Cont: The Sinking of MS Estonia: Case Re-opened Part IV

[Mojo]

For someone who claims to have actually made a special study of a region that is actually outside of his own shores - unlike most Brits or Americans who are only interested in 'Home News - I am shocked that:

• you have never heard of the Rome Treaty 1998 in Criminal Law

The treaty that nobody had heard of was the “Treaty 1988 (Criminal Law)” that you repeatedly cited. It seems that there is no such treaty, which kind of explains why nobody had heard of it. It now seems that you actually meant the Rome Statute of the International Criminal Court, although you still seem incapable of getting its title correct. This lack of attention to detail might pass muster in accountancy, but it won’t fly when you’re citing legal documents.

Oh, and it seems you didn’t bother to actually read the Statute, because it certainly doesn’t say what you claim it says.

• you have no idea as to the difference between deportation and disappearance

You’re the person pretending that a deportation was a disappearance.

 

[Vixen]

Shall I fetch the smelling salts?

Were the men expelled from Sweden and returned to Egypt?

Yes.

Were they given asylum in Sweden?

No.

So you're just quibbling over whether "deported" or "disappeared" is the more appropriate term. You could well argue that an unlawful deportation is not truly a deportation so another term might be appropriate, but a key element of disappeared is that they actually disappear, which they didn't.

No, no and no. The two Egyptian men were registered asylum seekers in Sweden. They had lawyers representing them. The CIA ordered the Swedish government to seize the two chaps and 'extradite' them, which the Swedes did, literally snatching them off the street and marched to a waiting private plane. Nobody knew what had happened to them or where they were. One of the men successfully sued Sweden at the European Court of Huma Rights citing Article 3 (Torture). He was disappeared and tortured. The other guy turns out to have been under house arrest in Egypt banned from having contact with anyone outside of his village. As Sweden was a signatory to the Rome Statute, it knowingly contravened its terms in bypassing due legal process.

To call it a chummy 'deportation' or 'application for asylum'_DENIED, is to wilfully bury one's neck in the sand.

The salient point is, Sweden were not averse to 'disappearing' people on the command of the CIA.

 

[Andy_Ross]

But how did the bow visor come to be missing in the first place?


Over to On Scene Commander Captain Esa Mäkelä of the Silja Europa on the night, whose deck was used as a helipad on the rescue night.

MTV Uutiset

Again with newspaper reports.

It was missing because over the decades it operated the attachment points became fatigued and failed.
The attachments were not strong enough for the job they were doing and not an ideal configuration.
At the time it was built there were no standards for bow visors and both Sweden and Finland had domestic law that exempted them from SOLAS certification as it would have limited their ferries to coastal work.

 

[Andy_Ross]

No, no and no. The two Egyptian men were registered asylum seekers in Sweden. They had lawyers representing them. The CIA ordered the Swedish government to seize the two chaps and 'extradite' them, which the Swedes did, literally snatching them off the street and marched to a waiting private plane. Nobody knew what had happened to them or where they were. One of the men successfully sued Sweden at the European Court of Huma Rights citing Article 3 (Torture). He was disappeared and tortured. The other guy turns out to have been under house arrest in Egypt banned from having contact with anyone outside of his village. As Sweden was a signatory to the Rome Statute, it knowingly contravened its terms in bypassing due legal process.

To call it a chummy 'deportation' or 'application for asylum'_DENIED, is to wilfully bury one's neck in the sand.

The salient point is, Sweden were not averse to 'disappearing' people on the command of the CIA.

Sweden may have agreed to the US request but they didn't 'disappear' them, they returned them to Egypt.

 

[Jack by the hedge]

No, no and no. The two Egyptian men were registered asylum seekers in Sweden. They had lawyers representing them. The CIA ordered the Swedish government to seize the two chaps and 'extradite' them, which the Swedes did, literally snatching them off the street and marched to a waiting private plane. Nobody knew what had happened to them or where they were. One of the men successfully sued Sweden at the European Court of Huma Rights citing Article 3 (Torture). He was disappeared and tortured. The other guy turns out to have been under house arrest in Egypt banned from having contact with anyone outside of his village. As Sweden was a signatory to the Rome Statute, it knowingly contravened its terms in bypassing due legal process.



To call it a chummy 'deportation' or 'application for asylum'_DENIED, is to wilfully bury one's neck in the sand.



The salient point is, Sweden were not averse to 'disappearing' people on the command of the CIA.

So your claim is now that the Americans demanded they be extradited but instead Sweden sent them back to Egypt.

 

[Reformed Offlian]

Er...

Irish Times

People here really do not know their current affairs. In the 1990's there was a lot of conflict in the Middle East and the western powers were certainly behind backing one group or another, not just the Russia-Iran alliance and at its centre was US President Bill Clinton (see current Netflix series 'The Girl from Oslo' for an insight into the conflicts). So to mention Kurds or Zionist Jews is a factual statement and appropriate to the background information, should an act of terrorism be behind the sinking of the Estonia. It is not such a tall story as this is what terrorist do.

It may be a "factual statement", but the insinuation that it is relevant to how the Estonia sank is a bigoted presumption without basis.

So, yes. Racist much. And shame on you for doubling down on it.

 

[Reformed Offlian]

You have a report in the Irish Times of a report in a Turkish paper(?) of a captured PKK commander who allegedly told his Turkish interrogators the PKK killed Palme. Did he also admit they killed JFK and burned the Reichstag?

What motive could Kurdish separatists have for singling out the Swedish PM for murder?

More importantly, why would they target random police employees?

 

[Vixen]

Describing that as my own link without providing the context is deeply inhonest.

Let's see what I wrote about that link:



They claim to base their description on the Öhrn report, but what they describe cannot be found in that report.

And of course, it does not support your statement about a press release.

From Helsingin Sanomat 1.10.1994, reporting of the event of 28.9.1994 when Bildt, Laar and Aho visited Turku Central University Hospital (TYKS):

Remember, Lehtola was now the official spokesperson.

The International Research Board investigating the sinking of the Estonia considers it possible that in the rising part of the ship's bow gate, the so-being of the so-being of the ship' is not the same. the fault in the visor would have caused the accident.

Kari Lehtola, a Finnish member of the Board of Directors, says that the information is based only on interviews with those who have been saved for the time being. According to them, estonia sank stern-first when it fell.
The reason for the sinking may be further clear when video footage of the ship is obtained from the ship by robotic camera. According to Lehtola, simply moving cargo would have caused only a 10-degree inclination on a vessel of this size and would not have brought it down alone.

Bengt Erik Stenmark, head of security at the Swedish Maritime Government, said at a press conference in Stockholm on Friday that he had concluded that estonia's bow gate was open and that water was flooding the car deck. The gate and visor were damaged, he said.

Stenmark also referred to information from two eyewitnesses that there was no bow gate on board at the time of the sinking. There was 30 to 50 centimeters of water on the car deck. As the ship tilted in the sea, the masses of water moved. Estonia capsized as the centre of gravity shifted to one side of the ship and the ship went into the depths rear-first.

Echo measurement observations show Estonia's propellers, but the observations do not show the condition of the bow.

There were several sightings of the Estonia sinking site. "The ship was only searched in a few nautical miles," Lieutenant Commander Juhani Toikka from the Turku and Pori Military Police Command told me.

The marine survey vessel Direction started echo measurements around 3 p.m. The ship has precise positioning equipment suitable for offshore use. The direction is used with the usual downward sonar, multi-scepter sonar and the obliver-like behind. There are two naval experts on board.

Due to the impending storm, Direction simply marked the location of the discovery and returned to the archipelago shelter. If the weather permits, the Direction and oil spill response vessel Halli will return to the site of the discovery on Saturday and start exploring Estonia with two robots moving at the end of the cable. They have both a video camera and standard cameras.
President Martti Ahtisaari also became acquainted with rescue operations and the conduct of searches at the Archipelago Coast Guard in Turku. He thanked those involved in the rescue efforts for their excellent work.

HS

 

[Andy_Ross]

More importantly, why would they target random police employees?

Well at least it gets the Russians off the hook for the sinking.

 

[Andy_Ross]

From Helsingin Sanomat 1.10.1994, reporting of the event of 28.9.1994 when Bildt, Laar and Aho visited Turku Central University Hospital (TYKS):

Remember, Lehtola was now the official spokesperson.

HS

What do you think your quoted text shows?

 

[Vixen]

Why are you presenting this as if it was a mystery? We all knew hundreds of pages ago that the Estonia's bow was built with the top of the ramp tucked up into a compartment in the visor, so when the visor broke free its weight would be dragging on the ramp. The failure of one led to the failure of both.

What is the use of your going back to tales of people being surprised because they didn't yet appreciate what had occurred and why?

How would Bildt and Svensson know 'it was a design fault of the bow visor' before (a) the ship had even been located and (b) the bow visor even proven to have fallen off or (c) even located, as of the day of the accident?

Henrik Sillaste would not be privy to the design specifications of the shipyard, Meyer-Werft.

Carl Bildt: "Move along, please! Nothing to see here! Nobody is to blame! It is just a little design fault in the bow visor with the locking system, which we will prove to you in our official accident report! NOW MOVE ALONG! NOTHING TO SEE HERE!!!"

 

[Vixen]

Where does he blame the Finns?
It was a Finnish ship but I see no 'blaming' of Finland.

Chapter 10 of the report details the history of ferry operations between Sweden and Finland.
https://onse.fi/estonia/chapt10.html

Chapter 18 details how both Sweden and Finland gave themselves exemption in domestic law from compliance with SOLAS regulations regarding bow visors, ramps and collision bulkheads.
https://onse.fi/estonia/chapt18.html

Also your own quote shows that he spoke to the survivors and they told him about the visor.

Oh yes, I forgot. He spoke to Henrik Sillaste: Naval Architect, Sea Captain and expert in mechanical engineering, who, knowing the bow visor was a bum design, nonetheless failed to report it at the time and was happy to sail in the Estonia. _NOT!


Weee-eeeeeelllll!

 

[LondonJohn]

But how did the bow visor come to be missing in the first place?


Over to On Scene Commander Captain Esa Mäkelä of the Silja Europa on the night, whose deck was used as a helipad on the rescue night.

MTV Uutiset

You've already been told, several times by now, that the anecdotal (and un-evidenced) "we thought we ought to have seen" on-the-night reminiscences of a ship's master.... are effectively worthless when set against 1) the expertise and experience of people who actually study/examine failure modes in ships for a living, and 2) the damn evidence in this case.

Do you think, for example, that an airline pilot, when flying over the wreckage of another airliner that had crashed, would necessarily be an expert in determining how/why that airliner had crashed and what the wreckage "ought to look like"? Or do you think, just perhaps, that he/she is an expert in flying his/her aircraft and dealing with emergencies on his/her aircraft, and that the study/determination-of-cause of accidents of other aircraft is best left to experts in that field....?

You have no idea, Vixen. No idea whatsoever.

 

[Reformed Offlian]

From Helsingin Sanomat 1.10.1994

HS

That is a second-hand attribution and not a transcript, but fair enough; it's something. I'm still going with "They made a mistake" as the most likely explanation.

 

[LondonJohn]

Describing that as my own link without providing the context is deeply inhonest.

Let's see what I wrote about that link:



They claim to base their description on the Öhrn report, but what they describe cannot be found in that report.

And of course, it does not support your statement about a press release.

Intellectual dishonesty in the debate? From Vixen????

Heaven forfend!!

 

[MarkCorrigan]

No, no and no. The two Egyptian men were registered asylum seekers in Sweden. They had lawyers representing them. The CIA ordered the Swedish government to seize the two chaps and 'extradite' them, which the Swedes did, literally snatching them off the street and marched to a waiting private plane. Nobody knew what had happened to them or where they were. One of the men successfully sued Sweden at the European Court of Huma Rights citing Article 3 (Torture). He was disappeared and tortured. The other guy turns out to have been under house arrest in Egypt banned from having contact with anyone outside of his village. As Sweden was a signatory to the Rome Statute, it knowingly contravened its terms in bypassing due legal process.

To call it a chummy 'deportation' or 'application for asylum'_DENIED, is to wilfully bury one's neck in the sand.

The salient point is, Sweden were not averse to 'disappearing' people on the command of the CIA.

They didn't disappear them. They went back to Egypt. That's not being disappeared.

 

[Andy_Ross]

How would Bildt and Svensson know 'it was a design fault of the bow visor' before (a) the ship had even been located and (b) the bow visor even proven to have fallen off or (c) even located, as of the day of the accident?

Henrik Sillaste would not be privy to the design specifications of the shipyard, Meyer-Werft.

Carl Bildt: "Move along, please! Nothing to see here! Nobody is to blame! It is just a little design fault in the bow visor with the locking system, which we will prove to you in our official accident report! NOW MOVE ALONG! NOTHING TO SEE HERE!!!"

Survivors told them that's what they thought it was. Your own quotes say this.

 

[Andy_Ross]

Oh yes, I forgot. He spoke to Henrik Sillaste: Naval Architect, Sea Captain and expert in mechanical engineering, who, knowing the bow visor was a bum design, nonetheless failed to report it at the time and was happy to sail in the Estonia. _NOT!


Weee-eeeeeelllll!

Survivors told them they thought it was the bow visor.
Your own quote says this.

 

[Vixen]

It may be a "factual statement", but the insinuation that it is relevant to how the Estonia sank is a bigoted presumption without basis.

So, yes. Racist much. And shame on you for doubling down on it.

It is a known fact that Alexander Voronin, whose attaché case it was that the divers recovered in Captain Piht's cabin was an ardent Zionist (and why not, as he was a Russian Jew) plus he was a known arms trader.

Jutta Rabe claims to have evidence that the CIA-ordered illicit cargo was intended for Israel.

The Swedish government admitted it smuggled Russian state secrets as cargo on the Estonia during September 1994, despite an EU Law coming into effect 1 Septemberr 1994 re the transport of dangerous goods and chemicals needing a special VAKS licence.

The Swedish customs official who blew the whistle said the aforementioned cargo he was ordered to 'wave through unexamined' was in a hired white Volvo from Ericssons and the car driver never identified.

 

[Vixen]

More importantly, why would they target random police employees?