Groups writes Obama, says Kashamu’s extradition would be an abduction

A Coalition of Civil Society Group, at the weekend disclosed that it has formally written to the United States of Ameri­ca’s President, Barrack Obama, on the planned extradition of businessman and sena­tor-elect, Prince Buruji Kashamu.

The group, which condemned the plot, described it as an act of abduction, torture and impunity not tenable in Unit­ed States and international laws.

The group’s President, Etuk Bassey Williams, in a chat with newsmen in Abuja on Sunday said, “It is imperative that the war against terror or any other illegality is conducted within the rule of law otherwise those fighting such crimes will lose their moral authority to do so”.

He said rendition, which was the legal process of sending a suspected criminal to another country to be in­terrogated or detained, usu­ally for law-enforcement pur­poses, was condemned by the United States president during his 2008 presidential campaign.

“The high rate of erroneous renditions clearly defines its failure thereby making the need for an alternative to be inevitable. It is in lieu of this that we propose that the technique of empathy and non-torture as used by former FBI counter terror agent, Ali Soufan, which has been very effective to be adopted in addition to developing other tactical and operational tra­decraft,” the group noteed

It recalled that “Amnesty International had criticised European countries and the US for op­erating contrary to basic legal principles and has called on the US to put an end to ren­dition, conduct independent and thorough investigations in the practice.

“The high rate of errone­ous renditions, ineffective­ness of coercive interroga­tion, and the reason that it instigated an unwarranted war in Iraq, make the practice undesirable.”

The group said the US remained the undisputable hope of the world, imploring it to re-evaluate how it imple­mented the policy on a tactical, operational and strategic level.

Kashamu’s lawyer had raised the alarm over alleged moves by the United States government to extract his client, a move Kashamu said was the handiwork of opponents.

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