reprieve and passed to the Lithuanian prosecutor.
The organisation is calling on the Lithuanian authorities to re-open their investigation into CIA renditions and secret prisons on their own soil, and to look into the web of links to other countries which newly-found flight information has identified.
Reprieve calls on Lithuania to re-open ‘torture site’ inquiry after discovering suspicious flight into Vilnius
Vilnius, 29 September - Legal action charity Reprieve is demanding that Lithuanian authorities revive their failed inquiry into CIA ‘black sites’ after a Freedom of Information request – made in conjunction with Access Info Europe – uncovered a mysterious flight into the country’s capital during the relevant period. The flight, which was either not noticed or not revealed by Lithuania’s two official inquiries into local rendition complicity, demonstrates the inadequacy of previous attempts to get to the bottom of damaging allegations that have been gathering pace over the last two years.
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