Flight Logs Reveal Hundreds of CIA Flights to Europe: Report

Agence France-Presse

Thursday 01 December 2005

More than 300 CIA flights have landed at European airports, a British newspaper said, adding a new element to claims that Washington has been transporting terrorist suspects to secret prisons in Europe.

The Guardian daily said it had seen flight logs documenting the flights by 26 planes operated by the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA).

The information showed an "unprecedented" amount of travel by the agency but did not reveal which planes took part in alleged prison transfers, it said.

The CIA has been accused in reports of using European countries for the transport, illegal detention and torture of suspected Islamist terrorists in the wake of the September 11, 2001 attacks on the United States.

Outrage over the reports mounted in Europe this week as EU Justice Commissioner Franco Frattini threatened sanctions on Monday for any member nation hosting CIA prison camps on their soil.

The Council of Europe's parliamentary assembly has announced a probe into reports of the clandestine prisons, including one that may be in Romania.

The Guardian said the flight logs revealed that the CIA visited Germany 96 times and Britain 80 times, though when charter flights were added this figure rose to more than 200.

France was only visited twice and Austria not at all, the newspaper said.

The logs also showed regular trips to eastern Europe, including 15 stops in Prague.

"Only one visit is recorded to the Szymany airbase in northeast Poland, which has been identified as the alleged site of a secret CIA jail," The Guardian reported.

Poland and Romania have denied hosting CIA prisons, it added.

The Guardian said the flight logs were obtained from Federal Aviation Administration data and sources in the aviation industry.

The United States has promised a timely and forthright reply to a EU letter demanding answers following the reports.

The issue threatens to dominate a five-day swing through the continent next week by Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice, after European Union chiefs warned member states involved in the alleged scheme could face sanctions.

Rice received the two paragraph letter from British Foreign Secretary Jack Straw, State Department spokesman Sean McCormack told reporters.

"We will ... endeavor to respond to this letter to the best of our ability, in a timely and forthright manner," he said, but declined to say if a reply would go out before Rice leaves for Europe on Monday.

Germany and nearly a dozen other European countries have launched their own investigations into alleged CIA flights transporting detainees via their territories.

The United States has defended the use of methods outside normal legal procedures for terror suspects by arguing it is fighting a "different kind of war" against terrorism which renders traditional methods obsolete.

But it contends that it has not broken international law, or infringed its own constitution.

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'Ghost detainees' named by groupFlight logs Link

Show over 300 CIA flights to Europe; over 80 in UK, 96 in Germany.