Sibel Edmonds' claim against FBI vindicated

[Hamel]

Link

CBS) A newly disclosed letter confirmed charges by a former FBI interpreter that she was fired at least in part because she blew the whistle on incompetent workers at the bureau.

When the FBI fired interpreter Sibel Edmonds more than two years ago after only a few months on the job, it had no idea the can of worms it was opening up. And today it got yet another taste.

In a letter released on Capitol Hill, FBI Director Robert Mueller acknowledged that the a recently concluded internal Justice Department investigation found "a contributing factor" in Edmonds firing was the fact that she had accused the bureau of ineptitude, reports CBS News Correspondent Jim Stewart.

Edmonds insisted today, the ineptitude still exists.

"The problems were systemic problems that existed within the FBI's translation units that involve security breaches and also incompetence. These were the problems I reported," she said.

Edmonds is now working on her PhD and acts as an advisor to the Sept. 11 families. It was just after the Sept. 11 attacks that she offered her services to the FBI as a Turkish and Middle Eastern language specialist.

But shortly after joining the bureau's Washington field office, she said she encountered sloppy work by colleagues and was told by superiors to work slower so the bureau might justify demands for a bigger budget.

"I was warned that if I were to make these issues public and take them outside the bureau I would be retaliated against and I would be fired. And exactly that's what occurred," she said.

Mueller said he would work with the Justice Department to determine whether disciplinary action is required of any bureau employees as a result of the Edmonds case.

Meanwhile the bureau insists it has made progress with its translation problems by hiring more interpreters. On Sept. 11 it had only 70 Arabic speakers. Now it has over 200, but acknowledges it still needs more.

This is the lady who has the goods on top government officials involved in crimes of various sorts, including the drug trade. Ashcroft has her lips sealed via gag order, so she goes to federal prison for a loooong time if she talks.

[Hamel]

Stonewalling in the name of national security

[Stuart Mackey]

snip

This is the lady who has the goods on top government officials involved in crimes of various sorts, including the drug trade. Ashcroft has her lips sealed via gag order, so she goes to federal prison for a loooong time if she talks.

Your jocking? this lady is witness to criminal activity within the government and is gagged and under threat of imprisonment id she testifies about criminal activity?..links?

[Hamel]

snip

This is the lady who has the goods on top government officials involved in crimes of various sorts, including the drug trade. Ashcroft has her lips sealed via gag order, so she goes to federal prison for a loooong time if she talks.

Your jocking? this lady is witness to criminal activity within the government and is gagged and under threat of imprisonment id she testifies about criminal activity?..links?

Interview with Edmonds

More

Ashcroft may face prison
over 9/11 cover-up,
says Daniel Ellsberg

by Fintan Dunne, Editor
BreakForNews.com,
15th June, 2004

Two whistleblowers stood side by side before a courthouse in Washington, D.C. on Monday. Veteran of the Pentagon Papers scandal, Daniel Ellsberg was backing a protest by former FBI translator Sibel Edmonds, against a court gag order which has silenced her revelations about the September 11th, 2001 attacks.

The whistleblower pair were protesting yet another delay by Judge Reggie Walton of the District Court of Columbia in determining whether Edmonds' closed session testimony to Congressional inquiries can be declared state secrets by U.S. Attorney General, John Ashcroft.

In a statement, Edmonds called Ashcroft's legal moves anti-freedom of speech and anti-due process.

Ellsberg's common cause with Edmonds is founded on his own battle to make public a top secret study of US decision-making in Vietnam, known as the Pentagon Papers.
ELLSBERG ON 9/11
14th June 8pmET

Daniel Ellsberg
with Fintan Dunne

Listen:
mp3

Streaming Audio
Win Media 12 mins

7th June 9amET

Sibel Edmonds
with Fintan Dunne

Listen: mp3
Win Media 30 mins

In an exclusive interview with BreakForNews.com he said that Ashcroft's legal actions against Edmonds were: "clearly intended to keep her from bringing out in public information that could lead.... to criminal indictments and possible convictions of major political figures."

Ellsberg says that if Edmonds' allegations are confirmed, the current Attorney General could be judged obstructive and share the fate of A.G. John Mitchell --who in Ellsberg v. Mitchell famously tried to squelch Ellsberg's 1971 revelations, and served prison time over the affair.

"John Ashcroft may well sleep eventually in the same cell as John Mitchell," Ellsberg said.

In a recent interview with BreakFornews.com, Sibel Edmonds alleged that the US State Department had blocked investigations showing links between criminal drug trafficking networks and the terror attacks on 9/11.

"Certain investigations were being quashed, let's say per State Department's request, because it would have affected certain foreign relations [or] affected certain business relations with foreign organizations," she said. (Interview - 4:00 min.)

Enlarge

Edmonds also indicated that the FBI's intelligence translation service had been penetrated by a criminal, semi-legitimate intelligence group --not linked to any government. Her measured words hinted at politically explosive connections between non-terrorist criminal networks and the 9/11 attacks.

Since October, 2002 Edmonds has been bound by provisional gag orders while awaiting an opportunity for a full hearing and a definitive ruling. The recent moves in the case arose from a government bid to exclude her testimony from a class action lawsuit by families of 9/11 victims.

Judge Walton had scheduled Monday as the first ever hearing at which Edmonds was to be allowed counter the state secret privilege assertion by Ashcroft. But after an in camera presentation last week by the government side, he called off the hearing. Unofficial reports say a new date may be set for early July.


Talk of US government interference in 9/11 investigations, and the considerable volume of online analysis discounting the official conspiracy theory, resonate with Ellsberg.

"I'm not an expert on all this," he admits. "But I am increasingly open to the explanation that people in the administration did see this coming... and may have indeed reduced some obstacles.., or opened the door, in effect. I haven't been absolutely convinced on that, but it does seem to me to be an open question that deserves investigation."

"Now beyond that... it seems to me quite plausible that --plausible, that's all I'd say-- that Pakistan was quite involved in this, and that many Saudis were well informed on this," says Ellsberg.

"And to say that. To say Pakistan-- is to me, to say C.I.A. Because I think the relations between the Pakistan I.S.I. [intelligence service] and CIA were very close from the beginning. And it's hard to say that the I.S.I knew something that the CIA had no knowledge of."

"So if you say, do I accept confidently, and do I rely on the official interpretation? Certainly not. But, I wouldn't say that I have been yet been thoroughly convinced by any alternative."

"I can add one thing though -from my own experience, that's relevant."

"Is it possible... that an American president could have... welcomed an attack on America that he would interpret [as] justifying an invasion of another country?"

"Well, that's more than possible, that happened --under a president that I served. Lyndon Johnson did put American destroyers in harms way, deliberately provoking an attack.. in the Tonkin Gulf. Not only in August of '64, but in February of '65. ...There was an attack on August 2nd, and that was not unwelcome to the United States at that point."


Enlarge

Sibel Edmonds has already become somewhat of a flag-bearer for the diverse 9/11 truth movement, which ranges across advocacy groups, families of victims, individual investigators and a host of online web sites --all disputing the official 'Al-Qaida conspiracy' theory.

But an article today by Scott Loughrey on the Baltimore Chronicle online, alleges that Edmonds is offering a limited hangout version of events, and accuses her of "repeating the propaganda of the state."

Loughrey writes that Edmonds blames intelligence failures, rather than more sinister explanations, for the failure to prevent the attacks.

That's misleading and unfair. Yes, the superficial reports of her claims in the mainstream media focus mainly on intelligence failures. Yes, Edmonds was coy in her early public statements --out of defenence to the sensitivity of her information and the gung-ho public sentiment at the time, no doubt.

But in closed session testimony to Congressional inquiries, Edmonds has given a much fuller account of her concerns. So dangerous an account that Ashcroft seeks to retrospectively cloak that testimony with state secret privilege

And as a disillusioned Edmonds has seen her evidence disappear unremarked into the black hole of those inquiries, she has blown the whistle publicly --as unreservedly as the gag order allows:

She says the pre-9/11 US intelligence system had been penetrated by a drug-linked, semi-legitimate criminal intelligence network, operating with seeming impunity inside the FBI.

The post-9/11 intelligence 'failures' included the willful quashing by the government, of investigations tracing those criminal networks.

The 9/11 terror plot itself, intersected with the activities of a drug trafficking network of international scope, in ways that form a "crystal clear" picture of what was going on --to quote Edmonds.

If that's a limited hangout, God help us. The truth must be awful.

If it's true, as Edmonds asserts, the official line is a shallow sham.

[Stuart Mackey]

snip

Dont ya just love the smell of corruption in the morning?

[Tsyroc]

I just love the part where Ashcroft is in prison.

On another note. If it turns out to be true that a large intelligence gathering organization tied to international drug smuggling was freely working within the FBI I can just picture the renewed vigor that will be pumped into "the War on Drugs". But we'll ignore that corruption thing.