New York Times article.

Several hundred other scientists over the years have had access to the material in that particular flask, but according to the F.B.I., all of them except for Mr. Ivins were exonerated. Mr. Ivins committed suicide two years ago just as prosecutors were moving to indict him -- an act that seems, under the circumstances, to be highly incriminating.

And yet, when you look a bit closer at the F.B.I.'s report, doubts persist, and they lend a good deal of credibility to the arguments of those, including some of Mr. Ivins's former colleagues, that the F.B.I.'s case, as Representative Rush D. Holt of New Jersey put it last week, is "barely circumstantial."

Andy Worthington writes.

On Friday, it emerged in a UK court that the Metropolitan Police is investigating allegations that MI5 was complicit in the torture, in US custody in Afghanistan, of Shaker Aamer, the last British resident still held at Guantánamo. In the High Court, Richard Hermer QC, counsel for Aamer, told Mr. Justice Sullivan that Met officers had visited his solicitors, Birnberg Peirce, on Wednesday. "It became apparent they are now investigating allegations raised by Mr. Aamer into the alleged complicity of the UK security service in his mistreatment," he said, adding that the police had made an application to the court "for release of relevant documents" relating to Aamer's allegations that the confessions he made in US custody were obtained through torture.

Guardian report.

The Polish authorities have for the first time admitted their involvement in the CIA's secret programme for the rendition of high-level terrorist suspects from Iraq and Afghanistan, it emerged today.

After years of stonewalling, Warsaw's air control service confirmed that at least six CIA flights had landed at a disused military air base in northern Poland in 2003.

Cryptome carries Meryl Nass's response to the FBI's closing of the Anthrax case. Her blog is here.

The FBI's report, documents and accompanying information (only pertaining to Ivins, not to the rest of the investigation) were released on Friday afternoon ... which means the FBI anticipated doubt and ridicule. The National Academies of Science (NAS) is several months away from issuing its $879,550 report on the microbial forensics, suggesting a) asking NAS to investigate the FBI's science was just a charade to placate Congress, and/or b) NAS' investigation might be uncovering things the FBI would prefer to bury, so FBI decided to preempt the NAS panel's report.

Guardian report.

The Metropolitan police is investigating allegations that MI5 was complicit in the torture of Shaker Aamer, the last remaining British resident in Guantánamo Bay, it was revealed today.

Investigating officers have applied to the high court for the release of classified government documents relating to the case. They are already investigating claims of MI5 complicity in the ill-treatment of British resident Binyam Mohamed while being held by the US.

Robert Fisk in the Independent.

Collusion. That's what it's all about. The United Arab Emirates suspect -- only suspect, mark you -- that Europe's "security collaboration" with Israel has crossed a line into illegality, where British passports (and those of other other EU nations) can now be used to send Israeli agents into the Gulf to kill Israel's enemies.

From the Guardian.

A growing number of young British Muslims say they have been tortured overseas with the apparent complicity of MI5 or MI6 officers. Not all are still considered terrorism suspects -- many were released without charge -- but the intelligence and security committee has never sought to interview any of them, or their lawyers.

Guardian report.

It was in the middle of 2008 that Jonathan Evans, director general of MI5, delivered a bombshell confession to the previously compliant parliamentarians of the intelligence and security committee.

He told them, in strict secrecy as usual, that assurances of MI5 innocence previously accepted without demur by the politicians had in fact been false.

Clive Stafford Smith in the Times.

Listeners to the Today programme yesterday would have heard Kim Howells, the Labour MP, demanding to know what a senior judge was "playing at". Lord Neuberger of Abbotsbury, the Master of the Rolls, had made some harsh assertions against the security services in his original judgment on the Binyam Mohamed torture case, for which Dr Howells, chairman of the "completely independent" Intelligence and Security Committee (ISC), claimed that there was no evidence.

I was astounded at Dr Howells's gall. The British public isn't permitted to see the classified evidence about Mr Mohamed's abuse. As his lawyer, I am -- albeit in the US -- and this places me in a fairly good position to call Dr Howell's bluff. I cannot reveal anything not in the public domain but I can suggest, sad to say, that Dr Howells has been less than forthright; either that, or evidence has been hidden from him and his committee.

Charles Moore in the Telegraph echoes the pro-torture sentiments of his colleague Con Coughlin, but with slightly more subtle language.

Also from the Telegraph, this article: MI5 officers diverted from counter-terrorism to fight 'torture' court cases.

Binyam Mohamed was released from Guantanamo Bay last year at the insistence of the British Government. It persuaded the American government to drop terrorist charges against him. Now our Government has been repaid for its efforts on his behalf by a legal judgment that undermines this country's ability to get information on our deadly enemies. Few of us want anyone tortured, and most of us want a system of justice that is independent of government. But we do not want a country that cannot protect itself from attack, or judges who take political decisions upon themselves. Yet this is what we are getting.

Moazzam Begg in the Guardian.

When I heard about Binyam Mohamed I felt a certain sense of relief that finally some of the truth was coming out into the public arena. But it's not a revelation to me as it's something I have maintained since my release: that the British intelligence services were present at every stage of my incarceration and knew what was happening to me and to many other British prisoners.

Guardian article.

The political storm over allegations of MI5 complicity in torture escalated tonight after Alan Johnson, the home secretary, accused the media of publishing "groundless accusations" and commentators of spreading "ludicrous lies" about the Security Service.

As defence lawyers prepared to challenge the government's success in suppressing severe criticism of MI5 officers made by one of Britain's most senior judges, the Liberal Democrat leader, Nick Clegg, pointed the finger at the "very top of government" saying senior ministers had probably known about claims of Britain's involvement in torture but failed to take action to stop it.

Henry Porter and Afua Hirsch in the Guardian comment on this very nasty article by Con Coughlin in the Telegraph.

See also this blog post by Obsolete and the Wikipedia page on Coughlin: both are interesting and informative.

This is not only an extremely nasty piece, it is the kind of knuckleheaded blathering you find in the American political discourse -- coarse, ignorant, seething and disreputable. What it shows is that the Telegraph harbours on its staff someone who seems to actively support sleep deprivation and all the rest of it.

Guardian article by Simon Jenkins.

Papers revealed by the high court depict a Foreign Office running about stamping on a stream of embarrassing disclosures, largely because Miliband was desperate not to seem a wimp in front of his hero, Hillary Clinton. We now know that both Miliband and the head of MI5, Jonathan Evans, told an untruth in asserting, as the latter said last October, that British security services do not practise torture, "nor do we collude in torture or solicit others to torture people on our behalf".

Nafeez Ahmed responds to Christopher Hitchens' attack on Gore Vidal (and by extension on himself).

See also: Hitchens attacks Gore Vidal for being a 'crackpot' in today's Independent.

Nafeez Ahmed's blog post on the matter.

... while denigrating Gore, Hitchens displays a chronic contempt for simple matters of fact and evidence.

Article in the Independent by Andrew McCorkell and Michael Gillard.

An Attorney General who suddenly switches his legal advice, a Prime Minister desperate to please a foreign power, Clare Short fuming on the sidelines, and the truth shrouded in mystery...

... critics claimed that it had, in effect, let the company off the hook. They pointed to comparisons with Tony Blair's handling of the decision to go to war in Iraq in 2003. In that case also, Mr Blair rejected the initial legal advice offered by Lord Goldsmith, this time on the legality of the planned invasion in 2003. The attorney general later amended his opinion into line with the former prime minister's intentions.