A German citizen who said he was kidnapped by the Central Intelligence Agency and tortured in a prison in Afghanistan lost his last chance to seek redress in court today when the Supreme Court declined to consider his case.
The justices’ refusal to take the case of Khaled el-Masri let stand a March 2 ruling by the United States Court of Appeals for the Fourth Circuit, in Richmond, Va. That court upheld a 2006 decision by a federal district judge, who dismissed Mr. Masri’s lawsuit on the grounds that trying the case could expose state secrets.
The ordeal of Mr. Masri, who is of Lebanese descent and was apparently the victim of mistaken identity, was the most extensively documented case of the C.I.A.’s controversial practice of “extraordinary rendition,” in which terrorism suspects are abducted and sent for interrogation to other countries, including some in which torture is practiced.
While it’s regrettable that Mr. Masri was the victim of mistaken identity the U.S. is in fact at war. In every war mistakes are sometimes made, but that doesn’t mean that extraordinary rendition is wrong. The fact that Mr. Masri is still alive and able to sue is a testament to our intelligence services.
It would have been simple for CIA to simply kill Mr. Masri and he just would have disappeared never to be seen again. That would have prevented there mistake from becoming public and saved the agency some embarrassment.
Instead they chose to do the right thing and return Mr. Masri to Germany where they captured him. He should accept an apology and move on with his life.
-Chris Jones
