Mon, Dec 05, 2005 - Page 1 News List

Germany has list of 437 CIA flights, magazine reports

RENDITIONS According to a report in `Der Spiegel' ahead of a visit by the US' top diplomat, the CIA may have used the flights to transfer suspected terrorists

AFP , BERLIN

The German government has a list of at least 437 flights operated by the CIA in German airspace, the news magazine Der Spiegel claimed in its edition to be published today.

The number includes both movements by planes of the CIA spy agency in German airspace and landings at German airports, it says.

"Such planes could be used to transfer presumed terrorists and place them in secret locations," Der Spiegel writes.

The report comes on the eve of a visit to Germany by US Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice.

The list was handed over by the national air navigation security agency at the request of the Left Party.

A German government spokesman confirmed the government had received the list, but said it allowed only to know "how many times which planes of which companies flew in German airspace or landed at German airports."

The national air navigation security agency did not provide any information "on who had used the planes or their destination," said the spokesman.

Der Spiegel says that in 2002 and 2003 two CIA aircraft alone accounted for 137 and 146 uses of German airspace or landings, chiefly at Frankfurt in the west, Berlin or the US base at Ramstein in western Germany.

Germany has the largest number of US bases in Europe.

In an interview published on Saturday in the Frankfurter Rundschau newspaper, the secretary general of the German branch of the human rights organization Amnesty International claimed the German government knew of the CIA flights.

That assertion was contested by Wolfgang Bosach, a leader of the ruling Christian Democratic Union party, saying if the government knew of them it would be a "serious violation" of European Convention on Human Rights.

The US has been accused since the beginning of last month of having operated CIA flights since Sept. 11, 2001 using European airspace or airports carrying terrorism suspects to countries practising torture.

A British newspaper claimed on Thursday, on the basis of US civil aviation figures, that 96 flights had been recorded in Germany, 80 in Britain, 15 in the Czech Republic, two in France and one in Poland.

Today, Rice will be in Berlin to start a European tour, during which she is likely to be questioned both about the flights and the alleged existence of US detention centers for suspected terrorists in eastern Europe.

She has said she will give answers before embarking on her tour.

also see story:

CIA `torture camps' highlight divide

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