Thatcher: Spain 'secretly backed coup by sending warships'

[emad]

Time Online
From Edward Owen in Madrid


Snip:
THERE was growing speculation in Madrid last night that the centre-right Government of José María Aznar, defeated by the socialists in elections in March, supported secret plans to stage a coup in Equatorial Guinea, a former Spanish colony. The plot involved the overthrow of the dictator, President Obiang Nguema, and the installation of Severo Moto, a veteran political exile in Spain who is backed by rich British businessmen.

Although no links have surfaced between Spaniards who knew about the alleged coup plot and Sir Mark Thatcher, statements made after the main group of mercenaries were detained in Zimbabwe would appear to confirm Spain’s clandestine involvement. As the mercenaries were allegedly completing their plans to topple Mr Obiang, two Spanish warships slipped out of the Rota naval base near Cádiz in January. The frigate Canarias was supported by a combat vessel Patiño with 500 crack troops and marines on board. No official announcement was made but those on board knew they were headed for Equatorial Guinea. Since Rota is a Nato base, used by the United States, one would assume that the US knew of the mission as well as their close allies, the British. Spain had not sent warships to Equatorial Guinea since it gained independence in 1968 — well before oil was found.

But someone, South Africa is a suspect, told the Spanish press. The two warships docked in the Canary Islands and the apparent objective of their voyage was aborted. On January 31, Ana Palacio, the then Foreign Minister, claimed that the unannounced visit by the Spanish navy to Equatorial Guinea had been postponed by the government and that the ships “were not a war mission but one of co-operation”. Eduardo Zaplana, Señor Aznar’s government spokesman, said that it had been considered “opportune” to postpone the visit “until the elections” had taken place in Guinea. He also said that the warships had been diverted “because of the misunderstanding produced by press reports”. Spain’s El País newspaper reported at the time that Equatorial Guinea was rife with rumours of an attempted coup prior to the April elections.

This week in Spain, various media reports suggest that Mr Moto, the veteran leader-in-exile of Equatorial Guinea, who has lived in Madrid for many years, was either on board one of the warships or had been flown to Mali in anticipation of a triumphant return to his fatherland. One report suggested that the Spaniards were going to grant Mr Obiang exile in Spain and arrange for his transfer to either the Canaries of the mainland. Yesterday neither the Spanish Foreign Ministry nor Mr Moto’s press office would comment on the mission of the warships or plans to replace Obiang with Moto. “Severo Moto had nothing to do with the coup,“ his spokesman told The Times.

http://www.timesonline.co.uk/article/0,,2-1234705,00.ht...

[UTUSN]

1. Nothing Says "Secrecy" Like a Coupla of Warships n/t

[Vladimir]

2. Spain saw Haiti and wanted to play... n/t

[seemslikeadream]

5. Yes Haiti was such a clean coup

no muss no fuss. Just get the guy on a plane!


EVERY DEATH CREATES NEW ENEMIES
MORE TERRORISTS
MORE DANGER
MORE DEATH
AND REMEMBER...

HE IS JUST GETTING STARTED...

BUSH'S PLAN FOR PEACE
IS THE PEACE OF THE COMMON GRAVE

http://www.bushflash.com/pax.html WATCH THIS VIDEO only takes 3 minutes

Wumpscut
Totmacher

sie ahnten nichts von mir
von meiner wilden gier
doch als du kamst zu mir
da wurde ich ein tier
kein gedanke an danach
als ich dir die knochen brach

tot tot tot ich mache dich tot
tot tot tot von blut alles rot

tot

fuer mein naechstes leben
schoepfe ich neue kraft
ich bin dem toeten ergeben
in der einzelhaft

tot tot tot ich mache dich tot
tot tot tot von blut alles rot
tot tot tot ich mache dich tot
tot tot tot von blut alles rot

ein dahinsichen
von gottes hand
ich kann dich riechen
und das denken verschwand

tot tot tot tot tot tot tot ich mache dich tot
tot tot tot von blut alles rot tot tot tot tot

ich mache dich tot ich mache dich tot
ich mache dich tot ich mache dich tot

sag mir was du willst
dass du meine sehnsucht stillst
ich mache dich tot fuer immerdar
von blut alles rot auf gottes altar

tot tot tot ich mache dich tot
tot tot tot von blut alles rot

ich mache dich tot fuer immerdar
ich mache dich tot glaub mir es ist wahr
ich mache dich tot fuer immerdar
ich mache dich tot auf gottes altar

[Vladimir]

6. Didn't you get the memo?

dead black people don't count...

[seemslikeadream]

7. neither do the ones still walking around

[seemslikeadream]

3. one would assume that the US knew of the mission

Mugabe must be relieved to find that the mercenaries weren't after him!

[emad]

4. Not yet! But who knows, in a few days time when Coup Fever

replaces Olympics catatonia and ordinarily harmless, unemployed ex-mercenaries twiddle their thumbs as Jonathan Bush releases some of those DoD $1.3trillion funds believed to be lost forever....

[goforit]

8. ONCE again.....Imperialist supporters of PNAC......FAIL!!!!!!!!!!!!

ROFLMAO!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
This is just way tooo funny!!!

Do these blithering idiots look stupid or what!!!

[prolesunited]

9. Another fascist failure

They are definitely getting bolder and stupider.

[GoBlue]

10. Mr. Moto?

You just can't make this shit up. ROTFLMAO

[donsu]

11. watching the Barons fight

will soon not be just a spectator sport

[Pallas180]

12. "Great minds..." - have similar thread on GD.,,,Thatcher arrested

but we didn't get to Spain yet.

they bought a cargo plane, a helicopter, and now warships were out
there?

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.ph...

We're googling to find the connection to our own greedy oil slicks -

thanks for the info



ai yi yi, chihuahua, this lil yappy doggy follows me wher'er I go.

[seemslikeadream]

13. The US knew, Spain knew, Britain knew. Whose coup was it?

The intelligence link: It reads like an adventure story, but the coup attempt is a political thriller, finds Investigations Editor Neil Mackay



ALL the Boy’s Own adventure stuff has overshadowed a far more disturbing issue regarding the ill-fated putsch plot to overthrow the government of Equatorial Guinea: just how much did western intelligence services, including MI6, have to do with this very African coup?
Zimbabwe – where dozens of the mercenary team were arrested en route to overthrow President-for-Life Teodoro Obiang Nguema – and Equatorial Guinea claim that the governments of Britain, America and Spain, which once owned Equatorial Guinea as part of its colonial empire, were all behind the coup.

The gossip and rumour within British and American intelligence circles points towards the UK and US certainly knowing that the coup was in the offing – even if there was no direct participation. However, some intelligence figures in African countries have claimed that agents of MI6 and the CIA had been telling senior figures in Equatorial Guinea’s military and intelligence services that if a coup did take place that they should sit tight, hold still and not defend Obiang. It is claimed that Britain and America intelligence agents told the military and intelligence chiefs of Equatorial Guinea that in return for their inaction they would be well looked after by any post-coup government.

Britain, it appears, had foreknowledge. A South African intelligence report detailing suspicions about a coup attempt in Equatorial Guinea is known to have been seen by British intelligence quite some time before the coup plot was rumbled. The report also links members of the Equatorial Guinea plot with the bloodless coup that took place in Sao Tome and Principe in July 2003. It was from Sao Tome and Principe that some of the mercenaries are thought to have travelled to Equatorial Guinea.
more
http://www.sundayherald.com/44412