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| Arabia |
| Saudis deny that freed Britons tortured |
| 2003-08-18 |
| A group of Britons freed August 8 by Saudi Arabia were not tortured while in captivity as friends and relatives have claimed, an adviser to Saudi Crown Prince Abdullah bin Abdul Aziz told BBC radio Sunday. The allegations of torture came after the five Britons and a Canadian with double nationality were released and returned home after having been convicted of organizing bomb attacks in Saudi Arabia. "We deny that," adviser Adel al-Jubeir said, adding, "Let them be examined by medical doctors and we’ll see." Of course, they’ll have to be good islamic doctors to be valid. Freed Briton James Lee’s fiancée Gillian Barton told BBC radio on August 11: "He has actually said that until the day he was released... he was tortured from beginning to end, whether that be mental or physical." The six men along with a Belgian, who was also released after Saudi King Fahd granted them royal clemency, had been accused of implication in a wave of bomb attacks against westerners between November 2000 and March 2001. Saudi authorities said the bombings were part of a turf war between gangs of westerners involved in supplying illicit liquor to Saudi Arabia’s expatriate community. The "alk runner" theory. But the men’s families, lawyers and others argued that they were scapegoats for attacks carried out by Islamic militants operating in Saudi Arabia. Prince Abdullah’s adviser rejected this hypothesis, insisting that they had been mixed up in selling alcohol, which is strictly banned in the kingdom. "Militants, what militants?" Jubeir said: "What happened is there was a series of explosions that were perpetrated by rival gangs who were involved in smuggling alcohol. We have the evidence, we have the proof and we stand by it. I don’t expect that the men who were pardoned would come out and say, ’Oh gee, the Saudis were really right, we were alcohol smugglers and we tried to shoot each other’." "I mean, the next thing you know, you’ll be saying that there are islamic extermists in Saudi Arabia." Asked about the royal pardon, Jubeir said King Fahd felt it was "in the best interest of the nation and in the best interest of our relations with Great Britain." "We just let them go to humor the infidels." |
| Posted by:Steve |