UK Govt apologizes over rendition flights

British territory - Diego Garcia which lies in the Indian Ocean

Many today will be asking who is in control of British territory after the government admitted that it had only just become aware that rendition flights to the US had stopped over at Diego Garcia in the Indian Ocean. Speaking on the BBC, Menzies Campbell, former Liberal Democratic Party leader, suggested America was “cleaning the house” prior to the upcoming US election. The rendition flights, which were transporting prisoners to Guantanamo Bay in 2002, had landed to refuel. The new information forced the Foreign Secretary David Miliband to apologize after repeated government denials that such flights did not use British territory. He said that those denials were made in “good faith” and that the government had only been alerted to the information last week. The reason they had not known about the two flights was due to “record errors”. US Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice is said to have expressed “deep regret” that the British government was misled [Extraordinary rendition (wikipedia) / Sky News / BBC / CNN]