collective amnesia and accountability-free zone

re: renditions and secret detentions

"Europe must not
become
yet
another
'accountability free zone' with
governments eager and enabled to simply
forget
the
past
or to whitewash inquiries into their involvement in these egregious practices. If such collective amnesia or
exoneration by perfunctory investigation is not challenged, Europe will be complicit in a profoundly damaging overarching
violation of international law in relation to what the USA previously called the “war on terror”:
creating an environment of
impunity for grave human rights violations and denying victims the redress to which they are so clearly entitled.
Any such
impunity would fundamentally undermine international human rights law, an impact that many governments with poor
human rights records outside North America and Europe will undoubtedly note and exploit to their advantage. "

http://www.amnesty.org/en/library/asset/EUR01/027/2010/en/17f7484c-e514-4d12-bf4f-a2a45728e5f5/eur010272010en.pdf

----i just want to reaffirm in the climate of torture, international rights law is very much a fantastical ideal . . .