South Africa in court over Pakistani's "rendition"

By Staff
|
Google Oneindia News

JOHANNESBURG, June 8 (Reuters) Deported on a chartered plane and never heard from again.

Khaled Rashid's lawyers say his story mirrors that of other suspects believed to have disappeared into secret prisons as part of Washington's ''war on terrorism''.

But Rashid vanished in South Africa, where the post-apartheid constitution provides some of the world's strongest human rights guarantees and officials deny that there was anything irregular about his case.

Now Rashid's lawyers have taken the government to court to find out what happened to him, and whether South Africa is cooperating with foreign security agencies in the ''rendition'', or kidnapping, of terror suspects for interrogation.

''Beyond a reasonable doubt this was a case of rendition,'' said Zahir Omar, one of the Rashid's family lawyers.

''Here is a man who was kidnapped, sent to a military base and whisked away to who knows where. This is not the kind of thing that happens in a democracy.'' The Pretoria High Court this week forced South Africa's Ministry of Home Affairs to divulge more about what happened to Rashid following his arrest as an illegal alien in November.

But the answers have been patchy -- spurring Omar to ask the court to order the ministers of home affairs, security inndintelligence to answer direct questions on what happened to the former supermarket worker.

WORLDWIDE NETWORK The Rashid case comes as a European watchdog yesterday released a report saying that 14 European countries colluded with a ''spider's web'' of secret prisons and prisoner transfers run by the U.S. Central Intelligence Agency.

The report, by the parliamentary assembly of the Council of Europe, said both eastern and western European countries played active or passive roles in the ''rendition'' programme.

Washington says it acts with the knowledge of governments concerned and acknowledges the secret transfer of some terrorist suspects between countries, although it denies any wrongdoing.

South Africa has not been formally implicated in the programme, but Rashid's lawyers say they believe it, too, is cooperating with Washington.

Home Affairs officials said Rashid, who is about 34, departed in an aircraft chartered by police on November 6. The aircraft, registered in the United Arab Emirates, left from Pretoria's Waterkloof airforce base and the ministry said it had no details on where it eventually landed.

Ministry of Home Affairs spokesman Nkosana Sibuyi said there was nothing irregular about Rashid's deportation, and that as far as the ministry was concerned he was back in Pakistan.

''We deport close to 10,000 people per annum and they are deported from different areas. There is nothing strange about this,'' he said, adding the ministry had provided information on the flight, as well as the Pakistani officials who were due to receive Rashid.

Rudolph Jansen, national director for Lawyers for Human Rights, said the government's response in the Rashid case showed it was not a ''bona fide deportation''.

''In the world that we live in today it should not be difficult for any government to show where they put people, in South Africa or in Pakistan or wherever,'' Jansen said.

''The fact that they are skirting the very obvious issue of where this guy makes one feel extremely uncomfortable.'' REUTERS SK VC0425

For Daily Alerts
Get Instant News Updates
Enable
x
Notification Settings X
Time Settings
Done
Clear Notification X
Do you want to clear all the notifications from your inbox?
Settings X
X