Gitmo victim: ‘Ticking time bomb intel is falsity, people say anything to stop torture’
Former Bagram and Guantanamo detainee Moazzam Begg, who was subject to abuse and mentioned in the Senate committee report, dismissed claims that CIA torture could be justified, sharing his own experience with RT. He once made up facts to end the torture.
READ MORE: 10 most shocking facts we found in CIA torture report
Begg was released without charge after nearly three years in
custody – first at Afghanistan’s Bagram base, then at Guantanamo
Bay prison. He says he was beaten there and deprived of sleep.
Begg is now living in the UK, campaigning for the rights of
detainees.
RT:How close was the cooperation between US
and UK intelligence in the post-9/11 era? Is it possible that
London was unaware of the CIA’s torture tactics?
Moazzam Begg: No, they were both working hand in glove.
I was at every leg of my journey – whether it was being held in
Pakistan by the Secret Intelligence Services along with the CIA ,
or whether it was at Bagram or Kandahar, which were the US
military detention sites, or at Guantanamo – I was interrogated
by MI5 and MI6 agents more times than I can remember. And so were
the 15 other British citizens or residents...In fact, one, who’s
still there, Shaker Aamer, he maintains that his head was
repeatedly smashed against the wall in the Bagram facility in
Afghanistan while MI5 agents looked on. So we have no doubt in
our minds at all that the British intelligence services were
completely involved at every level. And a couple of years ago,
actually, a criminal investigation – the first time in British
history – began of the MI5 and MI6 agents. You had British police
officers going over to Libya, going over to Guantanamo, speaking
to us over here, taking testimony from us in relation to what we
saw and witnessed from these agents. So it goes right to the top
and there’s simply no denying that Britain was involved.
RT:The Senate report mentions specifically that
information obtained from you – under torture – by the CIA helped
British intelligence capture Al-Qaeda’s top UK operative. Can you
comment on that?
MB: Well, I’ve seen that report and I think that
it’s just a complete falsity, and I’ll tell you why. It says that
a picture was drawn based upon what I had said and that that
picture was then taken and used as intelligence. The truth is
that I have no idea what the individual looked like. And under
torture you would say absolutely anything in order to get people
off your back.
RT:So that mention of you in the report is
false?
MB: No. The mention of me is correct, but…
RT:What they’ve got from you was
false?
MB: Yes. What they got from me was from...I’m
trying to explain to you under which circumstance. They had me in
a room with my hands tied behind my back to my legs. They were
punching and kicking me. They had a hood placed over my head. And
they lifted the hood up and waved a picture of a woman and
children in front of me and said – while there was a sound of a
woman screaming next door, which they led to me to believe was my
wife being tortured – they said that if you don’t cooperate with
us we’ll send you to Egypt or to Syria. At the end of this
process, that’s when I said, 'OK I’ll cooperate. I’ll do whatever
you want, I’ll sign documents.' And I did. And this is what
numerous people have done in US military custody.
RT:Just to get this straight: did you or
did you not lead them to capture Al-Qaeda’s top UK operative? Did
you know who this person was?
MB: No, I didn’t. I didn’t know at all. What I
did is that they asked me to do this sort of a photo-fit type
thing. And I had no idea at all what he looked like, but
nonetheless, at least, that got them off my back. And those are
the sort of things I think many people did. It wasn’t just me.
RT:UK officials say that they would only
have asked for information to be redacted out of the report if
there had been a threat to national security. Is that a fair
point?
MB: You don’t know because when they say this,
they’ve argued these cases before in relation to UK security.
Let’s not forget – this was torture. This was cruel, abusive,
inhumane, and degrading treatment that was taking place. They can
argue and say ‘yes, this is what helped to thwart attacks and
catch people and so forth.’ The truth is much more sinister. It’s
that people have been tortured in ways...at least, the Americans
have come clean with that. Britain still remains silent, at best,
and at worst, it’s simply covering it up by saying: 'We’re going
to have these torture inquiries; we’re going to have this torture
investigations.' And in reality, nothing has come up from it. In
fact, the inquiry that your report was talking about, the
judge-led inquiry by Peter Gibson, was then handed over to the
Intelligence and Security Committee, which itself oversees the
MI5 agency. So, it’s essentially MI5 policing itself. So, we
can’t expect any great deal of transparency coming from over
there.
READ MORE: CIA torture: MPs, human rights groups demand judicial inquiry into UK complicity