Secret Prisons

[type2negative 0]

Here is an interesting video in which the first part discuss how the Bush administration decided to "stop calling it torture and start calling it pressure and if someone died in custody that is even better!"

and "even torture small children in front of their parents, even sexually".

"bush even claimed having 'executive authority' to ignore ANY federal law he wished."

Time to phone Olga.

enjoy.

Time to phone Olga. - Do you mean Olg can fix it or whats???

If she can, You should have calles her before.!

Heh

[Marc and Olga 0]

In August 2002, the Justice Department advised the White House that torturing al Qaeda terrorists in captivity abroad "may be justified," and that international laws against torture "may be unconstitutional if applied to interrogations" conducted in President Bush's war on terrorism, according to a newly obtained memo.

If a government employee were to torture a suspect in captivity, "he would be doing so in order to prevent further attacks on the United States by the Al Qaeda terrorist network," said the memo, from the Justice Department's office of legal counsel, written in response to a CIA request for legal guidance. It added that arguments centering on "necessity and self-defense could provide justifications that would eliminate any criminal liability" later.

The memo seems to counter the pre-Sept. 11, 2001, assumption that U.S. government personnel would never be permitted to torture captives. It was offered after the CIA began detaining and interrogating suspected al Qaeda leaders in Afghanistan and elsewhere in the wake of the attacks, according to government officials familiar with the document.

The legal reasoning in the 2002 memo, which covered treatment of al Qaeda detainees in CIA custody, was later used in a March 2003 report by Pentagon lawyers assessing interrogation rules governing the Defense Department's detention center at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba. At that time, Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld had asked the lawyers to examine the logistical, policy and legal issues associated with interrogation techniques.

Bush administration officials say flatly that, despite the discussion of legal issues in the two memos, it has abided by international conventions barring torture, and that detainees at Guantanamo and elsewhere have been treated humanely, except in the cases of abuse at Abu Ghraib prison in Iraq for which seven military police soldiers have been charged.

Still, the 2002 and 2003 memos reflect the Bush administration's desire to explore the limits on how far it could legally go in aggressively interrogating foreigners suspected of terrorism or of having information that could thwart future attacks.

In the 2002 memo, written for the CIA and addressed to White House Counsel Alberto R. Gonzales, the Justice Department defined torture in a much narrower way, for example, than does the U.S. Army, which has historically carried out most wartime interrogations.

In the Justice Department's view -- contained in a 50-page document signed by Assistant Attorney General Jay S. Bybee and obtained by The Washington Post -- inflicting moderate or fleeting pain does not necessarily constitute torture. Torture, the memo says, "must be equivalent in intensity to the pain accompanying serious physical injury, such as organ failure, impairment of bodily function, or even death."

By contrast, the Army's Field Manual 34-52, titled "Intelligence Interrogations," sets more restrictive rules. For example, the Army prohibits pain induced by chemicals or bondage; forcing an individual to stand, sit or kneel in abnormal positions for prolonged periods of time; and food deprivation. Under mental torture, the Army prohibits mock executions, sleep deprivation and chemically induced psychosis.

Human rights groups expressed dismay at the Justice Department's legal reasoning yesterday.

"It is by leaps and bounds the worst thing I've seen since this whole Abu Ghraib scandal broke," said Tom Malinowski of Human Rights Watch. "It appears that what they were contemplating was the commission of war crimes and looking for ways to avoid legal accountability. The effect is to throw out years of military doctrine and standards on interrogations."

But a spokesman for the White House counsel's office said, "The president directed the military to treat al Qaeda and Taliban humanely and consistent with the Geneva Conventions."

Mark Corallo, the Justice Department's chief spokesman, said "the department does not comment on specific legal advice it has provided confidentially within the executive branch." But he added: "It is the policy of the United States to comply with all U.S. laws in the treatment of detainees -- including the Constitution, federal statutes and treaties." The CIA declined to comment.

The Justice Department's interpretation for the CIA sought to provide guidance on what sorts of aggressive treatments might not fall within the legal definition of torture.

The 2002 memo, for example, included the interpretation that "it is difficult to take a specific act out of context and conclude that the act in isolation would constitute torture." The memo named seven techniques that courts have considered torture, including severe beatings with truncheons and clubs, threats of imminent death, burning with cigarettes, electric shocks to genitalia, rape or sexual assault, and forcing a prisoner to watch the torture of another person.

"While we cannot say with certainty that acts falling short of these seven would not constitute torture," the memo advised, ". . . we believe that interrogation techniques would have to be similar to these in their extreme nature and in the type of harm caused to violate law."

"For purely mental pain or suffering to amount to torture," the memo said, "it must result in significant psychological harm of significant duration, e.g., lasting for months or even years." Examples include the development of mental disorders, drug-induced dementia, "post traumatic stress disorder which can last months or even years, or even chronic depression."

Of mental torture, however, an interrogator could show he acted in good faith by "taking such steps as surveying professional literature, consulting with experts or reviewing evidence gained in past experience" to show he or she did not intend to cause severe mental pain and that the conduct, therefore, "would not amount to the acts prohibited by the statute."

In 2003, the Defense Department conducted its own review of the limits that govern torture, in consultation with experts at the Justice Department and other agencies. The aim of the March 6, 2003, review, conducted by a working group that included representatives of the military services, the Joint Chiefs of Staff and the intelligence community, was to provide a legal basis for what the group's report called "exceptional interrogations."

Much of the reasoning in the group's report and in the Justice Department's 2002 memo overlap. The documents, which address treatment of al Qaeda and Taliban detainees, were not written to apply to detainees held in Iraq.

In a draft of the working group's report, for example, Pentagon lawyers approvingly cited the Justice Department's 2002 position that domestic and international laws prohibiting torture could be trumped by the president's wartime authority and any directives he issued.

At the time, the Justice Department's legal analysis, however, shocked some of the military lawyers who were involved in crafting the new guidelines, said senior defense officials and military lawyers.

"Every flag JAG lodged complaints," said one senior Pentagon official involved in the process, referring to the judge advocate generals who are military lawyers of each service.

"It's really unprecedented. For almost 30 years we've taught the Geneva Convention one way," said a senior military attorney. "Once you start telling people it's okay to break the law, there's no telling where they might stop."

A U.S. law enacted in 1994 bars torture by U.S. military personnel anywhere in the world. But the Pentagon group's report, prepared under the supervision of General Counsel William J. Haynes II, said that "in order to respect the President's inherent constitutional authority to manage a military campaign . . . [the prohibition against torture] must be construed as inapplicable to interrogations undertaken pursuant to his Commander-in-Chief authority."

The Pentagon group's report, divulged yesterday by the Wall Street Journal and obtained by The Post, said further that the 1994 law barring torture "does not apply to the conduct of U.S. personnel" at Guantanamo Bay.

It also said the anti-torture law did apply to U.S. military interrogations that occurred outside U.S. "maritime and territorial jurisdiction," such as in Iraq or Afghanistan. But it said both Congress and the Justice Department would have difficulty enforcing the law if U.S. military personnel could be shown to be acting as a result of presidential orders.

The report then parsed at length the definition of torture under domestic and international law, with an eye toward guiding military personnel about legal defenses.

The Pentagon report uses language very similar to that in the 2002 Justice Department memo written in response to the CIA's request: "If a government defendant were to harm an enemy combatant during an interrogation in a manner that might arguably violate criminal prohibition, he would be doing so in order to prevent further attacks on the United States by the al Qaeda terrorist network," the draft states. "In that case, DOJ [Department of Justice] believes that he could argue that the executive branch's constitutional authority to protect the nation from attack justified his actions."

The draft goes on to assert that a soldier's claim that he was following "superior orders" would be available for those engaged in "exceptional interrogations except where the conduct goes so far as to be patently unlawful." It asserts, as does the Justice view expressed for the CIA, that the mere infliction of pain and suffering is not unlawful; the pain or suffering must be severe.

A Defense Department spokesman said last night that the March 2003 memo represented "a scholarly effort to define the perimeters of the law" but added: "What is legal and what is put into practice is a different story." Pentagon officials said the group examined at least 35 interrogation techniques, and Rumsfeld later approved using 24 of them in a classified directive on April 16, 2003, that governed all activities at Guantanamo Bay. The Pentagon has refused to make public the 24 interrogation procedures.

source

Seems to me the bosses DO know about this "new" broader definition of torture....straight up to Rumsfeld himself.

Now where is his trial?

Edited September 9, 2006 by Marc and Olga

[one...two...tree 2,762]

Here is an interesting video in which the first part discuss how the Bush administration decided to "stop calling it torture and start calling it pressure and if someone died in custody that is even better!"

and "even torture small children in front of their parents, even sexually".

"bush even claimed having 'executive authority' to ignore ANY federal law he wished."

Time to phone Olga.

enjoy.

Important video, Marc! Thanks!

[Trumplestiltskin 5,791]

Iraq prisoner abuse was routine

The HRW report gives first-hand accounts of abuses at a detention centre at Baghdad airport called Camp Nama, as well as a facility near Mosul airport and a base near al-Qaim on the Syrian border.

An interrogator posted at Mosul in 2004 told HRW that he and his fellow interrogators had been told by the officer in charge of their unit to use abuse techniques on some detainees.

HRW says its findings show that criminal investigations of abuses need to follow the military chain of command, rather than focusing on lower-ranked soldiers.

The New York-based organisation calls on the US Congress to appoint an independent commission to investigate the extent of the problem, and urges US President George W Bush to appoint an independent prosecutor to investigate and prosecute perpetrators of the abuse.

"It is now clear that leaders were responsible for abuses in Iraq," Mr Sifton said. "It's time for them to be held accountable".

Amnesty International's briefing to the UN committee against torture

Two Afghan detainees, Dilwar and Habibullah died from multiple blunt force injuries inflicted while they were held in an isolation section of Bagram US airbase in December 2002. Army investigative reports later revealed that both men were kept hooded and chained to a ceiling while being kicked and beaten during sustained assaults by military personnel. A soldier who acknowledged inflicting more than 30 consecutive knee strikes to Dilawar (a slight, 22 year old taxi driver) as he stood in shackles, told investigators that the blows were standard operating procedure for uncooperative detainees. An army criminal investigation report said both deaths were caused primarily by severe trauma to the men’s legs, adding that "sleep deprivation at the direction of military intelligence soldiers" was also a "direct contributing factor" in Dilwar’s death.(6) Army medical examiners found the prolonged shackling had also contributed to his death.(7) 7 low-ranking soldiers, charged variously with assault, maltreatment, dereliction of duty and making false statements eventually received sentences ranging from five months’ imprisonment to reprimand, loss of pay and reduction in rank.

Abdul Jaleel died in January 2004 in the US Forward Operating Rifles Base in Al Asad, Iraq, after being kicked and beaten during interrogation. He was tied by his hands to the top of a door frame and gagged when he died. The autopsy report recorded death from "blunt force injuries and asphyxia". A senior army official admitted Jameel had been "lifted to his feet by a baton held to his throat" causing a throat injury that "contributed to his death". (8) Military commanders rejected a recommendation by army investigators to prosecute soldiers involved, on the ground that his death had been the "result of a series of lawful applications of force in response to repeated aggression and misconduct by the detainee".(9)

Major-General Abed Hamad Mowhoush, formerly of the Iraqi army, died during interrogation in the US detention facility in Al Qaim, Baghdad, in November 2003. An autopsy recorded cause of death as asphyxia and smothering due to chest compression. Mowhoush died after being rolled back and forth in a sleeping bag, which was placed over his head and bound with wire, while one of his interrogators sat on his chest. According to testimony in a subsequent court case, use of the sleeping bag was part of an approved "stress position" designed to play upon a detainee’s claustrophobia. It was also reportedly interpreted by officers as falling within the "fear up harsh" tactics that may still be found in military operational manuals. There is evidence that abusive interrogation techniques at the Al Qaim facility were routine and authorized.(10)

The US military initially reported that Mowhoush had died from natural causes. However, several months later, in the wake of the Abu Ghraib scandal, four US soldiers were charged in the death. Only one went to trial and was sentenced to a reprimand, $6,000 forfeiture of pay plus 60 days’ restriction of movement. There is evidence that Mowhoush was subjected to a brutal beating two days before his death by personnel from other agencies, including the CIA, none of whom has been charged.

A 27-year-old Iraqi male died while being interrogated by US Navy Seals in April 2004 in Mosul, Iraq. During his confinement he was hooded, flex-cuffed, deprived of sleep and subjected to extreme cold conditions, including the use of cold water on his body and hood. The exact cause of death was "undetermined" although the autopsy stated that hypothermia from wet and cold conditions may have contributed to his death.(11) His treatment included various techniques similar to those authorized by Secretary of Defense Rumsfeld in his April 2003 memorandum including "environmental manipuation (e.g. adjusting temperature)", hooding and sleep deprivation.

AI - Observation of a fair trial?

[Fischkoepfin 1]

This overlooks that there is actually a memo from the White House redefining the meaning of torture to exclude such things as water boarding, threatening people with dogs, keeping them awake for hours, and the like. According to the Geneva convention all these acts constitute torture under international law.

You can't expect your enemy to play by the rules if you don't do so yourself.

I don't expect a whole lot from people that crash civilian airplanes into civilian buildings in NYC, strap bombs on themselves to kill civilians worldwide, decapitate innocent civilian victims on camera with a knife, etc., etc.

So don't be surprised that a lot of folks could give a rat's a$$ if captive members of these terrorist organizations are not accorded provisions in the Geneva Convention that they do not practice themselves nor are signatories to.

We are infinitely more "humane" than these individuals will ever be. And we are not bound by a treaty with them to do so.

We are a nation that prosecuted a brutal war against Nazi Germany and Imperial Japan and rebuilt them into a industrial democracies after crushing them militarily.

I think our record is infinitely more pristine than our enemy.

That being said...a vast majority of Americans do not advocate commiting war crimes against our enemies. Sleep deprivation...give me a f*cking break! This is a far cry from outright murder...which is not condoned or tolerated by our nation.

Let's put this in perspective without the melodrama.

Maybe it was more prisitine in the past, but noone can rest on the laurels of having once fought a just war forever. "Being humane" on a regular basis takes a lot of work on a regular basis. To be more specific, the people in the Middle East who are currently suffering as a result of US-interventions give a rat's a$$ about whether the US got rid of Hitler because first of all they did not benefit from it and second of all it does not undo present injustice.

I vote for more secret prisions......dont bother me one bit.

FYI...the Bill of Rights only applies to actions brought against ppl here in the US. It doesnt apply in some foreign country. This is the very reason that these people are not brought here, but are kept in foreign lands such as Cuba.

You think we gave jury trials to the Nazis after WWII???

No, but you gave the Nazis a fair trial and prosecuted them for crimes against humanity. The interesting thing in regard to these trials is that there were two rules governing the prosecutions in Nuremberg. 1) Ignorance doesn't protect from prosecution and 2) Being not directly involved in the crime because you're higher up in the chain of command doesn't protect from prosecution either.

The point was to show the world that the best way to show extreme injustice is to counter it with a display of justice and law. And not in the way you suggest, which implies that injustice should be answered with injustice.

Also, and sorry to be repetitive, to pretend that only a "few bad apples" are torturing people overlooks the fact that they have been given the license to do so from the White House. The president can only say there is not torture because his definition of torture departs from international (and up to 2002 American law).

The prosecutions yoou discuss are of people at the lower end of the command chain, anyone not on the ground in the areas of combat has not been investigated let alone prosecuted.

what is your evidence that they were given license from the White House? pure conjecture on your part, because that's what you want to believe is true.

Right, because you disagree with me you resort to personal attacks. Always a good way to win an argument isn't it.

My evidence has been in the news for the last 4 years. Marc and Olga posted it earlier in this thread.

I do not want to believe this is true. I'd actually prefer if it weren't true. I grew up believing in the moral superiority of America, viewing America as a liberator. But the more I learn about the country, especially since 2001, the less it appears to resemble that image.