By Mark Curtis and Matt Kennard Declassified UK, 17 September 2019 The United Kingdom is fighting at least seven covert wars largely outside parliamentary or democratic oversight. The British government states that its policy on the covert wars it fights is “not to comment, and to dissuade others from commenting or speculating, about the operational […]
Topic: Libya
by Mark Curtis Published in Middle East Eye, 3 May 2019 Eight years on from Nato’s war in Libya in 2011, as the country enters a new phase in its conflict, I have taken stock of the number of countries to which terrorism has spread as a direct product of that war. The number is at […]
by Mark Curtis Published in Middle East Eye, 21 October 2018 Twelve years ago this month, WikiLeaks began publishing government secrets that the world public might otherwise never have known. What it has revealed about state duplicity, human rights abuses and corruption goes beyond anything published in the world’s “mainstream” media. On 14 October Ecuador partly restored […]
by Mark Curtis Published in Middle East Eye, 3 July 2018 Three years ago on 26 June, a 23-year-old Tunisian armed with a machine gun mowed down 38 tourists at a beach hotel in the resort of Port El Kantaoui. Thirty British tourists were among the dead in the worst attack on Britons since […]
Published in Middle East Eye, 14 June 2018 by Mark Curtis Seven years on from the British-led NATO war in Libya in 2011 to remove leader Muammar Gaddafi, the country remains riddled with conflict and lacks effective governance. And one year on from terrorist attacks in the UK whose perpetrators are linked to that […]
Published in Middle East Eye, 6 April 2018 by Mark Curtis In the current crisis with Moscow, British Foreign Secretary Boris Johnson has written that “Russia cannot break international rules with impunity”. Britain, along with Russia, has a particular obligation to uphold international law since it is one of the five permanent members of the […]
Article published in Middle East Eye, 5 April 2018 By Mark Curtis The revelation that the British government likely had contacts with the Libyan Islamic Fighting Group (LIFG) and the 17 February Martyrs Brigade during the 2011 war in Libya – groups for which the 2017 Manchester bomber and his father reportedly fought at […]
Documents ‘US embassy cables: UK feared hero’s funeral for Megrahi’ (US Embassy, UK, 25 February 2010) ‘US embassy cables: Britain feared Libya would “cut us off at the knees” if Megrahi was not released’ (US Embassy, Libya, 16 August 2009) ‘US embassy cables: US suspicion surrounds Tony Blair’s visit to Libya’ (US Embassy, Libya, 23 […]
Evidence suggests that one of the London attackers, Rachid Redouane, was in effect part of the broad UK-backed covert strategy to oust Syria’s Assad, following his similar role in Libya in 2011. It is also possible that Redouane could have been trained by Qatari special forces in Libya in 2011, as part of a broad […]
The Telegraph reports that London attacker Rachid Redouane fought in the 2011 British/NATO war against Qadafi – as did Salman Abedi, the Manchester bomber – and joined a militia which went on to send jihadist fighters to Syria. In Libya, he is believed to have fought with the Liwa al Ummah unit.[1] The Liwa al […]