The 'al-Jazeera Memo' FOIA Request: The Cabinet Office Explain
At the time the story broke Steve Wood over at the FOIA Blog put in a request for a copy of the so called al-Jazeera Memo. He received a section 27 refusal[pdf] Dec 22nd 2005, that revealed that the Cabinet Office did in fact have information relevant to a request for:
The reply was pretty clear,
So on January 24th 2006 Steve wrote back in some detail asking for a detailed review of the refusal, and an explanation for the apparent contradiction between the position of the Cabinet Office, and the position of everybody else in government here or across the Atlantic on the the existence of said conversation.
Steve's hopes of getting a reply within the alotted 15 days were to say the least, optimistic. Nearly 3 months after his request for review, he had been fobbed off repeatedly with the excuse that they needed more time to complete his request, and answer his questions.
Finally, on Monday May 8th, Steve was able to publish the Cabinet Office's response[pdf] to his detailed questions.
Yup, it took them nearly 4 months to draw up this response:
So, a request for "a copy of any memos or notes that record President Bush's discussions with the Prime Minister about the bombing of the al-Jazeera television station in Qatar" is refused with the confirmation that "the cabinet Office holds information which is relevant to your request."
A request for clarification of that point, amonst many others outlined in detail is stalled repeatedly for nearly 4 months, and the final response is to ignore all the other points raised in the initial request for review, and the explanation for the revealing reply of 22nd December when they said they had information relevant to a request for any memos or notes that record Bush's discussions with Blair about bombing of the al-Jazeera television station in Qatar - they didn't mean it!?
If this really is the case, and not the splitting of semantic hairs or a lie, then why did it take nearly 4 months for them to get round to saying so?
More to come on this over at the FOIA Blog...
David Keogh and Leo O'Connor
David Keogh and Leo O'Connor pleaded 'not guilty' to three counts between them of 'making a damaging disclosure' on 25 April. The case goes to trial at The Old Baily on October 9. I wonder what the chances are of the memo being leaked around this time.
If, as the Prime Minister said to Parliament on 28 November 2005, that he did not receive any information on action that the United States Administration allegedly proposed to take against the Al-Jazeera network, then what could the 'damaging disclosure' be?
Re Deavid Keogh and Leo
Re Deavid Keogh and Leo O'Connor:
Can the jury and public be excluded for evidence considered to be sensitive to national security as in USA where judges can also ignore a jury verdict.
As far as I know (and I'm
As far as I know (and I'm not sure about this) the public can be excluded but I don't think the jury can. I didn't know that judges can ignore juries in the USA. It kind of makes them pointless doesn't it?
Jury verdict can be ignored
Jury verdict can be ignored by judges in sentencing as happened with the al Arian case. Al Arian is a Palestinian academic with permanent US residence status and two daughters both jus soli American citizens. The judge ordered his deportation to Palestine after the jury dismissed 18 charges brought against him. He is not appealing because he wants a closure of the case after fout years. There was one other charge that was not brought before the court at all where al Arian offered to plea bargain to essentially seek closure. That charge, however, was minor and would not have been an issue of deportation. The judicial decision did not relate to this remaining charge since the process of plea bargain was still underway.