More authoritative allegations on torture of US detainees

"A discussion with the Chief of the Human Rights Office for the United Nations operation in Iraq for the past 2 years. John Pace started in Baghdad in the months after the former U.N. Special Representative, Sergio De Mello was killed by a truck bomb, and his term has just finished, as Iraq’s sectarian violence explodes into full world view. He describes a total breakdown of individual and human rights in Iraq, citing sectarian violence and a string of secret prisons in which people are held without any judicial authority."
Source

Listen :: Real Media :: Windows Media :: Download MP3 :: Podcast

[We referred to John Pace's allegations in the Yellow Pages item Torture 'rife' in US prisons in Iraq. Now, in this dramatic interview he says that 40,000 detainees in Iraq is a conservative estimate, and he repeats his assertions about the high level of torture, based on careful UN analysis in Baghdad. John Pace is interviewed about 20 minutes into this recommended program.]

Tagged: usa, torture, iraq, human+rights

After Neoconservatism, by Francis Fukuyama

A prominent conservative expresses a new view

"As we approach the third anniversary of the onset of the Iraq war, it seems very unlikely that history will judge either the intervention itself or the ideas animating it kindly. By invading Iraq, the Bush administration created a self-fulfilling prophecy: Iraq has now replaced Afghanistan as a magnet, a training ground and an operational base for jihadist terrorists, with plenty of American targets to shoot at. The United States still has a chance of creating a Shiite-dominated democratic Iraq, but the new government will be very weak for years to come; the resulting power vacuum will invite outside influence from all of Iraq's neighbors, including Iran. There are clear benefits to the Iraqi people from the removal of Saddam Hussein's dictatorship, and perhaps some positive spillover effects in Lebanon and Syria. But it is very hard to see how these developments in themselves justify the blood and treasure that the United States has spent on the project to this point.

The so-called Bush Doctrine that set the framework for the administration's first term is now in shambles

"The so-called Bush Doctrine that set the framework for the administration's first term is now in shambles. The doctrine (elaborated, among other places, in the 2002 National Security Strategy of the United States) argued that, in the wake of the Sept. 11 attacks, America would have to launch periodic preventive wars to defend itself against rogue states and terrorists with weapons of mass destruction; that it would do this alone, if necessary; and that it would work to democratize the greater Middle East as a long-term solution to the terrorist problem. But successful pre-emption depends on the ability to predict the future accurately and on good intelligence, which was not forthcoming, while America's perceived unilateralism has isolated it as never before. It is not surprising that in its second term, the administration has been distancing itself from these policies and is in the process of rewriting the National Security Strategy document ..
NY Times

Tagged: usa, neocon, iraq

Italy calls for closure of Guantanamo Bay prison

"Italian Premier Silvio Berlusconi has told Arab television station Al Jazeera that the United States should close its Guantanamo Bay prison as soon as possible.

"Speaking in an interview recorded on Tuesday and due to be broadcast on Friday, Berlusconi referred to the many reports of abuse and torture of detainees at the United States naval base in Cuba.

"'I too think that these centers where there have been episodes that the whole world has condemned should be closed as quickly as possible,' he said."
People's Daily

Tagged: torture, usa, guantanamo, human+rights

Blair faces torrent of criticism on human rights

"Tony Blair remained defiant last night in the face of a torrent of protests over Britain's human rights record, accusing his critics of having 'the world the wrong way round'.

"The Prime Minister was under pressure over his support for US 'rendition flights', his failure to call openly for the closure of the Guantanamo Bay camp in Cuba, and over draconian anti-terror laws, after damning reports by the Labour-led Commons Foreign Affairs Committee and by Amnesty International. His comments on the state of Iraq came on another day of bloodshed in the country.

"He even appeared out of step with his own Attorney General, Lord Goldsmith, who warned his cabinet colleagues that terrorist suspects were entitled to the same legal protections as 'law-abiding citizens'.

"Speaking at the London School of Economics, Lord Goldsmith said: 'Determining if a particular person is, or is not, a terrorist requires more than mere assertion on the part of an authority, however genuine and well-intentioned that authority may be.'"
Independent

UK Government’s "war on terror" policies put people at risk of torture
Amnesty's Stop Torture Campaign

Tagged: uk, blair, rendition, torture, iraq, war+on+terror, human+rights

Torture 'rife' in US prisons in Iraq

Human rights chief alleges "23,000 people in detention"

"The US is 'aware' of torture taking place in Iraqi prisons, according to the outgoing Maltese UN human rights chief in Iraq.

"'Yes, torture is happening now, mainly in illegal detention places. Such centres are mostly being run by militia that have been absorbed by the police force,' says John Pace, who retired last week as human rights chief for the UN assistance mission in Iraq.

"In a frank interview with The Times, Dr Pace says photos and forensic records have proved that torture was rife inside detention centres. Though the process of release has been speeded up, there are an estimated 23,000 people in detention, of whom 80 to 90 per cent are innocent.

"780 bodies, including 400 having gunshot wounds or wounds as those caused by electric drills"

"He says the Baghdad morgue received 1,100 bodies in July alone, about 900 of whom bore evidence of torture or summary execution. That continued throughout the year and last December there were 780 bodies, including 400 having gunshot wounds or wounds as those caused by electric drills.

"Dr Pace expresses deep concern over the progress of the Saddam Hussein trial, saying he would have preferred to see the former dictator tried internationally.

"After two years serving in Iraq, Dr Pace says that the non-existence of law and order has left society without any protection, clearly reflecting that the US invasion was not properly planned."
The Times

"The U.S. issues its annual report on human rights practices which usually accuses more than 190 countries of human rights abuses, but ignores the U.S.‘s violations in the field. Instead of acting as the 'world’s human rights police', the U.S. should consider its own erroneous behavior and take its own human rights violations seriously." Source

Tagged: usa, torture, iraq, human+rights

Report says 98 dead in US custody in Iraq, Afghanistan

"Nearly 100 prisoners have died in US custody in Iraq and Afghanistan since August 2002, the Human Rights First organisation has said on BBC television.

"At least 98 deaths occurred, with at least 34 of them suspected or confirmed homicides -- deliberate or reckless killing -- according to the group of US lawyers who will publish the report.

"Their dossier claims that 11 more deaths are deemed suspicious and that between eight and 12 prisoners were tortured to death."
Sydney Morning Herald

Tagged: afghanistan, iraq, torture, usa, abu+ghraib, human+rights

Horrors of Camp Delta exposed by British victims

"An award-winning film director who reconstructed scenes of torture and abuse at Guantanamo Bay has called for the immediate closure of the US-run camp.

"Michael Winterbottom's film shows prisoners in orange jumpsuits beaten, manacled to floors and subjected to defeaning music in solitary confinement. It tells the story of Asif Iqbal, Ruhel Ahmed and Shafiq Rasul, the so-called Tipton Three, who set off for Pakistan in September 2001 and ended up in Camp Delta, in Cuba's Guantanamo Bay. They were released without charge after more than two years' imprisonment.

"Mr Winterbottom said: 'What's most shocking isn't the torture or the shackling, it's that Guantanamo Bay exists at all. I think it should be closed down, and last week the United Nations said it should be closed down.'"
Independent

Tagged: guantanamo, usa, torture, human+rights

Israel 'may rue Saddam overthrow'

"The head of Israel's domestic security agency, Shin Bet, has said his country may come to regret the overthrow of former Iraqi President Saddam Hussein.

"Yuval Diskin said a strong dictatorship would be preferable to the present 'chaos' in Iraq, in a speech to teenage Jewish settlers in the West Bank."
BBC

Freedom of expression or NeoCon agenda?

Cartoons are a purposeful provocation argues that there was a hidden NeoCon agenda behind the publications of the Muhammed cartoons. AlterNet argues that such 'free speech' is to be desired.

Jurist Bernard Freamon writes: " ... section 266b of the Danish Penal Code ... authorizes criminal prosecution and conviction of any person 'who publicly or with the intention of dissemination to a wide circle of people makes a statement or imparts other information threatening, insulting or degrading a group of persons on account of their race, color, national or ethnic origin, belief or sexual orientation'." Yet no one was prosecuted.

Merza A Beg writes: "The right wing Jyllands-Posten of Denmark egregiously with the intent to offend published the cartoons."

Cartoon source

Tagged: muhammad+cartoons, free+speech

Drought emergency hits Somalia

"Hundreds of thousands of people in drought-hit areas of Somalia are facing dehydration, with some having to drink their own urine as chronic water shortages persist, aid agency Oxfam International said on Thursday.

"'The situation is as bad as I can remember. Some people are dying and children are drinking their own urine because there is simply no water for them to drink,' Oxfam quoted Abdullahi Maalim Hussein, an elder who accompanied the organisation on its recent mission to the affected areas, as saying."
Reuters AlertNet

Drought hits Somalia
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Tagged: somalia, famine, drought, aid

UN demands US close prison at Guantánamo

"United Nations human rights investigators called on the United States on Thursday to shut down the Guantánamo Bay camp and give prisoners quick trials or release them, but the White House promptly dismissed the report.

Arguing that many of the interrogation and detention practices constituted abuses amounting to torture, the report stated, "The United States government should close the Guantánamo Bay detention facilities without further delay."
International Herald Tribune

"In the final version of the report released in Geneva, the UN rapporteurs also charged Washington with violating international human rights treaties to get around their ban on torture.

"'Attempts by the United States administration to redefine "torture" in the framework of the struggle against terrorism in order to allow certain interrogation techniques that would not be permitted under the internationally accepted definition of torture are of utmost concern,' it said.

"'The confusion with regard to authorised and unauthorised interrogation techniques over the last years is particularly alarming.'"
ABC News (Australia)

Pressure over Guantanamo rises
UN calls for Guantánamo Bay to close
UN Releases Report Attacking Guantanamo Detentions

Google News: Track new stories about guantanamo – create an email alert or RSS

Tagged: guantanamo, torture, human+rights, civil+rights, usa, war+on+terror, un, united+nations

New Abu Ghraib pix Bush doesn't want seen

"Fresh photographs and video footage of prisoner abuse at the Abu Ghraib jail in Iraq were broadcast yesterday by an Australian television channel ..."
Source

Here you can read the transcript of last night's Australian report on the new Abu Ghraib photos and videos that George Bush doesn't want Americans to see.

New Abu Ghraib Photos Confirm Need for Real Inquiry (ACLU)

Tagged: abu+ghraib, abu+ghraib+photos, torture, usa, iraq, war, military, army, human+rights

Our freedom is at stake

Blair threatens us all with his determination to restrict the rights of terrorist suspects

By Chris Huhne

"In Britain, we have a tradition of fighting for our freedoms. When the threat is foreign, and the battle clearcut, there has been no greater rallying cry. Yet we now face a more insidious threat to our liberties. We have a government that argues our freedoms have to be given up for our security.

"Each change that ministers propose is presented as a small step that only unreasonable people could find objectionable. Each concession is presented not as a diminution of freedom, but with Orwellian doublethink as freedom from a greater threat. Thus ministers argued that the ability to lock up people without charge or trial was an essential guarantee of the freedom not to be blown up.

"Slice by tiny slice, we are waking up in a society where our traditional freedoms are draining away. Surveillance and the Big Brother state are new realities.

"We have already agreed that terrorist suspects can be held without charge or trial for 14 days. That is broadly in line with other countries that face a similar threat from terrorism, such as Australia, Germany and France. But it is not enough for Tony Blair. What the police ask for, he has said, he is happy to give.

"We will vote again today on Blair's suggestion of 90 days' detention, an interminable period for a person to be imprisoned without knowing the charges they face. The reason the Commons previously compromised with 28 days is because the Tories sound an uncertain trumpet on liberties. They fight with Labour for the support of authoritarian parts of our society. Those who care primarily for an ordered society are never too fussy who is hurt in the process, until their freedoms are at risk.

"Yet these compromises have become corrosive. All the safeguards that have for centuries helped to secure the rule of law have been attacked as impediments to the fight against terrorism and crime. It is time to restate some ancient truths. We have always believed that it is better that the guilty should go free than that the innocent should be punished. Furthermore, anyone accused of a crime has the right to be judged by their fellow citizens on a jury. And no one should be detained for more than a very short period without being charged.

"Even in wartime, we were much more careful of civil liberties. In 1940, when invasion threatened, we introduced Regulation 18B, allowing the government to detain anyone whom it believed to be a danger to the national interest. But those detained could appeal to the courts, and they were released in 1943 when the immediate danger of invasion was over ..."
Guardian Unlimited

Chris Huhne MP is a candidate for the UK Liberal Democrat leadership.

Tagged: blair, uk, police+state, liberty, civil+rights, war+on+terror

Party elders attack China censors

"A group of former senior Communist party officials in China have launched a scathing attack on the country's handling of the media and information.

"In an open letter, the group denounced the recent closure of investigative newspaper Bingdian (Freezing Point).

"They said strict censorship may 'sow the seeds of disaster' for China's political transition.

"Among the signatories are an ex-aide to Mao Zedong, a former newspaper editor and a former party propaganda chief.

"'History demonstrates that only a totalitarian system needs news censorship, out of the delusion that it can keep the public locked in ignorance,' the group said in the letter, according to Reuters news agency.

"The letter was signed on 2 February but publicly released on Tuesday.

"According to the BBC's Rupert Wingfield Hayes, in Beijing, this open outburst against China's media censors is all the more surprising because of who it comes from.

"Those signing the letter include Chairman Mao's former secretary, Li Rui; the former editor of the Communist party's own mouthpiece, People's Daily, Hu Jiwei; and ex-propaganda boss, Zhu Houze ..."
BBC

Tagged: china, censorship, civil+rights, human+rights

Keeping the video from Iraq in perspective

By Craig Murray

I feel the need to comment on the video of brutality by British soldiers released at the weekend, purely because so much rubbish has been spouted in the mainstream media on the subject.

I may surprise you by starting with the observation that, on the scale of violence we have visited on Iraq, this was a negligible incident. People on all sides are dying every day. I have heard enough first hand accounts, from British diplomats and military, from journalists and NGO workers, to know that if it had been U.S. troops facing that mob of stone throwing youths, they would simply have opened fire and blown some of them away. The media would report that another eight "insurgents" had died in a "firefight"; it would be lucky to make a footnote. If the troops had been mercenaries -- and these so-called "PMCs" vastly outnumber the British army in Iraq -- it would not have been a video camera but a heavy machine gun shooting from an upper window. In fact, what the soldiers here were doing is exactly what snatch squads did to members of mobs in Northern Ireland for thirty years.

In Iraq, when you’ve killed 100,000 civilians, what is beating up a few youths? Of course, what makes it a media story is that there were actually pictures. As the entire Western media in Iraq has a policy of skulking in places where they can be certain nothing will happen, such film is rare. And nowadays, if there are no pictures, it is not news.

Doubtless, some privates and lance corporals will be court martialled. Actually, I blame them very little. What are they supposed to do to disperse a crowd which, plainly, was trying to inflict actual violence on the troops? If every Iraqi who threw a stone at coalition forces was interned, you would keep millions of prisoners. There are no Iraqi authorities to whom prisoners can be turned over who will deal with them sensibly. The British don’t want prisoners, and the UK military now have a de facto policy of not turning prisoners over to the US authorities because of their inept and violent handling of them.

The British troops are in a completely impossible situation. Their role is to support a corrupt and inefficient Iraqi puppet administration which is incapable of exercising control, and would do little for good if it did have control. The vast majority of the Iraqi population do not want us there. The real good that this video might have done is in driving home to the British public, against the ceaseless propaganda of the mainstream media, that we are not wanted. That stone-throwing crowd were Shias, for God’s sake. The official propaganda says that they are on "our" side.

So our troops are being sniped at, blown up or facing violent mobs. They can do little about it. Their own military leadership are convinced that they should not be there. They are not the ones reaping the benefits of huge income from the new US and UK oil contracts, though they will be giving their lives to protect the carpetbaggers who have descended on Iraq like locusts. Is there any wonder that this boils over in frustration?

The disgraceful actions in that video were not the product of intrinsic evil on the part of the British troops involved. This incident was one of the more minor consequences of the illegal war of aggression and occupation launched by George Bush and Tony Blair. It is Blair and Bush, not the troops, who should be in the dock.
Source

As Britain's outspoken Ambassador to the Central Asian Republic of Uzbekistan, Craig Murray helped expose vicious human rights abuses by the US-funded regime of Islam Karimov. He is now a prominent critic of Western policy in the region.

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Tagged: iraq, video, torture, human+rights, uk, army, military

Vale 'on her own' over Muslim population comments

Australia: "A Federal Parliamentary Secretary has distanced herself from a Coalition colleague's comments about the abortion drug RU486.

"Yesterday Liberal MP Danna Vale said Australians were aborting themselves almost out of existence and that Australia would be a Muslim nation in 50 years."
ABC

CIA chief sacked for opposing torture

"The CIA's top counter-terrorism official was fired last week because he opposed detaining Al-Qaeda suspects in secret prisons abroad, sending them to other countries for interrogation and using forms of torture such as 'water boarding', intelligence sources have claimed.

"Robert Grenier, head of the CIA counter-terrorism centre, was relieved of his post after a year in the job. One intelligence official said he was 'not quite as aggressive as he might have been' in pursuing Al-Qaeda leaders and networks.

"Vincent Cannistraro, a former head of counter-terrorism at the agency, said: 'It is not that Grenier wasn’t aggressive enough, it is that he wasn’t ‘with the programme’. He expressed misgivings about the secret prisons in Europe and the rendition of terrorists.'

"Grenier also opposed 'excessive' interrogation, such as strapping suspects to boards and dunking them in water, according to Cannistraro.

"Porter Goss, who was appointed head of the CIA in August 2004 with a mission to 'clean house', has been angered by a series of leaks from CIA insiders, including revelations about 'black sites' in Europe where top Al-Qaeda detainees were said to have been held.

"In last Friday’s New York Times, Goss wrote that leakers within the CIA were damaging the agency’s ability to fight terrorism and causing foreign intelligence organisations to lose confidence. 'Too many of my counterparts from other countries have told me, "You Americans can’t keep a secret".'

"Goss is believed to have blamed Grenier for allowing leaks to occur on his watch.

"Since the appointment of Goss, the CIA has lost almost all its high-level directors amid considerable turmoil ..."
Times Online

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Google news on torture rendition

Tagged: torture, rendition, cia, usa, human+rights, iraq, terrorism, war+on+terror

Protesters at Olympics face 'zero tolerance'

"Silvio Berlusconi, Italy's prime minister, has pledged 'zero tolerance' of protests aimed at disrupting the Winter Olympics, which opened in Turin last night.
After a week in which Olympic torch-bearers ran the gauntlet of demonstrations along the route to the opening ceremony, Mr Berlusconi said Italy was in danger of appearing to be 'the only country in the world that doesn't want the games'.

"On Thursday, he said he was considering issuing a warning of 'drastic measures' if protesters continued disruption. But after a cabinet meeting yesterday, in which he received a 'reassuring' briefing from his interior minister, Giuseppe Pisanu, he adopted a more moderate tone, saying the authorities would pay 'vigilant and careful attention' to what happened in and around Turin."
The Guardian

The Road to the Muslim Holocaust

By Ghali Hassan

"We are being challenged by Islam these years -- globally as well as locally. It is a challenge we have to take seriously. We have let this issue float about for too long because we are tolerant and lazy. We have to show our opposition to Islam and we have to, at times, run the risk of having unflattering labels placed on us because there are some things for which we should display no tolerance. And when we are tolerant, we must know whether it is because of convenience or conviction."
Queen Margrethe II of Denmark, 15 April 2005

"Tolerance is a falsehood often pronounced with difficulty in all of Western societies. Small countries such as Denmark, Norway, Belgium, the Netherlands, Austria, and Sweden are leading the pack in the war on Muslims at home, and may be on the road to encouraging a new Holocaust against humanity.

"While these countries are part of the U.S.-led coalition, which is responsible for the mass murder of Iraqis, they have also introduced discriminate and draconian immigration laws which are specifically directed against Muslims fleeing war and economic hardship. The pretexts are always the phantom of the 'War on Terror'.

"Historically, Muslims have been at the receiving end of Western-Christian violence for centuries. Following the 9/11 attack on the USA, Western Europe joined the U.S. in its anti-Muslim crusade: 'We are all Americans now' united against Muslims. Although, 9/11 stills a mystery, it is used to legitimise a new form of Western-Christian fascism. Media pundits such as Christopher Hitchens and Daniele Pipes, who support the anti-Muslim ideology, are springing up like mushrooms all over the Western world. Using the cliché of 'free speech', they are fuelling a vicious and violent war against Muslims around the world.

"The recent blasphemous images of Prophet Mohammed published in the Danish right-wing Christian, Jyllands-Posten (J-P) newspaper are nothing more than a campaign which promotes racism, violence and the marginalisation of European Muslims. Islam is a peaceful religion, and Muslims are not 'terrorists'. The insult to Prophet Mohammed, who is revered by over a billion people around the world, has nothing to do with 'free speech'. Had the Danish cartoonist shown instead George Bush and Tony Blair slaughtering hundreds of thousands of innocent Iraqi women and children, he would have had lost his job by now and would be condemned by the same people who are barking about 'free speech'. Would any newspaper in Europe dare to discuss Europe’s strict censorship laws of discussing the Holocaust?

"Barely a month ago, in early January 2006, Flemming Rose, the 'cultural' editor of the Jyllands-Posten, told Dan Bilefsky of the International Herald Tribune, that, 'he would not publish a cartoon of Ariel Sharon strangling a Palestinian baby, since that could be construed as "racist"'. In the past, Jyllands-Posten has also refused to run drawings lampooning Jesus Christ submitted in April 2003 by Danish illustrator Christoffer Zieler, because they were 'offensive, not funny'. Zieler was also advised by the editor, Jens Kaiser: 'I don't think Jyllands-Posten's readers will enjoy the drawings. As a matter of fact, I think that they will provoke an outcry. Therefore, I will not use them'. (The Guardian, 06/02/2006). It is 'free speech' only if Westerners agree, otherwise, it is 'offensive' or 'anti-Semitism'. Flemming Rose has now offered a helping hand to Iran in drawing cartoons depicting the Holocaust. Rose will work together in assistance with the Iranians who want to draw the Holocaust and that the paper (J-P) would publish and print the Holocaust cartoons. It is also against the Danish criminal code (Article 140) to publish the blasphemous cartoons.

"I should also add that Ambassadors from at least twelve Muslim nations in Demark requested to meet (last October) with Mr Anders Fogh Rasmussen, the Prime Minister of Denmark to explain their opposition the blasphemous cartoons, but Mr Rasmussen refused and rejected their request ..."
Axis of Logic

Update: Anne from Copenhagen has left a comment on this post:

"Hey, i would like to tell you that the quote that you bring here from the danish queen is a result of wrong translation.

"I must correct this wrong quotation that you bring! it is a mistranslation!

"The queen Margrethe of Denmark is NOT talking about 'opposition' but about 'response'.

"The danish word for response is MODSPIL and the danish word for opposition is MODSTAND. The translater have not been aware from this differense. And has thereby been putting more wood to the fire, like many of the other acuses that we suffer from these days."

Thank you, Anne.

Tagged: muhammad+cartoons, racism, islam, terrorism, war+on+terror