New Interview With Sibel Edmonds

[G_j]

http://www.balkanalysis.com/modules.php?name=News&file=article&sid=498

Turkey: Sibel Edmonds: FBI's Compromised Security Damages Turkey's Security, Too

Posted on Thursday, February 03 @ 08:05:00 EST by CDeliso

In a new interview for the Turkish publication Vatan, former FBI translator Sibel Edmonds provides a general recap of her extraordinary story (the details of which can be found at, http://www.antiwar.com/deliso/?articleid=2917
but also provides several new details of interest to Vatan’s Turkish audience.

In the enigmatic fashion that has characterized all of Edmonds’ under-the-gag-order limited disclosures, the outspoken whistleblower claims in the Jan. 28 interview that “...the criminal activities which I complained about were also threatening the Turkish people’s interest and Turkish national security.”

This comment came in the context of Edmonds’ well-known allegation regarding former colleague Melek Can Dickerson, also of Turkish extraction and married to Air Force Major Douglas Dickerson. She claimed that the pair had threatened her after failing to recruit her into an international criminal ring that had infiltrated the US security apparatus, hampering FBI investigations into Turks suspected of involvement in what Edmonds has previously loosely described as a “semi-legitimate” organization. This group was involved, according to Edmonds, in things like arms and drug smuggling and relied on a complex web of governmental and non-governmental figures in several countries. She has not stated whether this organization has been eliminated since her sudden termination from the FBI in spring 2002.

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[EVDebs]

1. Anything new on Ptech, the Saudi software firm with FAA, intel

work going on while wargames (Vigilant Warrior, etc) were taking place 9-11-01 ?

[leftchick]

2. Very Intriguing!

<snip>

However, the biggest detail to emerge from the Vatan interview is Edmonds’ claim that the “semi-legitimate” organization’s operations also impinge on Turkish national security. She highlighted the dangers when saying that “I like Turkey very much... the Turkish government absolutely must investigate the people who I have complained about.”

When asked by the interviewer how any such investigation can be started from the Turkish side, since she is still prevented from naming those involved with the illicit dealings, Edmonds replied that “...I gave all the names to the relevant state department.”

Taken together, these statements would seem to add a piece to the puzzle. They would seem to show that while perhaps a few individuals in the Turkish government’s employ may have been part of the “semi-legitimate organization” in question, that the government as a whole on a policy level was not. This is significant as a reat deal of speculation has revolved around the extent of Turkish government involvement in the operation, since 60 Minutes in October 2002 implied that an agent of the Turkish Embassy in Washington had been spying on the FBI. Edmonds later stated that this claim was imprecise and that she had actually not been implying this.

Now, the controversy continues as Edmonds and her supporters continue to petition Congress to hear her case. However, we have learned that new mass media queries of suspected organizations in the Washington area are coming up against a wall of silence; certain powerful parties are determined to see that the full story does not come out.

[G_j]

3. I wonder if

the Turkish authorities could get access to the information if they were involved in an investigation, where we can't.
I'm not sure Ashcroft's gag order would apply in that case.

[G_j]

4. kick

[G_j]

5. more “state secrets privilege”

Privileged Torture

by William Fisher February 04, 2005


New York - The Justice Department has again asserted “state secrets privilege” in seeking to dismiss a lawsuit by Maher Arar, a Syrian-born Canadian citizen who was detained in the United States in 2002 and sent against his will to Syria, where he says he was tortured until his release a year later.

The privilege was invoked “in order to protect the intelligence, foreign policy and national security interests of the United States,” wrote Acting Attorney-General James B. Comey in legal papers filed in the Eastern District of New York.

“Litigating... plaintiff's complaint would necessitate disclosure of classified information,” according to Comey, including disclosure of the basis for detaining him in the first place, the basis for refusing to deport him to Canada as he had requested, and the basis for sending him to Syria.

He was never charged with any crime.

Arar, who has been home in Ontario for more than a year, is being represented by the Centre for Constitutional Rights (CCR), a New York-based civil rights advocacy organisation

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