Attorney General turns down call to refer torture claims to police

The claims were made in a November 2009 report by Human Rights Watch and referred to Lady Scotland by David Davis, Tory MP for Haltemprice and Howden.

The report, Cruel Britannia, contained allegations that agents were complicit in the torture of five UK nationals at the hands of the Pakistani intelligence agencies.

Four of the men claimed to have met British officials while in Pakistani detention at times when they showed “clear and visible signs of torture”.

But in a statement the Attorney General’s office said Lady Scotland had not asked the police to investigate.

The spokesman said a referral was not needed as the report could be made available to Scotland Yard directly for study.

In two of the cases referred to in the report claims of complicity in torture were explicitly rejected by British courts, the spokesman said.

They included that of Rangzieb Ahmed who was sentenced to life imprisonment in December 2008 for directing terrorist activities. Another was Salahuddin Amin, from Luton, who was found guilty of taking part in a plot to blow up the Bluewater shopping centre in Kent and the Ministry of Sound nightclub in London.

The spokesman said: “The Attorney notes that the English courts have rejected claims that alleged UK complicity in ill-treatment amounted to abuse of process in the criminal cases of two of these individuals covered by the report – Rangzieb Ahmed and Salahuddin Amin.

“The Court of Appeal upheld these findings of the trial judges in both cases, pending a final appeal by Rangzieb Ahmed.

“It is not possible to go into further detail on individual cases for various reasons, including some that are the subject of ongoing legal proceedings.”

The Attorney’s office rejected calls for a judicial inquiry.

Detectives are investigating a claim MI5 was complicit in the torture of former Guantanamo Bay detainee Binyam Mohamed and claims MI6 was complicit in the torture of a non-Briton in a separate case.