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Torture in the News
Current (30 Days) | Archive
Margolis Moves to Exonerate Yoo and Bybee, as Criminal Investigation Opens in Spain
Harper's February 2, 2010
Three developments last week show the growing gap between the Obama Administration and its NATO allies with respect to the legacy of torture from the Bush era. They also demonstrate that, contrary to Obama’s promises faithfully to uphold the Convention Against Torture and Geneva Conventions, his Justice Department has no intention of doing so when crimes from the Bush era are in question. This attitude is not going over well with key allies.
The Guantánamo “Suicides”: A Camp Delta sergeant blows the whistle
Harper's January 18, 2010
1. “Asymmetrical Warfare”
When President Barack Obama took office last year, he promised to “restore the standards of due process and the core constitutional values that have made this country great.” Toward that end, the president issued an executive order declaring that the extra-constitutional prison camp at Guantánamo Naval Base “shall be closed as soon as practicable, and no later than one year from the date of this order.” Obama has failed to fulfill his promise. Some prisoners there are being charged with crimes, others released, but the date for closing the camp seems to recede steadily into the future. Furthermore, new evidence now emerging may entangle Obama’s young ...
Rising Oromo singers tortured: opposition
Ethiomedia October 8, 2009
ADDIS ABABA - Two rising singers from Oromia who glorified 'Oromo fighters' through their works have been reportedly tortured at Maeklawi Prison in the Ethiopian capital, a pro-OLF website reported on Tuesday.
Rwanda queen-killing suspect held
BBC October 6, 2009
One of the most-wanted suspects in the 1994 Rwandan genocide has been arrested in Uganda, police say.
Former intelligence chief Idelphonse Nizeyimana is accused of organising the killing of thousands of ethnic Tutsis - including the revered former queen.
Correspondents say he was travelling to Kenya from the Democratic Republic of Congo when he was detained.
Some 800,000 Tutsis and moderate Hutus were killed by Hutu militias during 100 days of slaughter.
CIA heads urge end of abuse probe
BBC September 18, 2009
Seven former heads of the CIA have written to President Obama urging him to end the inquiry into allegations of abuse of suspects held by the agency.
The US Attorney General Eric Holder last month named a prosecutor to examine whether the CIA had gone beyond approved interrogation methods.
The letter to Mr Obama said the investigation would hamper intelligence operations.
Iraqi shoe thrower released; says he was tortured
YAHOO September 15, 2009
BAGHDAD – The Iraqi journalist who threw his shoes at former President George W. Bush was released Tuesday after nine months in prison and in a defiant address, he accused Iraqi security forces of torturing him with beatings, whippings and electric shocks.
Muntadhar al-Zeidi, whose stunning act of protest last December made him a hero for many in the Arab and Muslim worlds, said he now feared for his life and believed that U.S. intelligence agents would chase after him.
Burma: US Should Complete Policy Review
Human Rights Watch September 15, 2009
(New York) - The Obama administration should promptly conclude its Burma policy review and adopt initiatives to make its policies on diplomacy, sanctions and humanitarian aid more effective, Human Rights Watch said in a letter to Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton released today.
Investigating 'Africa's Guantanamo'
BBC July 8, 2009
Salim Awadh is talking to me from inside a cell somewhere in the Ethiopian capital, Addis Ababa. There are seven other prisoners kept in the same small, dark room, he starts to tell me.
Then he suddenly stops speaking. I can hear frantic whispering in the background. Then he says it is safe to carry on.
"The conditions are really bad: we don't have enough food, we don't have enough access to medicine. The cell is wet," he says.
"We sleep on the floor rather than the sodden mattresses. One of the other prisoners was beaten so badly he's had his leg broken."
Iraqi prisoners protest at torture, rape
Reuters June 15, 2009
BAGHDAD (Reuters) - Hundreds of Iraqi prisoners have launched a protest at dire prison conditions and systematic torture including rape, lawmakers said on Monday
UAE detains 'torture tape' sheikh
BBC May 12, 2009
TASSC Staff Speaks out Against Torture
Inside Scoop with Mark Levine May 4, 2009
Check out TASSC International's own Helping Hands Director Orlando Tizon on Inside Scoop with Mark Levine @ http://radioinsidescoop.com/
Anti-torture activists arrested at White House
USA Today May 1, 2009
By AP Staff Report
WASHINGTON (AP) — Dressed in an orange jumpsuit, Ken Crowley stood silently facing the White House.
On Crowley's back, a black sign printed with the name of a Libyan man read, "Cleared for Release."
The Washington, D.C., resident, who was among 61 people arrested during an anti-torture demonstration Thursday, said he wanted to bring attention to the plight of detainees held in Guantanamo Bay, Cuba.
Anti-Torture Protesters Arrested at White House
Huffington Post May 1, 2009
By Arthur Delaney
Sixty-one anti-torture protesters were arrested outside the White House on Thursday in a planned act of mass civil disobedience at the end of an event organized by Witness Against Torture and Amnesty International.
The protesters -- wearing black hoods and orange jumpsuits -- were part of a larger group of 150 that marched in a slow procession from the Capitol to Lafeyette Park across from the White House to protest the torture of detainees held in U.S. counter-terror efforts.
60 arrested to commemorate GTMO detainees
Russia Today May 1, 2009
Russia Today Video
60 arrested to commemorate GTMO detainees
Russia Today May 1, 2009
Russia Today Video
Effectiveness Of Harsh Questioning Is Unclear
The Washington Post April 26, 2009
By Joby Warrick and Peter FinnWashington Post Staff Writers
Sunday, April 26, 2009
During his first days in detention, senior al-Qaeda operative Khalid Sheik Mohammed was stripped of his clothes, beaten, given a forced enema and shackled with his arms chained above his head, according to the International Committee of the Red Cross. It was then, a Red Cross report says, that his American captors told him to prepare for "a hard time."
Over the next 25 days, beginning on March 6, 2003, Mohammed was put through a routine in which he was deprived of sleep, doused with cold water and had his head repeatedly slammed into a plywood wall, according to the report. The interrogation also included days of extensive waterboarding, a technique that simulates drowning.
Cheney Requests Release of 2 CIA Reports on Interrogations
The Washington Post April 26, 2009
By Dan Eggen
Washington Post Staff Writer
Saturday, April 25, 2009
Former vice president Richard B. Cheney is asking for the release of two CIA reports in his bid to marshal evidence that coercive interrogation tactics such as waterboarding helped thwart terrorist plots, according to documents released yesterday by the National Archives and Records Administration.
Amid Outcry on Memo, Signer's Private Regret
The Washington Post April 26, 2009
By Karl Vick Washington Post Staff Writer
Saturday, April 25, 2009
LAS VEGAS -- On a Saturday night in May last year, Jay S. Bybee hosted dinner for 35 at a Las Vegas restaurant. The young people seated around him had served as his law clerks in the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 9th Circuit, the post Bybee had assumed after two turbulent years at the Justice Department, where as head of the Office of Legal Counsel he signed the legal justifications for harsh interrogations that have become known as the "torture memos."
Five years along in his new life as a federal judge, Bybee gathered the lawyers and their dates for a reunion, telling them he was proud of the legal work they had together produced.
And then, according to two of his guests, Bybee added that he wished he could say the same about his previous position.
U.N. Says Thousands Killed in Sri Lanka
The New York Times April 26, 2009
By THOMAS FULLER
Published: April 24, 2009
COLOMBO, Sri Lanka — An average of 70 civilians have been killed each day since late January in fighting between the Sri Lankan government and ethnic Tamil separatists, according to the latest tally by the United Nations.
Despite international calls for a cease-fire, including a visit here on Friday by senior Indian officials, the government is pushing ahead with its plans to destroy the remnants of the Tamil Tigers, now confined to a narrow strip of land about four miles long off Sri Lanka’s northeast coast.
How Torture Worked to Sell the Iraq War
After Downing Street April 26, 2009
If not the Justice Department lawyers, who gave the earlier go-ahead? The Senate report puts the onus directly on the decider-in-chief, President George W. Bush. He issued a written determination on February 7, 2002, "that Common Article 3 of the Geneva Conventions, which would have afforded minimum standards for humane treatment, did not apply to al-Qaeda or Taliban detainees."
Three cheers for Dick Cheney. The former vice president has urged, however rhetorically, that the Obama administration release more of the torture memos. "One of the things that I find a little bit disturbing about this recent disclosure is they put out the legal memos, the memos that the CIA got from the Office of Legal Counsel, but they didn't put out the memos that showed the success of the effort," the former vice president told FoxNews.
"I've now formally asked the CIA to take steps to declassify those memos so we can lay them out there and the American people have a chance to see what we obtained and what we learned and how good the intelligence was."
Yes, National Review, We Did Execute Japanese for Waterboarding
After Downing Street April 26, 2009
By Paul Begala | Huffington Post
In a CNN debate with Ari Fleischer, I said the United States executed Japanese war criminals for waterboarding. My point was that it is disingenuous for Bush Republicans to argue that waterboarding is not torture and thus illegal. It's kind of awkward to argue that waterboarding is not a crime when you hanged someone for doing it to our troops. My precise words were: "Our country executed Japanese soldiers who waterboarded American POWs. We executed them for the same crime we are now committing ourselves."
Mr. Fleischer, ordinarily the most voluble of men, was tongue-tied. The silence, rare in cable debates, spoke volumes for the vacuity of his position.
Now Mark Hemingway of the National Review Online has asserted that I was wrong. I bookmark NRO and read it frequently. It's smart and breezy -- but on this one it got its facts wrong.
Trapped Sri Lankans face starvation
Al Jazeera English April 26, 2009
AJE Staff
Tens of thousands of civilians in Sri Lanka's northern war zone face starvation, Tamil Tiger separatists and government officials have said.
The assessment came as John Holmes, the UN humanitarian chief, arrived in Sri Lanka for talks with the government on getting aid to people trapped in the conflict.
Torture? It Probably Killed More Americans than 9/11
Common Dreams April 26, 2009
Published on Sunday, April 26, 2009 by the Independent/UK
by Patrick Coburn
The use of torture by the US has proved so counter-productive that it may have led to the death of as many US soldiers as civilians killed in 9/11, says the leader of a crack US interrogation team in Iraq.
"The reason why foreign fighters joined al-Qa'ida in Iraq was overwhelmingly because of abuses at Guantanamo and Abu Ghraib and not Islamic ideology," says Major Matthew Alexander, who personally conducted 300 interrogations of prisoners in Iraq. It was the team led by Major Alexander [a named assumed for security reasons] that obtained the information that led to the US military being able to locate Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, the head of al-Qa'ida in Iraq. Zarqawi was then killed by bombs dropped by two US aircraft on the farm where he was hiding outside Baghdad on 7 June 2006. Major Alexander said that he learnt where Zarqawi was during a six-hour interrogation of a prisoner with whom he established relations of trust.
Major Alexander's attitude to torture by the US is a combination of moral outrage and professional contempt. "It plays into the hands of al-Qa'ida in Iraq because it shows us up as hypocrites when we talk about human rights," he says. An eloquent and highly intelligent man with experience as a criminal investigator within the US military, he says that torture is ineffective, as well as counter-productive. "People will only tell you the minimum to make the pain stop," he says. "They might tell you the location of a house used by insurgents but not that it is booby-trapped."
Sri Lanka Guilty of 'Humanitarian Disaster'
Common Dreams April 26, 2009
Published on Friday, April 24, 2009 by The Times/UK
Aid workers accused Sri Lanka yesterday of causing an avoidable humanitarian disaster as the country's Government appealed for international help in handling 100,000 civilians who have fled the conflict with the Tamil Tigers since Monday.
The Government had maintained for weeks that there were fewer than 50,000 civilians in the area where the army has pinned down the last of the Tigers.
It insisted that UN and Red Cross estimates of 100,000 to 150,000 civilians in the zone were exaggerated - and prepared internment camps to screen non-combatants based on its own figures.
The Bush administration repeatedly ignored warnings about its detainee interrogation policies
The Washington Post April 25, 2009
Washington Post Editorial
April 25, 2009
OVER THE past two weeks, the world has been inundated with specifics about the abuse of terrorism suspects during the Bush administration: repeated episodes of waterboarding, snarling dogs, forced nudity, severe sleep deprivation, extended confinement in small, dark boxes.
Yet it is clear from a recently released and well-documented report by the Senate Armed Services Committee that such abuses were not committed by rogue service members or CIA agents who took matters into their own hands. The extreme interrogation methods were, according to the report, sought out and authorized by administration officials at the highest levels, including then-Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld.
Bush policy 'led to Abu Ghraib'
BBC April 22, 2009
|
 Tough interrogation spread outwards from Guantanamo, the report said |
US government backing for the CIA's harsh interrogation methods set the tone for abuses by US troops towards detainees in Iraq, a US report says.
It was not appropriate simply to blame low-ranking officers for what occurred at Abu Ghraib prison, the report by the Senate Armed Services Committee said.
Top officials had sent the message that such acts were appropriate, it stated.
CIA 'amnesty' dismays campaigners
BBC April 17, 2009
Human and civil rights groups in the US have expressed dismay at news that CIA agents will not face prosecution over interrogation tactics in the Bush era.
Campaigners welcomed the White House's decision to publish details of harsh interrogation techniques now banned by President Barack Obama. But rights groups said the decision not to prosecute agents was a failure to uphold the law of the land.
Others defended the techniques, saying the interrogations boosted US security. The former head of the CIA, Michael Hayden, who ran the agency under President George W Bush, said the White House move would undermine intelligence work and dissuade foreign agencies from sharing information with the CIA.
Uganda unit 'tortured detainees'
BBC April 8, 2009
An anti-terrorism unit in Uganda is responsible for the unlawful detention of suspects and torture, US-based Human Rights Watch says in a report.
Based on interviews with 25 alleged victims, the group says that suspects had been held for up to 11 months without access to families or lawyers.
It said they were severely beaten and some died as a result of torture. An army spokesman told AFP news agency that torture was not condoned and the allegations would be investigated.
"Institutionally, we do not condone or practice torture. We are actually at the forefront of advancing human rights," Maj Felix Kulaiyigye said.
Detainee's Harsh Treatment Foiled No Plots
The Washington Post March 30, 2009
By Peter Finn and Joby Warrick
When CIA officials subjected their first high-value captive, Abu Zubaida, to waterboarding and other harsh interrogation methods, they were convinced that they had in their custody an al-Qaeda leader who knew details of operations yet to be unleashed, and they were facing increasing pressure from the White House to get those secrets out of him. In the end, though, not a single significant plot was foiled as a result of Abu Zubaida's tortured confessions, according to former senior government officials who closely followed the interrogations.
Delay in Immigration Raids May Signal Policy Change
The Washington Post March 30, 2009
Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano has delayed a series of proposed immigration raids and other enforcement actions at U.S. workplaces in recent weeks, asking agents in her department to apply more scrutiny to the selection and investigation of targets as well as the timing of raids, federal officials said.
Spanish Judge Accuses Six Top Bush Officials of Torture
Commondreams.org March 30, 2009
Published on Saturday, March 28, 2009 by the Guardian/UK
by Julian Borger and Dale Fuchs
MADRID - Criminal proceedings have begun in Spain against six senior officials in the Bush administration for the use of torture against detainees in Guantánamo Bay. Baltasar Garzón, the counter-terrorism judge whose prosecution of General Augusto Pinochet led to his arrest in Britain in 1998, has referred the case to the chief prosecutor before deciding whether to proceed.
Militants kidnap 11 tribal police in Pakistan: official
Earth Times March 30, 2009
by Earth Times Staff
Islamabad - Islamist militants on Sunday kidnapped 11 tribal policemen following an attack on a checkpoint in Pakistan's troubled north-west near the Afghan border, an official said. The gunmen forced the Khasadar policemen to surrender all weapons after laying siege to the Shin Qamar post in Khyber tribal district, a hub of militant activity.
More than 100 countries infiltrated by electronic spying operation
Earth Times March 30, 2009
by Earth Times Staff
New York/Toronto - A spying operation that infiltrated computers - many of them belonging to governments - in 103 countries has been uncovered by a group of Canadian researchers, the New York Times reported Sunday. Victims of the malicious software, or malware, include computers in: the offices of the Dalai Lama; Tibetan exile centres around the world; NATO headquarters in Brussels; and the Indian embassy to the United States. In all, 1,295 computers might have been accessed and had documents copied by the system, which the researchers dubbed GhostNet.
Foreign Ways and War Scars Test Hospital
The New York Times March 30, 2009
Hennepin County Medical Center, a sprawling complex in downtown Minneapolis near the Metrodome, offers an extraordinary vantage point on the ways immigrants are testing the American medical establishment. The new arrivals — many fleeing repression, war, genocide or grinding poverty — bring distinctive patterns of illness and injury and cultural beliefs about life, death, sickness and health.
Many injured in Madagascar protests
Al Jazeera English March 30, 2009
By AJE Staff
At least 34 people have been injured in Madagascar during protests in support of Marc Ravalomanana, the former president, medics have said.Thousands of people were confronted by police who fired tear gas in Antananarivo, the capital, on Saturday.
Manila mulls move to save hostages
Al Jazeera English March 30, 2009
By AJE StaffThe Philippine government has agreed to move troops from a southern jungle area in a bid to save kidnapped aid workers threatened with beheading, officials say. Ronaldo Puno, the interior secretary, said the troop withdrawal should be completed within 36 hours to facilitate the release of one of the three staff of the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) held hostage. It was not immediately clear what would happen to the remaining hostages
Continued Detention of Marri Is Ordered
The Washington Post March 23, 2009
By Carrie Johnson
Washington Post Staff Writer
Thursday, March 19, 2009; Page A02
A federal magistrate ordered alleged sleeper agent Ali Saleh Kahlah al-Marri detained on conspiracy and terrorism charges yesterday, setting the stage for a trial that could explore al-Qaeda's plans after the devastating terrorist strikes in the United States more than seven years ago.
Pakistani Villagers Pay a Price for Defying Rebels
The Washington Post March 23, 2009
By Pamela Constable
Sunday, March 22, 2009; Page A12
BAZITKHEL, Pakistan -- This tiny village in northwestern Pakistan has paid a high price for its defiance. The health clinic lies in ruins, blasted to rubble by a car bomb that exploded outside three weeks ago.But while most inhabitants of this violence-plagued region near the Afghan border have been cowed by the growing tide of Islamist and criminal violence, those in a handful of communities like Bazitkhel -- where tribal bonds are especially strong -- are determined to arm themselves and fight back.
Iraq's Kurds Find Prosperity Breeds Distrust
The Washington Post March 23, 2009
Saturday, March 21, 2009; Page A08
AKRA, Iraq -- On a hilltop overlooking this small Kurdish town, a sleek $28 million hospital rises like a cutting-edge sculpture. Inside, builder Sabah Melhem admired a European medical scanner gleaming under white fluorescent light. Virtually every room contains state-of-the-art equipment, unlike anywhere else in Iraq. "I hope in every city I can build a hospital like this," Melhem declared. "This is my dream."But below the surface of Kurdistan's prosperity, tensions are churning over who is benefiting from economic growth. The two ruling Kurdish political parties, America's staunchest allies in Iraq, dominate virtually every aspect of the regional economy, spawning conflicts of interest and corruption, according to Kurdish and U.S. officials.
How the U.S. can help revitalize economies in Pakistan and Afghanistan
The Washington Post March 23, 2009
Washington Post Editorial
AS THE Obama administration formulates its strategy for Pakistan and Afghanistan, pretty much everyone agrees that spurring the economy in both countries -- creating jobs -- is key to defusing militancy. The usual prescription is more foreign aid, which is sure to figure in any new plan. But what doesn't always get acknowledged in these discussions is that such aid often doesn't do much good.
Coming Soon: Declassified Bush-Era Torture Memos
Commondreams.org March 23, 2009
Published on Sunday, March 22, 2009 by Newsweek
by Michael Isikoff and Mark Hosenball
Over objections from the U.S. intelligence community, the White House is moving to declassify-and publicly release-three internal memos that will lay out, for the first time, details of the "enhanced" interrogation techniques approved by the Bush administration for use against "high value" Qaeda detainees. The memos, written by Justice Department lawyers in May 2005, provide the legal rationale for waterboarding, head slapping and other rough tactics used by the CIA.
IDF Soldiers Ordered to Shoot at Gaza Rescuers
Commondreams.org March 23, 2009
Published on Sunday, March 22, 2009 by Haaretz (Israel)
by Amira Hass
GAZA STRIP - "Rules of Engagement: Open fire also upon rescue," was handwritten in Hebrew on a sheet of paper found in one of the Palestinian homes the Israel Defense Forces took over during Operation Cast Lead. A reservist officer who did not take part in the Gaza offensive believes that the note is part of orders a low-level commander wrote before giving his soldiers their daily briefing.
Chinese Authorities Detain Tibet Protesters
The New York Times March 23, 2009
SHANGHAI — China said 6 people were arrested and 89 others were detained after hundreds of people attacked a police station in a Tibetan region of northwest China on Saturday, according to the state-controlled media.
The authorities, who said they had restored order in the region, said the attack involved nearly 100 monks from the Ragya Monastery in the Tibetan Autonomous Prefecture of Golog in Qinghai Province.
The police said the unrest broke out Saturday after rumors spread in the region about a man being investigated by the police and then disappearing after he broke Chinese law by advocating Tibetan independence. The riot was the latest and biggest skirmish this month between ethnic Tibetans and Chinese authorities and comes as China’s Tibetan region faces growing tensions amid a series of historically delicate anniversaries.
A Religious War in Israel’s Army
The New York Times March 23, 2009
JERUSALEM — The publication late last week of eyewitness accounts by Israeli soldiers alleging acute mistreatment of Palestinian civilians in the recent Gaza fighting highlights a debate here about the rules of war. But it also exposes something else: the clash between secular liberals and religious nationalists for control over the army and society.
Several of the testimonies, published by an institute that runs a premilitary course and is affiliated with the left-leaning secular kibbutz movement, showed a distinct impatience with religious soldiers, portraying them as self-appointed holy warriors.
N. Korea Says It Is Holding Reporters
The New York Times March 23, 2009
By CHOE SANG-HUN
SEOUL, South Korea — North Korea confirmed Saturday that it had detained two American journalists on charges of “illegally intruding” into the North through its border with China.
The journalists, Laura Ling, a Chinese-American, and Euna Lee, a Korean-American, both working for Current TV, were on a reporting trip along the border when they were detained by North Korean border guards, according to human rights activists and a South Korean news report. Their colleague, Mitch Koss, and their Chinese guide were reported to have been detained by Chinese border guards.
US Weighs Taliban Strike Into Pakistan
Commondreams.org March 18, 2009
Published on Wednesday, March 18, 2009 by The New York Times
by David E. Sanger and Eric Schmitt
WASHINGTON - President Obama and his national security advisers are considering expanding the American covert war in Pakistan far beyond the unruly tribal areas to strike at a different center of Taliban power in Baluchistan, where top Taliban leaders are orchestrating attacks into southern Afghanistan.
New Deal for Blackwater
Commondreams.org March 18, 2009
Published on Wednesday, March 18, 2009 by The Washington Times
by Jim McElhatton
Days after the Baghdad government decided it no longer wanted the company then known as Blackwater in Iraq, the State Department signed a $22.2 million deal in February to keep the embattled contractor working there through most of the summer, contract records show.
The decision keeps Blackwater - since renamed Xe - in Iraq months longer than anyone has suggested publicly, while raising questions about why the U.S. would pay a contractor for work in Iraq if it may not be able to operate there legally.
Groups Bash US Health Care for Detained Immigrants
Commondreams.org March 18, 2009
by Jennifer Kay
MIAMI - U.S. immigration authorities routinely delay, deny or botch medical care for immigrants in detention, according to separate reports by two advocacy groups released Tuesday.
Human Rights Watch and the Florida Immigrant Advocacy Center said immigrants detained by U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement routinely receive inadequate medical care in poorly equipped facilities nationwide
Red Cross Described 'Torture' at CIA Jails
Commondreams.org March 18, 2009
Published on Monday, March 16, 2009 by the Washington Post
by Joby Warrick, Peter Finn and Julie Tate
The International Committee of the Red Cross concluded in a secret report that the Bush administration's treatment of al-Qaeda captives "constituted torture," a finding that strongly implied that CIA interrogation methods violated international law, according to newly published excerpts from the long-concealed 2007 document.
The report, an account alleging physical and psychological brutality inside CIA "black site" prisons, also states that some U.S. practices amounted to "cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment." Such maltreatment of detainees is expressly prohibited by the Geneva Conventions.
Suspected Al-Qaeda Agent Gets Hearing
The Washington Post March 18, 2009
Washington Post Staff Writers
Wednesday, March 18, 2009; Page A06
Suspected al-Qaeda sleeper agent Ali Saleh Kahlah al-Marri spent years isolated in a U.S. Navy brig after authorities proclaimed him an enemy combatant in the Bush administration's long-running war against terrorism.
Today, Justice Department prosecutors will try to convince a federal judge that Marri should be detained even longer while he awaits trial on charges of conspiracy and material support of terrorism.
TASSC in the News!
Unitarian Universalist Service Committee March 13, 2009
Check out the Unitarian Universalist Service Committee website below! TASSC's own advocacy coordinator Harold Nelson as well as our partners in justice, the National Religious Committee Against Torture is featured in a March 6 article entitled, "It's Time for Truth on U.S. Torture"
http://www.uusc.org/content/time_truth_torture
Turkey Warns Obama Against 'Genocide' Recognition
Commondreams.org March 9, 2009
Published on Monday, March 9, 2009 by Agence France Presse
ANKARA - Turkey's Foreign Minister Ali Babacan said Sunday there was a "risk" that US President Barack Obama would recognise the massacre of Armenians a century ago as genocide.
Obama, who is expected to visit Turkey in April, said several times during his election campaign that he would recognise the 1915-1917 massacres under the Ottoman Empire as genocide.
The United States has previously condemned the killings while not calling them genocide to avoid tensions with Turkey, a NATO member and key Middle East ally.
Terror-War Fallout Lingers Over Bush Lawyers
Commondreams.org March 9, 2009
Published on Monday, March 9, 2009 by The New York Times
by Charlie Savage and Scott Shane
WASHINGTON - When John C. Yoo, a former Justice Department lawyer, was selected by President George W. Bush in May 2004 to join a government board charged with releasing historical Nazi and Japanese war crimes records, trouble quickly followed.
The Abu Ghraib torture scandal was exploding, and fellow panelists learned that Mr. Yoo had written secret legal opinions saying presidents have sweeping wartime power to circumvent the Geneva Conventions. They protested that it was absurd to name Mr. Yoo, who they believed might have sanctioned war crimes, to a war crimes commission.
Afghan Refugees Risked Their Lives but are Frustrated by Resettlement in US
Commondreams.org March 9, 2009
Published on Saturday, March 7, 2009 by The Kansas City Star
by Malcolm Garcia
Mohammad Naseer Yasini sat alone in a North Kansas City apartment and recalled life under the Taliban
At that time, he never imagined he would one day work for American soldiers.
He was young, still a boy then, but his memories remain clear. It was a stressful time in Afghanistan, he said. Few people had jobs or other opportunities. He smiled a little ruefully.
Yasini arrived in Kansas City last month and is one of the hundreds of Iraqis and Afghans who move to the United States on a special immigrant visa after serving alongside American troops in their home countries. The visa was created specifically for those whose lives have been threatened because of their work for U.S. forces.
US Top Court Dismisses Al-Qaeda Case
Commondreams.org March 9, 2009
WASHINGTON - The US Supreme Court Friday dismissed a constitutional challenge brought by alleged Al-Qaeda sleeper agent Ali al-Marri as to whether "enemy combatants" can be held indefinitely on US soil.
Marri had been the only "enemy combatant" held on US soil without charge.
Aid Group Says Rape Growing Problem Around Globe
Commondreams.org March 9, 2009
by Celean Jacobson
JOHANNESBURG - More needs to be done to deal with an epidemic of rape in the world's conflict zones and to help victimized women, Doctors Without Borders said Thursday, reporting that its staffers alone treat an average of 35 cases every day.
Meinie Nicolai, director for the medical aid group in Belgium, said rape is being used as a weapon of war in Congo, runs rampant in impoverished South African townships and is an increasingly common experience of Zimbabwean refugees.
Rights and Wrongs of Rendition: MI5 consults 'ethical counsellor'
Commondreams.org March 9, 2009
Published on Friday, March 6, 2009 by The Independent/UK
by Kim Sengupta
Britain's spies have been seeking guidance from an "ethical counsellor" on how to cope with moral dilemmas
MI5 members have discussed issues like the rights and wrongs of extraordinary rendition and whether the Government was right to try to alter the ideological views of citizens
The counsellor's existence was revealed yesterday in the Commons Intelligence and Security Committee's annual report. The post, created three years ago, is held by a former service director-general
Kidnappings on the rise in Afganistan
The Earth Times March 9, 2009
by Earth Times Staff
Kabul - The number of abductions has risen dramatically in Afghanistan, a confidential paper by the Interior Ministry said. In the first six months of 2008, 175 people were abducted in Afghanistan, compared with 96 in the same period the previous year, the paper, which was obtained by Deutsche Presse-Agentur dpa, said.
Experts believe the real number of kidnappings is much higher, as many cases are not reported to police out of fear for the victims.
Detainee's Account Roils U.K. Leaders
The Washington Post March 9, 2009
By Kevin Sullivan
LONDON, March 8 -- Opposition lawmakers on Sunday called for a judicial inquiry into allegations that British intelligence agents participated in the "extraordinary rendition" and torture of a British resident who was held in U.S. custody at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, and other locations for nearly seven years.
Federal Courts in Va., N.Y. May Take Some Guantanamo Cases
The Washington Post March 9, 2009
Federal authorities have finished compiling detailed electronic dossiers on 241 detainees who remain in the U.S. military prison at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, and interagency review teams have begun studying the individual files. The process could see some suspects transferred to federal courts, possibly in Northern Virginia and New York City, the jurisdictions where the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks occurred, according to Justice Department officials.
Seeking Justice, Chinese Land in Secret Jails
The New York Times March 9, 2009
BEIJING — They are often tucked away in the rough-and-tumble sections of the city’s south side, hidden beneath dingy hotels and guarded by men in dark coats. Known as “black houses,” they are unofficial jails for the pesky hordes of petitioners who flock to the capital seeking justice.
Sudan Frees Opposition Leader
Al-Jazeera English March 9, 2009
By Al-Jazeera staff
Hassan al-Turabi, the Sudanese opposition leader, has been released from prison, having been detained for two months after he called on Omar al-Bashir, Sudan's president, to hand himself over to the International Criminal Court (ICC).
TASSC, 142 Human Rights Organizations urge Holder to Appoint Prosecutor
After Downing Street March 4, 2009
Statement on Prosecution of Former High Officials
We urge Attorney General Eric Holder to appoint a non-partisan independent Special Counsel to immediately commence a prosecutorial investigation into the most serious alleged crimes of former President George W. Bush, former Vice President Richard B. Cheney, the attorneys formerly employed by the Department of Justice whose memos sought to justify torture, and other former top officials of the Bush Administration
CIA Destroyed 92 Interrogation Tapes, Probe Says
The Washington Post March 3, 2009
The CIA got rid of 92 videotapes depicting the harsh interrogations and confinement of "high value" al-Qaeda suspects, government lawyers disclosed yesterday, as a long-running criminal probe of the tapes' destruction inched toward a conclusion that is not expected to result in charges against CIA operations employees, three sources said.
Surveillance Court Quietly Moving
The Washington Post March 3, 2009
By Del Quentin Wilber
First, the workers encased the room in reinforced concrete. Then came the thick wood-and-metal doors that seal into the walls. Behind those walls they labored in secret for two years, building a courtroom, judge's chambers and clerk's offices. The only sign that they were done came recently, when biometric hand scanners and green "Restricted Access" placards were placed at the entrances.
What workers have finally completed -- or perhaps not; few really know, and none would say -- is the nation's most secure courtroom for its most secretive court. In coming days, the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court will move from its current base at the Justice Department and settle into a new $2 million home just off a public hallway in the District's federal courthouse.
The Keystone Spies
The Washington Post March 3, 2009
Editorial
THE ONLY THING that surprises us anymore about the Maryland State Police's infamous undercover spying program is that officers were able to squeeze in so much bumbling in such a short period. In only 14 months during the administration of former Gov. Robert L. Ehrlich Jr. (R), law enforcement agents labeled activists working to establish a bike lane as terrorists; designated a group of antiwar protesters as white supremacists; determined that consumers who fought an electricity rate hike were a security threat; and discovered that middle-aged peaceniks had shared cookies with security guards.
Guantánamo for Kids
Commondreams.org March 3, 2009
Published on Tuesday, March 3, 2009 by The Guardian/UK
by Michelle Pauli
Guantánamo Bay's days may be numbered, with President Obama's pledge to close the detention camp, and prisoners trickling home, but children's writer Anna Perera is determined that teenagers, at least, will understand the full horror of the human rights abuses that took place in the name of the "war on terror"
Perera is the author of Guantánamo Boy, a novel that pulls no punches in its depiction of the torture, isolation and injustices suffered by prisoners at the notorious camp.
DOJ Memos Reveal Legal Thinking Behind Controversial Bush Terrorism Policy
Commondreams.org March 3, 2009
Published on Tuesday, March 3, 2009 by ABC News
by Ariane de Vogue, Pierre Thomas, and Jason Ryan
WASHINGTON - The Justice Department today released nine national security legal opinions written by the Bush administration, and revealed that in the weeks before President George W. Bush left office, an administration attorney had disavowed all of them.
The newly released memos deal with warrantless wire tapping, executive power and the seizure of terrorism suspects, all of which were issues on which the Bush administration received criticism from civil liberties advocates.
Holder Stands Firm on Waterboarding
Politico March 3, 2009
By Politico Staff
Attorney General Eric Holder on Monday reaffirmed his commitment to ban waterboarding as an interrogation technique for suspected terrorists.
“As I unequivocally stated in my confirmation hearing before the United States Senate, waterboarding is torture,” Holder said. “My Justice Department will not justify it, will not rationalize it and will not condone it.”
Bashir defiant over warrant threat
Al-Jazeera English March 3, 2009
By AL-JAZEERA STAFF
Omar al-Bashir, the Sudanese president, has struck a defiant tone as judges at the International Criminal Court (ICC) prepare to decide whether to issue a warrant for his arrest.
Judges in The Hague will decide on Wednesday if they will order al-Bashir to be detained to face allegations of war crimes in Sudan's western Darfur region.
http://english.aljazeera.net//news/africa/2009/03/20093314248171925.html
Blackwater founder quits CEO post
Al-Jazeera English March 3, 2009
By AL-JAZEERA STAFF
Erik Prince, the founder of the controversial US private security firm Blackwater, has said he will remain the company's chairman after announcing he was stepping down as chief executive officer.
Tehran Detain American-Iranian Journalist
The Washington Post March 3, 2009
TEHRAN, March 2 -- Iran's Foreign Ministry said Monday that an American Iranian freelance journalist who, according to her family, was detained more than a month ago, had been working in the country illegally.
Roxana Saberi's Iranian-born father, who lives in Fargo, N.D., said Sunday that his daughter has been held in Iran since Jan. 31 and that there has been no information about her fate since she called nearly three weeks ago and told him she had been detained for buying a bottle of wine.
The Price of Tomatoes: Keeping Slavery Alive in Florida
Commondreams.org March 2, 2009
Published on Monday, March 2, 2009 by Gourmet
by Barry Estabrook
Driving from Naples, Florida, the nation’s second-wealthiest metropolitan area, to Immokalee takes less than an hour on a straight road. You pass houses that sell for an average of $1.4 million, shopping malls anchored by Tiffany’s and Saks Fifth Avenue, manicured golf courses. Eventually, gated communities with names like Monaco Beach Club and Imperial Golf Estates give way to modest ranches, and the highway shrivels from six lanes to two. Through the scruffy palmettos, you glimpse flat, sandy tomato fields shimmering in the broiling sun. Rounding a long curve, you enter Immokalee. The heart of town is a nine-block grid of dusty, potholed streets lined by boarded-up bars and bodegas, peeling shacks, and sagging, mildew-streaked house trailers. Mongrel dogs snooze in the shade, scrawny chickens peck in yards. Just off the main drag, vultures squabble over roadkill. Immokalee’s population is 70 percent Latino. Per capita income is only $8,500 a year. One third of the families in this city of nearly 25,000 live below the poverty line. Over one third of the children drop out before graduating from high school.
Zimbabwe activist freed
BBC News March 2, 2009
By BBC News Staff
Prominent Zimbabwean human rights activist Jestina Mukoko has been freed after three months in custody. But Zimbabwean journalist Brian Hungwe told the BBC she remains in hospital, where she had been under police guard.
Treat U.S.-Held Prisoners Like Gitmo Detainees, Afghans Urge
Commondreams.org February 23, 2009
KABUL - The word "Guantanamo" serves as shorthand among some Afghans for all the reasons they hate foreign troops, but the impending closing of the notorious prison has gotten surprisingly little attention in this country.
Even a man who could be expected to feel the most joy about Guantanamo closing, a former detainee who spent more than six years in the camp, quickly turns the conversation to the detention facility north of Kabul, inside the U.S. military base at Bagram.
Freed Guantanamo Detainee Says US Behind hisTorture
Commondreams.org February 23, 2009
LONDON - Binyam Mohamed, a British resident held at Guantanamo Bay for more than four years, was released and put on a plane to Britain on Monday and accused the U.S. government of orchestrating his torture.
Mohamed, 30, was due to arrive back in Britain shortly following his release from the U.S. prison camp on Cuba. His statement was issued via his lawyers after his release.
"I have been through an experience that I never thought to encounter in my darkest nightmares," said Mohamed, an Ethiopian citizen who has British residency.
US attorney general in Guantanamo
BBC News February 23, 2009
New US Attorney General Eric Holder is visiting Guantanamo Bay - his first trip to the controversial US detention camp in Cuba.
He is being briefed on the detainees and the charges they were facing before military trials were halted last month.
Mr Holder is also reviewing cases of some 250 remaining inmates, following President Barack Obama's order to close the camp within a year.
Guantanamo Bay release overturned
BBC February 19, 2009
A US federal appeals court has rejected the release of 17 Guantanamo Bay detainees onto US soil, reports say.
A US judge ruled last year that the 17 Uighurs - Chinese Muslims - were no longer enemy combatants and should be released into the United States.
China has requested their return, but the US will not send them home for fear they will be persecuted.
No other country has agreed to take the men, who have been detained since they were picked up in Afghanistan in 2001.
The appeals court said that only the executive branch, not the judiciary, could make decisions on immigration, Associated Press news agency said.
CIA nominee decries waterboarding
BBC February 6, 2009
US President Barack Obama's nominee to head the CIA, Leon Panetta, has condemned the interrogation technique "waterboarding" as "torture".
But he made it clear that agents who had carried out waterboarding in the past should not be prosecuted if they believed they were following the law.
The Bush administration approved the practice for at least three terror suspects in 2002 and 2003.
Mr Obama has banned harsh interrogation techniques, including waterboarding.
"I have expressed the opinion that I believe waterboarding is torture and that it is wrong," Mr Panetta told the Senate Intelligence Committee, which is considering his nomination.
Ministers face torture pressure
BBC February 4, 2009
UK ministers must answer allegations that Britain was complicit in torture, a senior Conservative MP has said.
David Davis said a High Court ruling on Wednesday alleged that Binyam Mohamed, a UK resident held in the Guantanamo Bay camp in Cuba, had been tortured.
The ruling also said the US threatened to withdraw intelligence help from the UK if details were released.
The judges said the UK's attorney general has begun a criminal investigation into possible torture.
Investigation
Lord Justice Thomas and Mr Justice Lloyd Jones said the attorney general would be investigating the issues of "torture and cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment".
The judges said they wanted the full details of the alleged torture to be published in the interests of safeguarding the rule of law, free speech and democratic accountability.
Obama orders Guantanamo closure
BBC January 22, 2009
US President Barack Obama has ordered the closure of the Guantanamo Bay prison camp as well as all overseas CIA detention centres for terror suspects.
Signing the orders, Mr Obama said the US would continue to fight terror, but maintain "our values and our ideals".
He also ordered a review of military trials for terror suspects and a ban on harsh interrogation methods.
Continuing a flurry of announcements, he named his envoys to the Middle East, and to Afghanistan and Pakistan.
At Mr Obama's request, military judges have suspended several of the trials of suspects at Guantanamo so that the legal process can be reviewed.
White House answers judge's finding of US torture
YAHOO January 14, 2009
WASHINGTON – The Bush administration maintained Wednesday that the U.S. does not torture prisoners despite a claim to the contrary from the military judge in charge of trying Guantanamo Bay detainees.
Susan. J. Crawford is the top Bush administration official overseeing the military trials of terrorist suspects held at the U.S. prison in Cuba. She told The Washington Post that the United States tortured a Saudi man in 2002. The legal implications of the treatment prevented her from bringing him to trial, Crawford said.
The case of Mohammed al-Qahtani, whom officials have claimed was to have been the "20th hijacker" on 9/11, illustrates the legal and logistical trouble ahead for President-elect Barack Obama, who plans to order the closure of the stigmatized prison his first week on the job.
"We tortured Qahtani," Crawford said, making her the first senior Bush administration official to say that aggressive interrogation techniques had crossed the line.
Thai troops 'torturing in south'
BBC January 14, 2009
Thai troops are engaged in "systematic" torture as they combat an insurgency in the south, Amnesty International says.
Troops were using violence to intimidate individuals and communities into ending support for the insurgents, the rights group said in a report.
A Thai commander acknowledged isolated cases of abuse, but said that torture was neither acceptable nor tolerated.
The insurgency in Thailand's Muslim majority south has killed more than 3,500 people since 2004.
Thailand annexed the three southern provinces - Narathiwat, Yala and Pattani - in 1902. The vast majority of people there are Muslim and speak a Malay dialect.
Religion and Ethics
BBC January 14, 2009
Religion and Ethics- Ethical issues.
Detainee Tortured, Says U.S. Official
Washington Post January 14, 2009
The top Bush administration official in charge of deciding whether to bring Guantanamo Bay detainees to trial has concluded that the U.S. military tortured a Saudi national who allegedly planned to participate in the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks, interrogating him with techniques that included sustained isolation, sleep deprivation, nudity and prolonged exposure to cold, leaving him in a "life-threatening condition."
UK call to help close Guantanamo
BBC January 1, 2009
The British government is pressing European countries to help resettle inmates from Guantanamo Bay detention centre, the Foreign Office has said.
US president-elect Barack Obama plans to close the camp in Cuba. Some 50 of the 250 inmates are said to have been cleared for release.
The Times newspaper reported Britain was preparing to accept detainees.
But the Foreign Office said it was "not pushing for a deal" to allow more Guantanamo inmates into the UK.
While Britain has not directly offered asylum, it said it accepted the US would need help closing the facility.
People 'still willing to torture'
BBC December 19, 2008
Decades after a notorious experiment, scientists have found test subjects are still willing to inflect pain on others if told to by an authority figure.
Rwanda genocide mastermind jailed
BBC December 18, 2008
Former senior defence official Theoneste Bagosora has been convicted of instigating Rwanda's 1994 genocide and sentenced to life in prison.
Bagosora and two co-defendants were found by a UN tribunal to have led a committee that plotted the massacre of ethnic Tutsis and moderate Hutus.
It is the first time the Rwanda tribunal has convicted anyone of organising the killings.
More than 800,000 people were killed in Rwanda's genocide.
Along with Bagosora, former military commanders Anatole Nsegiyumva and Alloys Ntabakuze were also found guilty of genocide, crimes against humanity and war crimes, and given life sentences.
Obama plans Guantanamo deadline
BBC December 18, 2008
Barack Obama has said he aims to close the Guantanamo Bay detention centre and put a clear end to torture in the US within two years of becoming president.
The president-elect told Time magazine he aims to restore the balance between US security needs and the Constitution.
Outgoing Vice-president Dick Cheney has said he does not see how the Guantanamo facility can be responsibly closed until the "war on terror" was over.
He also justified using water-boarding on some detainees during interrogation.
Guantanamo closure plan ordered
BBC December 18, 2008
US Defense secretary Robert Gates has ordered plans to be drafted for the closure of the Guantanamo bay detention center.......
Press Release
TASSC International December 3, 2008
TASSC International
PRESS RELEASE
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
TORTURE SURVIVORS CALL FOR INVESTIGATION OF BUSH, OTHERS
Washington, DC December 4, 2008--An international group of torture survivors has called upon the incoming Obama administration to investigate President Bush and others of his administration to determine if they have violated U.S. laws against torture and, therefore, should be prosecuted.
The survivors, members of the Torture Abolition and Survivors Support Coalition International (TASSC), an organization founded by and for torture survivors, condemned proposals for bipartisan commissions as "nothing more than tootheless tigers intended to paper over probable criminal conduct."
TASSC advocacy coordinator Harold Nelson denounced those opposing the investigation as "apologists for human rights violations, war crimes and the idea that the powerful are above the law." Nelson went on, "How could the Obama administration denounce human rights violations elsewhere if it refused to investigate those which may have been ordered by the leaders of our own government."
TASSC is part of a coalition including Human Rights USA, legal experts and others who are drawing up a criminal complaint to be presented to the new Attorney General calling for such an investigation.
Contact: Harold Nelson
Office: 202.529.2991
Cell: 202.431.9881
***************************************************************************
Obama’s first problem is US war crimes
TIMES ONLINE December 1, 2008
Asmall and largely unnoticed spat among the transition planners for the president-elect, Barack Obama, broke out last week. It was the first genuinely passionate debate among the Obamaites and it centres on a terribly difficult and terribly important decision that will be among the first that Obama has to make.
'Punish India police for torture'
BBC NEWS November 22, 2008
Police in the Indian state of Andhra Pradesh must be prosecuted for torturing Muslims detained after bomb blasts last year, a rights group says.
Human Rights Watch warned of the risks of stigmatising and alienating "an entire community". The state government admitted last week that 21 men had been tortured and would each receive $600 in compensation. A series of blasts in May and August 2007 killed nearly 60 people in the state capital, Hyderabad.
'Stripped, beaten'
The authorities in Andhra Pradesh detained nearly 100 men for questioning soon after the bomb attacks in the capital, Hyderabad, but the government last week admitted that 21 of the suspects had been tortured.
China official admits to torture
BBC NEWS November 22, 2008
Wang Zhenchuan, Deputy Procurator General, said at least 30 wrong verdicts were handed down each year because torture had been used.
Mr Wang said the real number could be higher, according to state media.
Confidence in China's justice system has been seriously undermined by recent high-profile wrongful convictions.
A butcher executed for murder in 1989 was proved innocent when his alleged victim was found alive, while a man was freed after 11 years in jail when his wife, whom he was accused of killing, was also found alive.
Mr Wang's unusually frank comments appeared to be part of a campaign to tackle problems in the judicial system, and shore up public trust.
Poll results: Waterboarding is torture
CNN November 22, 2008
WASHINGTON (CNN) -- A majority of Americans consider waterboarding a form of torture, but some of those say it's OK for the U.S. government to use the technique, according to a poll released Tuesday.
Michael Mukasey said waterboarding is repugnant, but he stopped short of saying it was torture.Asked whether they think waterboarding is a form of torture, more than two-thirds of respondents, or 69 percent, said yes; 29 percent said no.Asked whether they think the U.S. government should be allowed to use the procedure to try to get information from suspected terrorists, 58 percent said no; 40 percent said yes.In the procedure, water is used on restrained prisoners to make them feel like they are drowning.The practice became an issue during the recent confirmation hearings for attorney general nominee Michael Mukasey, who has refused to categorically reject the practice.
Mukasey told the Senate Judiciary Committee last week that while he finds waterboarding personally "repugnant," he could not answer "hypothetical" questions about whether the technique amounts to torture.
Obama Advisers: Torture Prosecutions Not Likely
The Huffington Post November 22, 2008
WASHINGTON — Barack Obama's incoming administration is unlikely to bring criminal charges against government officials who authorized or engaged in harsh interrogations of suspected terrorists during the George W. Bush presidency. Obama, who has criticized the use of torture, is being urged by some constitutional scholars and human rights groups to investigate possible war crimes by the Bush administration.
Obama Considering Commission On Bush Admin Torture
The Huffington Post November 22, 2008
"Despite the hopes of many human-rights advocates, the new Obama Justice Department is not likely to launch major new criminal probes of harsh interrogations and other alleged abuses by the Bush administration," Newsweek's Michael Isikoff reports. "But one idea that has currency among some top Obama advisers is setting up a 9/11-style commission that would investigate counterterrorism policies and make public as many details as possible.""At a minimum, the American people have to be able to see and judge what happened," said one senior adviser, who asked not to be identified talking about policy matters. The commission would be empowered to order the U.S. intelligence agencies to open their files for review and question senior officials who approved "waterboarding" and other controversial practices.
Ex-Liberian president's son convicted of torture
CNN October 30, 2008
(CNN) -- Federal jurors convicted the son of former Liberian president Charles Taylor Sr. of torture and conspiracy charges Thursday, said a spokeswoman for the U.S. attorney's office in the southern district of Florida.
Former Liberian President Charles Taylor's son, Charles McArthur Emmanuel, is shown during his trial.
Taylor's case, tried in Miami, Florida, was the first brought under a 1994 United States law saying those accused of committing torturous acts overseas can be tried in a U.S. federal court.
He could face a sentence of up to life in prison. It was not immediately clear when he will be sentenced.
Vigilant About Torture
The Washington Post October 20, 2008
The Oct. 15 news story "CIA Tactics Endorsed in Secret Memos; Waterboarding Got White House Nod" confirmed what President Bush indicated in an interview with ABC News in June: that the administration not only knew of but also approved the use of torture as an interrogation technique against detainees in the war on terrorism.
Torturing Democracy
Toturingdemocracy.og October 17, 2008
Tortruring Democracy
Ugandans ban female circumcision
BBC NEWS October 15, 2008
A community in eastern Uganda has banned the deeply rooted practice of female genital mutilation (FGM), an official has said.
Kapchorwa district chairman Nelson Chelimo said it was "outmoded" and "not useful" for the community's women.
The Sabiny are the only group in Uganda that practises FGM, which involves cutting off a young girl's clitoris
Central African Republic: UN reports mounting human rights abuses
UN NEWS October 11, 2008
Extrajudicial killings, torture and arbitrary arrests, mostly attributed to the defence and security forces and encouraged by a culture of impunity, have contributed to a considerable deterioration in human rights in the Central African Republic (CAR), according to a United Nations report released today. “The Central African Republic (Government) is urgently advised to resolutely follow a policy that is based more firmly on the struggle against impunity,” the UN Peacebuilding Support Office in the country, known by its French acronym BONUCA, says.
Guantanamo Uighur release blocked
BBC NEWS October 9, 2008
An US federal appeal court has blocked a judge's order that 17 Chinese detainees at the Guantanamo Bay camp should immediately be released. A district court had said it was wrong for the Bush administration to continue holding the Chinese Muslim Uighurs, as it had no evidence against them.
The White House then appealed, saying the original ruling - the first of its kind - could set a dangerous precedent.
Captured in Afghanistan in 2001, the group has been held without charge.
Under the original ruling, they were to be brought to court on Friday, and then freed to stay with members of the Uighur community in the Washington area.
The appeal court ruling puts a temporary halt to the release to allow lawyers for both sides to present further arguments over the coming week.
Kenyan detainees insist Ethiopia used torture
RFI October 6, 2008
On Saturday two of the eight Kenyans that returned home from jail in Ethiopia this weekend reiterated accusations of mistreatment and torture. The eight had been held without charge since 2006 on suspicion of links to Al-Qaeda. They were among a group of people moved from Kenya to Somalia and then held in custody in Ethiopia as part of a so-called "rendition" exercise.
Special Report: 'You're going to confess. We can do anything to you'
ScotlandonSunday October 6, 2008
Falsely imprisoned for bombings in Saudi Arabia, tortured and beaten, Scotsman Sandy Mitchell thought the worst had already happened. Then he was sentenced to death by crucifixion. Now, eight years on, he has been pardoned and released, but where can he turn for help to pick up the pieces of his shattered life?
UN Says Millions of People in Arbitrary, Unlawful Detention
VOA October 4, 2008
The new High Commissioner for Human Rights, Navi Pillay, is calling on governments to stop the arbitrary and unlawful detention of their citizens. Pillay is launching a United Nations initiative to abolish this illegal practice and to highlight the plight of millions of people around the world who suffer unjust imprisonment and systematic violation of their human rights. Lisa Schlein reports for VOA from Geneva.The U.N.'s top human rights official, Navi Pillay, says arbitrary arrest and unlawful imprisonment is widespread and global. She says problems relating to detention exist in almost all countries.
But, while unlawful detentions have been going on for a long time, she says they have been made worse in recent years by the so-called war on terrorism.
APA letter to Bush: New policy limits psychologist involvement in interrogations
EurkAlert October 4, 2008
Prohibits psychologist participation in interrogations at unlawful detention sites
WASHINGTON – The American Psychological Association sent a letter today to President Bush, informing him of a significant change in the association's policy that limits the roles of psychologists in certain unlawful detention settings where the human rights of detainees are violated, such as has occurred at the U.S. naval base at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, and at so-called CIA black sites around the world.
"The effect of this new policy is to prohibit psychologists from any involvement in interrogations or any other operational procedures at detention sites that are in violation of the U.S. Constitution or international law (e.g., the Geneva Conventions and the U.N. Convention Against Torture)," says the letter, from APA President Alan E. Kazdin, PhD. "In such unlawful detention settings, persons are deprived of basic human rights and legal protections, including the right to independent judicial review of their detention."
The roles of psychologists at such sites would now be limited to working directly for the people being detained or for an independent third party working to protect human rights, or to providing treatment to military personnel. The new policy was voted on by APA members and is in the process of being implemented. http://www.apa.org/releases/kazdin-to-bush1008.pdf
Ethiopia frees Kenyan 'Islamists'
BBC October 4, 2008
Eight Kenyan men deported to Ethiopia and jailed as terror suspects for more than a year have returned to Kenya.
The eight were imprisoned in 2007 on suspicion of being members of an Islamic militia driven out of Somalia by Ethiopian troops.
And a BBC investigation uncovered evidence of the poor conditions endured by detainees at a jail in Addis Ababa, the Ethiopian capital, known as "Africa's Guantanamo".
Ex-Liberia president, son face UN, US charges
Associated Press October 2, 2008
THE HAGUE, Netherlands (AP) — In separate courts on different continents, former Liberian President Charles Taylor and his American son are standing trial on charges of committing atrocities in neighboring West African nations.
The unprecedented father and son trials — one by a U.N.-backed war crimes tribunal in The Hague and the other by a U.S. federal court in Miami — are revealing the savagery of the conflicts in Liberia and Sierra Leone.
In Miami, a witness displays the scars he says came from burning plastic poured onto his skin in Liberia. In The Hague, a mother recounts how rebels in Sierra Leone ordered her to carry a sack containing the heads of her two children who had just been hacked to death.
The cases demonstrate that the days when war crimes suspects could flee and slip into obscurity to avoid prosecution may be drawing to a close.
Torture trial begins for ex-Liberian leader's son
USA TODAY September 29, 2008
MIAMI (AP) — Former Liberian President Charles Taylor's son housed political opponents in dirt pits, shocked their genitals and even beheaded some, federal prosecutors said Monday during opening statements.
The trial marks the first test of a 1994 law that makes it a crime for a U.S. citizen to commit torture overseas.
Charles McArthur Emmanuel headed the "Demon Forces," an elite paramilitary anti-terrorist unit in his father's government in west Africa. The unit trained soldiers and tortured prisoners with acts like "running the rim," which prosecutors say forced victims to carry telephone pole-sized logs on their shoulders and run in circles while being whipped.
"Men were burned, prodded with electrical prods, sodomized, all to encourage them to confess to non-existent crimes," U.S. prosecutor Christopher Graveline said during opening statements, showing the jury pictures of alleged torture victims' scars.
Emmanuel, 31, has pleaded not guilty to the charges, which carry a combined possible sentence of life in prison.
UN Human Rights Commission discouraged by Kyrgyz authorities for releasing Uzbek refugees
September 27, 2008
The United Nations Commission on Human Rights is discouraged by the fact that Kyrgyzstan’s authorities released four refugees to Uzbekistan, Tursunbek Akun Ombudsman of Kyrgyzstan told reporters on Friday.
The four Uzbek refugees Johangir Maksudov, Adil Rahimov, Yakub Tashbaev and Rasul Pirmanov, have fled Uzbekistan after the Andijan 2005 events, filed complains to the UN Human Rights Commission.
“Kyrgyzstan broke several international agreements. Namely the UN International Pact on Civil and Political Rights as Uzbek citizens will face torture and death penalty in Uzbekistan,” Akun added.
“Kyrgyzstan should elaborate a certain procedure of UN decisions fulfillment. International many-sided agreements should be made termless priority against regional ones,” Dmitry Kabak, a human rights activist said.
The ombudsman also mentioned about the coming session of the Collective Security Treaty Organization to run on September 29-October 10.
Ethiopia threatens to withdraw from Somalia
WSWS September 22, 2008
Ethiopian Prime Minister Meles Zenawi has warned that he is prepared to withdraw his country’s troops from Somalia, where they are propping up the US-backed Transitional Federal Government (TFG), even if the latter was not in control of the country.
His comments in an interview with the Financial Times at the end of August mark a significant shift in policy. He had previously indicated that Ethiopia would stay in Somalia until the TFG was in control of the country and well established.
He threatened that “technically we could bring them [the Ethiopian troops] back home tomorrow. We feel we have done what we planned to do in terms of preventing a total takeover of Somalia by a jihadist group.”
A Landmark Torture Trial
September 22, 2008
A landmark trial is scheduled to begin this week, in which a senior government official is accused of responsibility for vicious acts of torture committed in the name of fighting terrorism.
Alas, the defendant is not one of the many Bush Administration officials who so richly deserve their moment in the dock. But the trial does mark the first application of a federal law criminalizing extraterritorial acts of torture--a law that could someday be used to prosecute "war on terror" abuses.
Passport Fraud and Torture
The defendant in this case, Charles "Chuckie" Taylor, Jr., is
HRF Tells Senate That U.S. Interrogation and Detention Policy Must Be 'Firmly Rooted' in the Rule of
Human rights First September 16, 2008
Chairman Feingold, Ranking Member Brownback and Members of the Subcommittee, thank you for inviting me to be here today to share the views of Human Rights First on what must be done to restore the rule of law in the area
Egyptian detainees accuse state of torture
Socialist Worker Online September 9, 2008
Egyptian detainees accuse state of torture
The detainees, who were corralled in a cage in the court, chanted, “We want Justice! God help us! We are innocent!” and shouted abuse at police commander Khaled Gharaba as he entered the room.
They accuse him of torturing confessions out of them.
Kenyans dismiss torture pay-out
BBC News September 2, 2008
 Torture increased after a 1982 coup attempt against President Moi |
Kenyan activists have dismissed as paltry, compensation they were awarded for being tortured by government agents under former President Daniel Arap Moi.
A court last week awarded $20,000 to each of seven victims. They had demanded $180,000.
Their lawyer, and a victim himself, Rumba Kinuthia, said they also want the torturers to face justice.
At least 2,000 people were tortured at the infamous Nyayo House in Nairobi, which is now open to the public.
President Mwai Kibaki succeeded Mr Moi in 2003 and promised to compensate torture victims but some human rights activists have accused him of dragging his feet.
Protesters in Guantanamo orange march against torture
MinnPost.com September 2, 2008
Why would people climb into full-body jumpsuits on the last hot day in August, pull black cloth bags over their heads and march more than a mile in the noon sun?
"What is going on at Guantanamo flies in the face of everything our form of government and the principles of the United States Constitution stand for," Bob Kolstad, a lawyer from Minneapolis, said as he wrestled into his suit. "This is a visible symbol of how corrupt our government has become."
Guantanamo hearing grants more time
The Press Association August 29, 2008
The Government was given a further week by the High Court to consider its position over its refusal to disclose secret documents in the case of a British resident held in Guantanamo Bay.
Ethiopian national Binyam Mohamed, 30, who came to Britain in 1994 seeking asylum, says the material supports his case that the evidence against him was obtained through torture.
He was arrested in Pakistan in 2002 and has been held at the detention facility in Cuba for the past four years. He is facing US military trial for terrorism offences and possibly the death penalty if found guilty.
Mohamed, who worked as a janitor in London, alleges the evidence against him is based on confessions extracted by torture and ill-treatment - claims denied by American authorities.
Lawyers for the Foreign Secretary argue that disclosure of the material would cause "significant damage to national security of the United Kingdom".
UK Government must provide information about rendition, disappearance and torture
Amnesty International UK August 29, 2008
Amnesty International today called on the government of the UK to give the lawyers for Binyam Mohamed, a former UK resident imprisoned at Guantánamo Bay, information which it holds and which might help him to show that he has been a victim of torture and other ill-treatment in the US-led programme of renditions and secret detention.
"Providing this information would be a first step towards accountability for the UK's involvement in the US programme of rendition and secret detention, and in the torture and other ill-treatment of terrorist suspects," said Halya Gowan, a spokesperson on Europe at Amnesty International.
Binyam Mohamed was arrested at Karachi airport in April 2002 and handed over into US custody three months later. In July 2002, he was transferred on a CIA-registered plane to Morocco, where he was held for about 18 months and allegedly tortured, including by having his penis cut by a razor blade.
Bush administration agrees to turn over documents in torture case
Herald Tribunes August 29, 2008
LONDON: In a significant reversal, the Bush administration has agreed to turn over documents that allegedly support allegations by a prisoner at Guantánamo Bay, Cuba, that he was tortured while in American custody in Pakistan in early 2002, a British court said in a ruling Friday.
The administration strenuously sought to keep secret the documents about the detainee, Binyam Mohamed, and its changed position came in response to pressure from the British government and the British court, which has indicated that if the defense could not get the documents from the United States, it was inclined to order the British government to do so.
The High Court had ruled on Aug. 21 that the Foreign Office must provide Mohamed with information relating to his time in detention. His lawyers said the material supported his claim to have been "extraordinarily rendered," tortured and forced into a confession on terrorism charges.
The court described the American reversal, which came a few days ago, as "welcome" and "significant."
Mum flees Russian troops who torture pal
People.co.uk August 24, 2008
A british mum feared for her life while being hunted by armed Russian soldiers in Georgia.
Mum-of-four Margot Dunne took refuge in a secret hideout after a friend was taken captive.
She spent a terrifying night before the pair were reunited and escaped to safety.
Margot, 44, was with pal Travis Turner, 33, when troops armed with Kalashnikov rifles swooped on them last week.
Margot slipped away but American-born Travis was held and interrogated over her whereabouts.
Margot, of Stockton-on-Tees, Co Durham, said: "Travis is a hero for not leading them to the Georgian family hiding me. They had interrogated him. They played mind games with him - loading weapons right behind his head to scare him.
UK Guantanamo inmate wins ruling
BBC NEWS August 21, 2008
 Binyam Mohamed could face the death penalty if found guilty |
A UK resident detained at Guantanamo Bay has won a High Court ruling that the government should disclose material which he says backs his torture claims.
Binyam Mohamed, who is facing terrorism charges, says the documents support his case that the evidence against him has been obtained through torture.
Mr Mohamed, 30, has been held at the US military prison in Cuba for four years.
The judges said the information relating to him was "not only necessary but essential for his defence".
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Nobel nominee in torture ban call
BBC News August 19, 2008
A several-time nominee for the Nobel Peace Prize has led calls at a conference in Glasgow, for an international ban on torture.
Dr Inge Genefke urged more than 45 countries to sign the United Nations Convention Against Torture.
The Danish activist was speaking at the 12th World Congress on Pain on Tuesday.
About 5,000 delegates are expected to attend between 17 and 22 August. The congress will also discuss the latest research and treatment of pain.
Torture taking flight from Canada?
RABBLE.ca August 19, 2008
Drivers trying to use Fasken Drive in northwest Toronto were in for a surprise on Monday, August 11 when they discovered that a sizable stretch of the road was shut down in both directions by police barricades, complete with lights flashing atop patrol cars and a large “Road Closed” sign.
This was all in honour of a planned vigil by members of Stop Canadian Involvement in Torture at the offices of a company called Skyservice.
The vigil was called for after the company had ignored six months of correspondence seeking a meeting to discuss our concerns about their possible contracts to deport Canada’s secret trial detainees to torture in Syria, Egypt, Algeria and Morocco.
Such flights are illegal. Indeed, the Convention Against Torture states unequivocally that “No State Party shall expel, return ("refouler") or extradite a person to another State where there are substantial grounds for believing that he would be in danger of being subjected to torture.”
A push to ban psychologists' role in torture
Boston Globe August 19, 2008
Holding signs that read, "Do no harm" and "Abolish torture," about 100 people attended a rally outside the American Psychological Association's annual convention yesterday, urging the organizations to ban its members from being involved in military interrogations and torture as part of the war on terrorism.
A resolution to that effect is being weighed by the organization's 148,000 members, and debate on the topic has permeated the discussion at this year's meeting, held at the Boston Exhibition and Convention Center. Members are sending in their votes on the issue this month.
NY judge wants CIA to reveal 'torture' documents
NewsDay.com August 19, 2008
NEW YORK - A judge ordered the CIA to prepare a list of witnesses and documents relating to the destruction of videotapes of detainee interrogations.
Judge Alvin Hellerstein says he is growing impatient with delays to resolving requests by the American Civil Liberties Union for the information.
The judge says he will order production of a list of witnesses and documents unless the Central Intelligence Agency can convince him it will interfere with a criminal probe. He gave the agency 10 days to do so.
A criminal probe is under way into why the CIA destroyed videotapes in 2005 that were made to document new harsh questioning techniques.
Defendants in court for 'torture' of 5 children in Hawaii home
Honolulu Adviser August 14, 2008
A couple who prosecutors said operated a "house of torture" admitted yesterday to subjecting five children living in their care to two years of physical abuse.
Deputy Prosecutor Lori Wada said Gabriel Kalama, 31, and his wife, Barbara, 28, both of Wai'anae, committed "heinous atrocities" from 2004 to 2006 against children entrusted to their care by the Family Court system.
The victims, all siblings, were the cousins of Barbara Kalama. The Kalamas originally were foster parents to the children and later became their legal guardians, Wada said.
They were taken from the home in 2006 after the Kalamas and Rita Makekau, 51, Barbara Kalama's mother, who lived in the same home, were indicted on charges including assault, child endangerment and abuse of a family member.
Evidence of Torture Hidden From Journalists in Beijing
Epoch Times August 14, 2008
Falun Gong practitioners act out a torture scene common in Chinese prisons and labour camps. (Greg Wood/AFP/Getty Images)
Foreign journalists in Beijing are actively seeking out information about Falun Gong practitioners detained in camps near Olympic venues, as the Chinese regime tries to cover its tracks.
More than 20,000 overseas journalists in Beijing were sent a guide to ‘re-education-through-labor’ camps published by the Falun Dafa Information Centre (FDI), prompting many reporters to investigate the claims of torture and severe rights violations.
Tribunal to hear torture cases
The Times of India August 10, 2008
BANGALORE: The National Project on Preventing Torture in India (NPPT) will organize a tribunal on August 12 and 13 at St Joseph's College on Lalbagh Road. Around 100 cases of torture by the police will be heard by a jury headed by Justice H Suresh, retired judge of the Bombay High Court.
The alleged perpetrators can also depose before the jury to present their side of the story. The NPPT - spearheaded by the South India Cell for Human Rights Education and Monitoring (SICHREM) in Karnataka - is an effort towards ratification of the UN Convention Against Torture and framing of a domestic law for preventing torture and protecting victims and witnesses.
GUYANA: Torture allegations mount up
Stabroek News August 10, 2008
There are at least six allegations of torture pending against the security services and even though there have been denials followed by promises of in-depth probes, the findings of any investigations have still not been made public.
Allegations from Buxton-ians Patrick Sumner, Victor Jones and three of the army’s own – Alvin Wilson, Sharth Robertson and Michael Dunn – surfaced earlier this year. And while in custody a convicted prisoner Edwin Niles was severely beaten as well as being burnt, allegedly at the hands of prison officers. In all these cases the men suffered torture during interrogation. The earlier cases did not result in any deaths, but were serious enough to leave the victims ailing for months.
Prisoner Niles was burnt with a hot liquid on his back. The post- mortem examination conducted by government pathologist Nehaul Singh revealed that the man had died of blood clots in his lungs because of the burns on his back and that he had also sustained a fractured arm. He had completed a day of labour at army base Camp Ayan-ganna and upon a search of his person after returning to the Camp Street prison, officers recovered seven .22 rounds of ammunition from his pants pockets. According to reports the pants Niles was wearing were not his; he had picked them up at the army base.
It was during the course of his interrogation concerning the ammunition that he was reported to have suffered the beating. The Guyana Prison Service has been reluctant to say exactly what happened prior to the man’s hospitalization and subsequent death, confining itself to the statement that Niles had been injured during an altercation with prison officers.
Chinese Rights Lawyer Suffers Unimaginable Torture
Epoch Times August 8, 2008
Edward McMillan-Scott (L) Vice President, European Parliament poses with Democracy Legislator Albert Ho next to a portrait of mainland Chinese jailed human rights lawyer Gao Zhisheng in Hong Kong, 26 August 2006. (Mike Clarke/AFP/Getty Images)
A much-loved Chinese human rights lawyer has been subject to forms of torture “beyond anyone’s imagination”, a high-level government source has disclosed.
Gao Zhisheng was arrested in November last year and tortured for nearly two months before being released into house arrest. Now in a taped interview, a senior Chinese government whistleblower has revealed the extent of the torture and humiliation the lawyer suffered.
In one case he was stripped and beaten with electric batons and when he lost consciousness prison guards urinated on his head. His family, in particular his young children are also believed to have suffered forms of torture.
Torture trial debate riles Brazil's old soldiers
International Herald Tribune August 8, 2008
RIO DE JANEIRO: Retired Brazilian army officers accused ministers of terrorism links and listed their alleged past crimes on Thursday, reacting angrily to renewed debate on whether military-era torturers should be tried.
Unlike neighbours such as Argentina and Chile, Brazil has never prosecuted anyone for the murder and widespread torture of dissidents during its 1964-1985 dictatorship.
But Justice Minister Tarso Genro raised the possibility last month that military-era torturers could be tried, saying their crimes were not political and therefore not covered by the country's 1979 Amnesty law.
Surrounded by paintings of grand martial scenes at Rio's Military Club, several hundred gray-haired former officers -- who would have the most to fear from Argentine-style prosecutions -- heard speakers denounce the government.
Zimbabwe Court Asked to Close Alleged Torture Camps in East
Bloomberg.com August 5, 2008
Aug. 5 (Bloomberg) -- A lawmaker from Zimbabwe's opposition Movement for Democratic Change asked the High Court for an injunction to free MDC supporters he alleged have been tortured at government-backed camps in his eastern district.
``The destruction of homes, the harassment and beating of MDC members and organizers has been extended throughout the district,'' Douglas Mwonzora said today in a telephone interview from Zimbabwe's capital, Harare. ``Self-styled war veterans are demanding food and money from villages in an organized protection racket. People have been forced from their homes and are seeking protection elsewhere.''
No date has been set for the hearing, said Mwonzora, former spokesman for the National Constitutional Alliance, a group that campaigns to change the country's constitution. He was elected March 29 to represent Nyanga North. Nyanga, in the Eastern Highlands, is one of Zimbabwe's main tourism destinations.
Downstairs from her glittering Chilean salon, there was a torture chamber
McClatchy DC August 4, 2008
SANTIAGO, Chile — During the darkest years of this country's military dictatorship, Mariana Callejas was an up-and-coming writer and the hostess of the era's most glamorous literary salon.
Chile's leading authors trekked up to Callejas' hillside mansion every Thursday night to talk literature, have a few drinks and sometimes dance until the next morning. The salon offered a respite from the fear and violence of Gen. Augusto Pinochet's Chile, in which nearly 3,200 dissidents died or disappeared at the hands of government agents.
Writer Carlos Iturra, who attended the meetings, said in an e-mail that he'd always remember those nights for "the good writers who were formed there" amid the "dances, drinks, laughs and debates."
Rights group: UK trained Kenya 'torture troops'
Associated Press August 4, 2008
NAIROBI, Kenya (AP) — A human rights group called on Monday for suspension of international military cooperation with Kenya, saying Britain helped train Kenyan troops who are accused of torture and murder.
Human Rights Watch says such aid should be halted until there is an independent investigation and action is taken against those responsible for atrocities.
Britain and the U.S. provide assistance and training to security forces in Kenya, which is considered a regional hub for controlling extremist Islamist groups in the Horn of Africa.
"The British people should be concerned that their money is being spent on training forces implicated in torture, murder and disappearances," said researcher Ben Rawlence, who wrote Monday's report.
Would Barack Obama prosecute the Bush administration for torture?
Salon.com August 3, 2008
Aug. 4, 2008 | WASHINGTON -- On the campaign trail in April, Barack Obama was asked whether, if elected, he would prosecute Bush administration officials for establishing torture as American policy. The candidate demurred. "If crimes have been committed, they should be investigated," he said. But he quickly added, "I would not want my first term consumed by what was perceived on the part of the Republicans as a partisan witch hunt, because I think we've got too many problems to solve."
People who have given advice to the Obama campaign say they see little political advantage in the candidate discussing during a general election campaign how his administration might investigate or prosecute Bush administration officials for torture.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/africa/7518993.stm
BBC NEWS July 22, 2008
The United Nations says it is alarmed by the number of deaths in a prison in the Democratic Republic of Congo.
At least 26 inmates have died from acute malnutrition at the main prison in the city of Mbuji Mayi in Kasai Oriental province since February.
Four inmates died of hunger last week alone. The UN says it is particularly concerned because no measures are being taken to improve living conditions.
Former bin Laden driver pleads not guilty
YAHOO! NEWS July 21, 2008
GUANTANAMO BAY NAVAL BASE, Cuba - The first war crimes trial at Guantanamo has begun with a not guilty plea from a former driver for Osama bin Laden.
Mukasey: Congress should set rules for detainees
July 21, 2008
WASHINGTON (AP) — Attorney General Michael Mukasey wants Congress to help figure out how to give Guantanamo Bay terror detainees their day in U.S. civilian courts.
A Supreme Court ruling last month "stopped well short" of detailing how foreign suspects will be allowed to challenge their detention, Mukasey said in draft excerpts of a speech he was to deliver Monday morning.
"In other words, the Supreme Court left many significant questions open," Mukasey said in the excerpts that were obtained by The Associated Press.
He called it "well within the historic role and competence of Congress and the executive branch to attempt to resolve them." Mukasey was speaking at the American Enterprise Institute, a Washington think-tank.
At issue is the June 12 ruling that struck down a provision of the Military Commissions Act of 2006 that denied Guantanamo detainees the right to file petitions of habeas corpus. Habeas corpus is a centuries-old legal principle, enshrined in the Constitution, that allows courts to determine whether a prisoner is being held illegally.
As a result, about 200 detainee cases are now being reviewed in U.S. District Court in Washington, where judges have said they want to set rules governing the detainees' hearings by year's end.
Mukasey, however, wants lawmakers — and not federal district judges — to set the rules. It's unclear at best whether Congress could act by then, and any new laws setting such standards likely would be snarled in appeals for years.
Among the issues to be sorted out is how civilian judges might be allowed to review evidence against the prisoners. The Justice Department has fought for years to limit judicial review of evidence in these cases.
Mukasey noted that the Supreme Court acknowledged the hearings "could raise serious national security issues."
"The court recognized, and with good reason, that certain accommodations must be made to reduce the burden habeas corpus proceedings will place on the military and to protect sources and methods of intelligence gathering," Mukasey said.
Roughly 265 men remain at the prison at the U.S. naval base in Cuba. Most are classed as enemy combatants and held on suspicion of terrorism or links to al-Qaida and the Taliban.
The prison has been harshly criticized at home and abroad for the detentions themselves and the aggressive interrogations that were conducted there.
UK 'must check' US torture denial
BBC NEWS July 20, 2008
The British government should not rely on US assurances that it does not use torture, a report by MPs says.
The foreign affairs select committee said the UK and US differ on their definitions of what constitutes torture and it urged the UK to check US claims.
It recommended the government carry out an "exhaustive analysis of current US interrogation techniques."
The MPs also said the government should check claims that Britain is not used by the US for "rendition" flights.
US judge OKs first Guantanamo Bay detainee trial
YAHOO! NEWS July 17, 2008
WASHINGTON - The first war crimes trial at Guantanamo Bay can begin Monday, a federal judge ruled, saying civilian courts should let the military process play out as Congress intended.
The decision is a victory for the Bush administration, which plans to use military commissions to prosecute terrorism suspects, including those charged in the Sept. 11, 2001 attacks. Had the trial been delayed, it would have been a sign that the entire process might crumble under the weight of ...
Indonesia regrets E Timor wrongs
BBC July 15, 2008
The report lays much of the blame at the feet of the Indonesian army.
Indonesian President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono has expressed "remorse" for wrongs committed during East Timor's vote for independence in 1999. .......
About 1,000 people are believed to have been murdered, and many others tortured, raped and displaced during 1999.
Treatment of Khadr criticised
BBC NEWS July 15, 2008
Zachary Katznelson, senior counsel at the civil rights organisation Reprieve, says if there is evidence against Omar Khadr he should be charged.
He said that the 16-year-old was a child at the time of his capture but was being treated the same way as adults at Guantanamo Bay.
Sudan president al-Bashir charged with genocide
YAHOO! NEWS July 14, 2008
THE HAGUE, Netherlands - The prosecutor of the International Criminal Court filed genocide charges Monday against Sudanese President Omar al-Bashir, accusing him of masterminding attempts to wipe out African tribes in Darfur with a campaign of murder, rape and deportation.
The filing marked the first time prosecutors at the world's first permanent, global war crimes court have issued charges against a sitting head of state.
Secret report accuses CIA of torture, book says
The New York Times July 11, 2008
By SCOTT SHANEThe New York Times
Khalid Sheikh Mohammed
WASHINGTON — Red Cross investigators concluded last year in a secret report that the CIA's interrogation methods for high-level al-Qaida prisoners constituted torture and could make the Bush administration officials who approved them guilty of war crimes, according to a new book on counterterrorism efforts since 2001.
The book says the International Committee for the Red Cross declared in the report, given to the CIA last year, that the methods used on Abu Zubaydah, the first major al-Qaida figure the United States captured, were "categorically" torture, which is illegal under both U.S. and international law.
MoD to pay £3m to Iraqis tortured by British troops
The Guardian.uk July 11, 2008
Postmortem photograph of Baha Mousa
Baha Mousa
The government has agreed to pay almost £3m to the family of Baha Mousa and nine other Iraqis tortured by British troops and issued a full apology for the "appalling abuse" they suffered.
The group's lawyers, Leigh Day & Co, said the Treasury solicitors had agreed to pay £2.83m in damages after two days of talks in London.
General Freddie Viggers, the officer dealing with the mediation, issued a full apology to the nine men and Mousa's family.
Somali refugee car washer
BBC NEWS July 10, 2008
Raped
Ahmed's 19-year-old sister, Fatum, tells the story of why she left.
"One day I was out walking and some Ethiopian soldiers started to beat me with their guns, and then they raped me right there in the street,” she says.
“I ran away but later, that same night, they found my house and came to repeat their actions."
"I don't mind if you show my picture because then everybody will know what's happening in Somalia and do something about it."
Indonesia funded 'E Timor abuse'
BBC NEWS July 10, 2008
The Indonesian army funded militias that committed human rights abuses in East Timor, according to a truth commission report seen by the BBC.
The commission has been investigating human rights violations committed as Indonesia withdrew from East Timor nine years ago.
It says the Indonesian army was responsible for gross human rights abuses carried out by militias there.
The report says the crimes included murder, torture and sexual violence.
Panel calls for new war powers legislation
YAHOO! NEWS July 8, 2008
WASHINGTON - Congress should pass legislation to require the president to consult lawmakers before going to war, according to a bipartisan study group chaired by former secretaries of state James Baker III and Warren Christopher.
In a report released Tuesday, the panel says the current law governing the nation's war powers has failed to promote cooperation between the executive and legislative branches. It says the 1973 resolution should be repealed and replaced with new legislation that would require the president to inform Congress of any plans to engage in "significant armed conflict," or non-covert operations lasting longer than a week.
UN International Day
July 6, 2008
Joint statement on the occasion of the UN International Day in support of victims of torture Six United Nations entities regularly involved with issues relating to the prevention of torture and helping its victims have said that, despite a strong international legal framework outlawing torture, much remains to be done "to ensure that everybody is free of this scourge," and urged that special attention be paid to ensure better protection for women.
UN High Commissioner for Human Rights joins in with the following human rights entities and experts on the statement marking the UN International Day in Support of Victims of Torture.
Tunisia accused of using torture in name of anti-terrorism
The Guardian June 23, 2008
Tunisia routinely uses torture, illegal detention and unfair trials in the name of fighting terrorism and should be held to accepted standards by its western backers, Amnesty International will urge today.
Amnesty documented 977 cases of people tried for terrorism in the north African country in the past two years. Virtually all were convicted of planning to join jihadist groups abroad or inciting others to join, but never on charges of having planned or committed acts of violence at home.
Tunisia, under President Zine El Abidine Ben Ali, is usually bracketed as one of the most "moderate" Arab regimes despite its authoritarian character.
US interrogation policy condemned
BBC News June 18, 2008
A US Senate committee has criticised military officials for the manner in which they developed interrogation techniques used at Guantanamo Bay.
Pentagon lawyers testified to the Armed Services Committee that methods such as water-boarding were based on training given to soldiers on resisting torture.
Chairman Sen Carl Levin said they had then "twisted the law to create the appearance of legality".
The White House responded by saying the US had treated all detainees humanely.
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Rwanda suspect 'not under arrest'
BBC News June 14, 2008
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 Police confirmed the man they arrested is not Felicien Kabuga (above) |
Kenyan police have confirmed they got the wrong man after arresting an individual on suspicion of being a top Rwandan genocide criminal.
They had carried out DNA tests on the man, who was arrested on Friday in one of Nairobi's plush suburbs in the belief he could be Felicien Kabuga.
The Rwandan businessman is accused by the International Criminal Court of being a key financier of the genocide.
Some 800,000 people were killed in just 100 days in the 1994 massacre.
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Gates: Detainee abuses gave US 'black eye'
Yahoo, AP June 13, 2008
BRUSSELS, Belgium - Defense Secretary Robert Gates said Friday that reports of detainee abuse in the early years of the Guantanamo Bay prison operation have given the United States "a black eye."
Gates was asked at a press conference about Thursday's Supreme Court ruling that gives suspected terrorists the right to go to federal court to seek their release from indefinite detention at Guantanamo.
The U.S. defense secretary spoke at the conclusion of two days of NATO meetings, unrelated to Guantanamo. He told reporters he would wait until he returned to Washington and received briefings on the court decision before commenting on what it means for the future of the detention operation in Cuba.
Until then, "I'm not going to make any judgment in terms of what we ought to do next."
Mukasey: Detainee ruling won't stop terror trials
Google , AP June 13, 2008
WASHINGTON (AP) — The Supreme Court's decision on Guantanamo Bay will unleash a torrent of court filings from detainees seeking their freedom but won't affect the military trials planned for some terrorism suspects, Attorney General Michael Mukasey said Friday.
The Bush administration disagrees strongly with the high court's decision that the foreigners held under indefinite detention at the Guantanamo naval base in Cuba have the right to seek release in civilian court. President Bush said Thursday he would abide by the decision, but also said his administration was evaluating whether to respond to the court's ruling with new legislation.
In Brussels, Belgium, on Friday, Defense Secretary Robert Gates said he would reserve judgment on "what we ought to do next" at Guantanamo until he received briefings on the ruling.
Amnesty International welcomes US Supreme Court decision
Associated Press of Pakistan June 13, 2008
LONDON, June 13 (APP): The human rights watchdog-Amnesty International has welcomed US Supreme Court ruling recognizing the right of foreign nationals detained in Guantanamo Bay to challenge their detention in US civilian courts, saying the decision was an “essential step forward towards the restoration of the rule of law“.
This is the third time since 2004 that the US’s highest court has rejected arguments advanced by the Bush administration that it can indefinitely detain people without charge or trial, with no meaningful access to justice,” said Amnesty International.
Egypt: Govt Forcibly Returns Up to 1,400 Asylum Seekers From Eritrea
All Africa June 13, 2008
The Egyptian authorities forcibly returned a group of around 200 asylum-seekers to Eritrea in the night of 11 June, and are preparing to forcibly return a further 1,400. In Eritrea they will be at risk of torture and other ill-treatment.
The office of the UN High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) in Egypt has not been granted access to any of the Eritreans to assess their asylum claims, despite repeated requests. The authorities appear to have scheduled a number of special flights to Eritrea.
Justice 5, Brutality 4
The New York Times June 13, 2008
For years, with the help of compliant Republicans and frightened Democrats in Congress, President Bush has denied the protections of justice, democracy and plain human decency to the hundreds of men that he decided to label “unlawful enemy combatants” and throw into never-ending detention.
Twice the Supreme Court swatted back his imperial overreaching, and twice Congress helped Mr. Bush try to open a gaping loophole in the Constitution. On Thursday, the court turned back the most recent effort to subvert justice with a stirring defense of habeas corpus, the right of anyone being held by the government to challenge his confinement before a judge.
High Court ruling may delay war crimes trials
Associated Press Writer June 12, 2008
WASHINGTON - The Supreme Court ruled Thursday that foreign terrorism suspects held at Guantanamo Bay have rights under the Constitution to challenge their detention in U.S. civilian courts.
In its third rebuke of the Bush administration's treatment of prisoners, the court ruled 5-4 that the government is violating the rights of prisoners being held indefinitely and without charges at the U.S. naval base in Cuba. The court's liberal justices were in the majority.
Justice Anthony Kennedy, writing for the court, said, "The laws and Constitution are designed to survive, and remain in force, in extraordinary times."
Kennedy said federal judges could ultimately order some detainees to be released, but that such orders would depend on security concerns and other circumstances.
Sudan accused of Darfur cover up
CNN News June 6, 2008
KHARTOUM, Sudan (CNN) -- Sudan's entire state apparatus has been mobilized "to plan, commit, and cover up crimes" in the war-torn area of Darfur, a prosecutor for the International Criminal Court said Thursday.
The United Nations estimates 2.5 million people have been forced from their homes in Darfur.
He said the Sudanese government "has taken no steps to arrest" the men, one of whom is now in charge of the government's humanitarian affairs. The other is a militia leader.
"For the last five years the whole Darfur area has been a crime scene. Girls are raped, schools are bombed. ... And they are covering up these crimes," Moreno-Ocampo said at a news conference at the United Nations Thursday.
US Accused of Holding Terror Suspects on Prison Ships
Truth Out June 2, 2008
The United States is operating "floating prisons" to house those arrested in its war on terror, according to human rights lawyers, who claim there has been an attempt to conceal the numbers and whereabouts of detainees.
Details of ships where detainees have been held and sites allegedly being used in countries across the world have been compiled as the debate over detention without trial intensifies on both sides of the Atlantic. The US government was yesterday urged to list the names and whereabouts of all those detained.
Guantanamo man on terror charge
BBC News May 31, 2008
 Binyam Mohamed came to the UK as an asylum seeker in 1994 |
The only remaining British resident to be held in Guantanamo Bay has been charged with terrorism by a US military tribunal, the BBC has learned.
Binyam Mohamed, who denies the charge, says he was repeatedly tortured by interrogators in Morocco, where he was sent under "extraordinary rendition".
If convicted of conspiring to commit terrorism, the 29-year-old from west London could face the death penalty.
His lawyers are calling on the British government to help with his defence.
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Guantanamo trials 'being rushed'
BBC News May 29, 2008
 Khalid Sheikh Mohammed was captured in Pakistan in 2003 |
Lawyers for five 9/11 suspects have said the US government is rushing their cases to trial at Guantanamo in order to sway the US presidential election.
They have called for the military judge to dismiss the case on the grounds it is politically motivated, according to documents seen by the Associated Press.
Alleged 9/11 mastermind Khalid Sheikh Mohammed is among the men facing trial.
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World 'failing on human rights'
BBC News May 29, 2008
 Amnesty International urged the US to close the Guantanamo Bay camp |
World leaders are failing to tackle human rights abuses around the globe, Amnesty International says.
In an annual report, the group says people are still being tortured or ill-treated in at least 81 countries.
In at least 54 states they face unfair trial and cannot speak freely in at least 77 nations, the group adds.
It says world leaders should apologise for 60 years of human rights failures since the UN adopted the Universal Declaration of Human Rights in 1948.
The group also challenges them "to re-commit themselves to deliver concrete improvements".
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Guantanamo detainee wins ruling
BBC NEWS May 23, 2008
Guantanamo detainee wins ruling |
 Canadian Omar Khadr is accused of killing a US soldier in 2002 |
Canada's government acted illegally by turning over information about a terrorism suspect to the United States, Canada's Supreme Court has ruled.
It said that handing over documents from an interview with Omar Khadr at the Guantanamo Bay prison camp violated Canada's human rights obligations.
Mr Khadr - a Canadian citizen - is the only Westerner still held at the jail.
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Rice defends post 9/11 interrogation techniques
YAHOO! NEWS May 22, 2008
MOUNTAIN VIEW, Calif. - Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice on Thursday defended tough interrogation techniques for terrorism suspects approved by the Bush administration in the wake of 9/11, saying they were necessary to protect America from new attacks.
In her most extensive public comments about how the administration dealt with detainee interrogations in the aftermath of Sept. 11, 2001, and the anthrax attacks that followed, Rice insisted the methods of questioning complied with both U.S. law and treaty obligations.
Gates: U.S. 'stuck' in Guantanamo
CNN News May 21, 2008
WASHINGTON (CNN) -- Efforts to close the U.S. detention center at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, are at "a standstill," Defense Secretary Robert Gates told a Senate subcommittee Tuesday.
An Army soldier stands guard at the Guantanamo Bay U.S. Naval Base in Cuba.
"The brutally frank answer is that we're stuck, and we're stuck in several ways," Gates told the defense subcommittee of the Senate Appropriations Committee.
Human rights groups have long called for the facility to be closed, alleging that detainees endure numerous human rights violations amounting to torture.
CIA chief Michael Hayden admitted this year that the agency had used waterboarding, a controversial technique that simulates drowning, on three Guantanamo detainees.
Gates said that he favors closing the detention center, which currently holds about 270 detainees, but that a number of problems stand in the way.
Torture Team: Rumsfeld's Memo and the Betrayal of American Values by Philippe Sands
AMAZON May 20, 2008
Phillipe Sands book brings together a lot that was already known with some new information provided by interviews. This book was valuable in that it places the information in a coherent narrative. Sands lets his Interviewees speak for themselves and succeeds in not judging them personally, nor questioning their motives, but only points out where the International and US law may be used to judge them and their possible guilt. He interviews Jim Haynes, General Hill, Doug Feith, Diane Beaver, General Myers and others, devoting a chapter to each interview.
Sands focuses his main argument on the fact that lawyers were not guided by law in their memos and advice to the President, VP, Secretary of Defense, and others, but were subservient to the policy choices of our leaders. To use a phrase of Vice President Cheney, the Pentagon and Justice Department lawyers tried to write the law from the "dark side." We the readers are the jury who will decide if they stayed within the bounds of the rule of law.
Torture protests at UC law school ceremonies
San Francisco Chronicle May 20, 2008
(05-17) 10:53 PDT BERKELEY -- Some 50 protesters, clad in orange jumpsuits and black hoods to emulate the infamous photos of prisoners in Iraq, picketed UC Berkeley's law school graduation ceremony Saturday, demanding that the university fire Professor John Yoo for his authorship of the Bush administration's policies on torture.
"We want to see him fired and disbarred for being a war criminal," said Anne Weills, an Oakland attorney who said she was with the National Lawyers Guild, one of the groups that protested. "Academic freedom stops when you intend to harm or injure somebody."
Yoo, a tenured constitutional law professor at Boalt Hall, took a leave of absence from 2001 to 2003 to work for the U.S. Department of Justice. During that time, he wrote what critics call the "torture memos," which protesters say outlined the legal basis for the use of torture at the Abu Ghraib (Iraq) and Guantanamo Bay (Cuba) military prisons.
Boalt Hall officials said earlier last week that Yoo would not attend Saturday's graduation ceremony.
Afghan student in torture claim
BBC News May 19, 2008
 Kambakhsh told the appeals court the charges against him were 'lies' |
An Afghan student journalist who was sentenced to death for blasphemy has told an appeals court that he confessed after being tortured.
Sayed Parwez Kambakhsh was convicted in January of insulting Islam.
But at the appeals court in Kabul the 24-year-old insisted he was innocent of all the charges.
He said he was tortured into confessing that he had disrupted university classes by asking questions about women's rights under Islam.
He said he was tortured into confessing that he had disrupted university classes by asking questions about women's rights under Islam.
He was also convicted of distributing an article on the same subject, and adding three additional paragraphs.
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See How They Run
The New York Times May 16, 2008
It should not be an extraordinary moment when a candidate for president declares allegiance to the Constitution, promises to not ignore or flagrantly violate laws, talks about ending a long and draining war and vows transparency in the Oval Office.
Such is the sorry state of affairs after seven years of Republican lawmakers’ marching in mute lockstep with President Bush into one policy disaster after another. Senator John McCain scored some points on Thursday merely by acknowledging how much has to change.
Mr. McCain said in a speech that if elected, he will end the war in Iraq by the close of his first term; work in “concerted action” with other nations to counter the nuclear threats of Iran and North Korea; and eliminate a tax meant for the rich that is crushing the upper-middle class. He promised to not “subvert the purpose of legislation,” as Mr. Bush has done, with signing statements; and to not seek to create, as Mr. Bush has done, an imperial presidency accountable to no person or institution. “The powers of the presidency are rightly checked by the other branches of government,” he said.
Woman opens heart to man who slaughtered her family
CNN News May 16, 2008
GITARAMA, Rwanda (CNN) -- What does Macy's have to do with healing from genocide? Nothing and everything.
Iphigenia Mukantabana sits with Jean-Bosco Bizimana, her family's killer, at her home after church.
Fourteen years after Hutu extremists killed between 800,000 and 1 million people -- mostly Tutsis -- in a devastating slaughter, Rwandan women are weaving peace baskets for sale at Macy's in the United States. Not only does the work bring them a regular salary, the business is also fostering reconciliation between victim and perpetrator.
Iphigenia Mukantabana, a master weaver, sits in front of her house in Gitarama -- an hour from the capital, Kigali -- making beautiful baskets with her friend Epiphania Mukanyndwi.
In 1994, Mukantabana's husband and five of her children were hacked and clubbed to death by marauding Hutu militias. Among her family's killers was Jean-Bosco Bizimana, Mukanyndwi's husband.
Charges urged for Kenya 'torture'
BBC News Africa May 16, 2008
 The KNCHR said Mohammed Yusuf Haji should be held accountable |
Kenya's defence minister and army chiefs should face prosecution over the alleged torture of civilians, the state-funded human rights body says.
The Kenya National Commission for Human Rights (KNCHR) says medical reports back up complaints of torture.
The military was deployed to the Mt Elgon area in March, in a crackdown on the Sabaot Land Defence Force (SLDF).
The government denied the allegations, in turn accusing the militia of committing atrocities.
The SLDF says it is fighting for ancestral land belonging to the Sabaot community but has been accused of killing members of rival ethnic groups.
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Needed Testimony
The Washington Post May 10, 2008
NEARLY SEVEN years after the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks, questions remain about the administration's legal and policy responses to the tragedy. Is the president, as Justice Department lawyers have argued, virtually unconstrained in carrying out his commander-in-chief duties during wartime? Do that power and exigent circumstances allow him to sanction interrogation techniques that skirt domestic and international strictures against torture?
Argentina's dirty war: the museum of horrors
Telegraph May 10, 2008
More than 30,000 Argentine citizens died in the military junta's 'dirty war'. Now one of its 400 torture camps is to be a public memorial to the disappeared. But as far-right groups intimidate those prepared to speak up, it seems the war of silence is not over. By Alfonso Daniels
Last October Héctor Febres, a stocky 66-year-old former Coast Guard officer, dressed in an elegant light-green suit, entered a windowless Buenos Aires court for the first time. He was accused of torturing prisoners and being responsible for the abduction of hundreds of newborn babies from mothers who later 'disappeared' during the military dictatorship in Argentina 30 years ago.
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Father Patrick Rice, left, who was tortured as a 'subversive', stands before the headstone of a French nun abducted after helping mothers trying to find their 'disappeared' children. Right - the Naval Mechanical School in Buenos Aires, where almost 5,000 detainees died, is now the site of a human-rights museum |
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http://www.telegraph.co.uk/arts/main.jhtml?xml=/arts/2008/05/17/sm_argentina17.xml
Federal Agents Raid Office of Special Counsel
Washington Post May 7, 2008
By Carrie Johnson and Christopher Lee
Washington Post Staff Writers
Wednesday, May 7, 2008; Page A01
Nearly two dozen federal agents yesterday raided the Washington headquarters of the agency that protects government whistle-blowers, as part of an intensifying criminal investigation of its leader, who is fighting allegations of improper political bias and obstruction of justice.
Agents fanned out yesterday morning in the agency's building on M Street, where they sequestered Office of Special Counsel chief Scott J. Bloch for questioning, served grand-jury subpoenas on 17 employees and shut down access to computer networks in a search lasting more than five hours.
Torture Showdown Coming?
Special to washingtonpost.com May 7, 2008
By Dan Froomkin
Some of the leading architects of the Bush administration's torture policies have agreed to appear before the House Judiciary committee. But anyone hoping for an accountability moment may be in for disappointment.
Coming Clean on Torture
The Washington Post May 5, 2008
The BUSH administration took a positive step last week by announcing that it would make available to certain lawmakers memos and correspondence that lay out the legal underpinnings of the CIA interrogation program involving terrorism suspects.
Spain rejects Peron extradition
BBC News April 30, 2008
 Isabel Peron has been living in Spain since 1981 |
A court in Spain has rejected a request from Buenos Aires to extradite former Argentine President Isabel Peron who is wanted for alleged human rights abuses.
The National Court in Madrid ruled that the charges did not constitute crimes against humanity and that therefore the statute of limitations had expired.
Ms Peron, 77, is wanted over alleged links to right-wing paramilitaries who operated during her 1974-1976 rule.
Argentina also wants to question her over the disappearance of two men.
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House Chairman Threatens Subpoenas On Torture Policy
CBS Evening News April 30, 2008
House Judiciary Chairman Threatens White House With Subpoenas On Torture Policy
(AP) The chairman of the House Judiciary Committee on Monday threatened to serve subpoenas on former Attorney General John Ashcroft and two others associated with the Bush administration's interrogation policies if they don't agree to testify.
If the three _ including John C. Yoo, the former assistant deputy attorney general, and David Addington, Vice President Dick Cheney's chief of staff _ do not reply by Friday, "I will have no choice but to consider the use of compulsory process," Rep. John Conyers, D-Mich., wrote in letters to them.
That's Washington-speak for issuing congressional subpoenas, tough talk that Conyers has leveled at the White House before. A previous dispute is being hashed out in federal court, with Conyers' committee suing White House Chief of Staff Josh Bolten and former presidential counsel Harriet Miers for refusing to comply with subpoenas on the firings of federal prosecutors. The White House maintains that their testimony is off-limits from congressional oversight under executive privilege.
New fighting stops DR Congo aid
BBC News April 25, 2008
 Nearly 900,000 people have been displaced in Kivu |
Renewed fighting in eastern Democratic Republic of Congo has forced the United Nations refugee agency to suspend aid to displaced people.
The UNHCR said hundreds more people have fled their homes because of the latest clashes in North Kivu province.
A week of clashes between the army and fighters from the FDLR of Rwandan Hutu rebels has killed 20 people after three months of relative calm, the UN says.
The army says it is planning a major offensive against the FDLR.
The UNHCR says violence in Kivu has now displaced almost 900,000 people.
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Zimbabwe police in election raids
BBC News April 25, 2008
 The police say they were looking for those behind political violence |
Riot police in Zimbabwe have carried out raids on headquarters of independent poll monitors and the opposition MDC in the capital, Harare.
Witnesses say vote-counting material was taken from the MDC office and activists hiding there were arrested.
The Zimbabwe Election Support Network chairman told the BBC that documents and computers had been seized.
The observer group says MDC leader Morgan Tsvangirai gained the most votes in last month's presidential election.
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Militias 'recruit child bombers'
BBC News April 25, 2008
The insurgency in Iraq is targeting children to become suicide bombers
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Insurgent groups in Iraq are recruiting children as suicide bombers, according to a United Nations official.
The findings of the UN special representative for children and armed conflict echo concerns expressed by the US military about insurgent tactics.
Radhika Coomaraswamy, the UN envoy, made her comments at the end of a week-long fact-finding visit to Iraq.
Last month, the US released footage of what it said was al-Qaeda propaganda showing children being trained.
The US says children are being taught how to use guns and carry out kidnappings in addition to other terrorist activities.
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Church calls for Zimbabwe action
BBC News April 24, 2008
 This man says he was locked in a burning hut by ruling party militants |
The leaders of the Anglican church have called for international action to prevent violence in Zimbabwe reaching "horrific levels".
In a joint statement the Archbishops of Canterbury and York also called for an international arms embargo on Zimbabwe.
President Robert Mugabe "is living on borrowed time", Archbishop of York John Sentamu told the BBC.
Meanwhile, a Chinese foreign ministry official said a ship carrying weapons to Zimbabwe might return to China.
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EU deal on immigrant detentions
BBC News April 24, 2008
 The death of a young Malian immigrant near Paris sparked protests |
After years of dispute, the EU has struck an accord on the detention and deportation of illegal immigrants.
"We have 10 to 12 million illegal persons in the EU... they are modern slaves," said German MEP Manfred Weber, who described the deal as a "big step".
He said there would be a six-month limit on detention for most people and a readmission agreement would have to be struck before they were sent home.
A final decision will now have to be made by MEPs and member states.
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Lawyer fears 9/11 mastermind trial will be 'insanity'
CNN News April 24, 2008
WASHINGTON (CNN) -- Prescott Prince is a small-town lawyer who has never taken a death penalty case to trial. Yet he finds himself involved in one of the biggest capital punishment cases this century: He's defending the alleged mastermind of the September 11, 2001, terror attacks, Khalid Sheikh Mohammed.
Prescott Prince says the suspected 9/11 mastermind deserves a fair trial.
He readily acknowledges how his client is perceived as "one of the most reviled people" in the world. But he says it's imperative America give Mohammed a fair trial, just like anyone else accused of a crime.
No civilian court, he says, would accept confessions obtained after a defendant was mistreated. But the CIA admits Mohammed was waterboarded, a controversial interrogation technique that involves simulated drowning.
"I take the position that this is mock execution. ... Colloquially speaking, at least it's torture," Prince says.
Ethiopian troops 'took children'
BBC News April 23, 2008
 Witnesses said civilians were among the dead, some with their throats cut |
Amnesty International has accused Ethiopian troops of capturing 40 Somali children during a raid on a mosque last week, and called for their release.
The rights group condemned the killing of more than 20 people, including some religious scholars, during the raid.
It quoted witnesses as saying that many of the dead were unarmed civilians, and that some had had their throats cut.
Ethiopia denied its troops were involved in the killings, which came during fierce clashes with insurgents.
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Zimbabwe churches: Stop the murder, torture
CNN April 22, 2008
(CNN) -- Zimbabwe's religious leaders have called for international help to stop the political and humanitarian crisis gripping the nation since last month's presidential and parliamentary elections.
Tendai Biti, secretary-general of the opposition MDC, which has disputed the vote results.
The church leaders said they have witnessed political violence, killings, kidnappings and torture -- and warned it would get worse without outside help.
But Zimbabwe's government repeated its denial of state-sponsored political violence against opposition party members and government officials challenged anyone with evidence of it to come forward, according to Zimbabwe's state-run newspaper, The Herald.
Why Britons walked warily in Waziristan
BBC News April 21, 2008
In 1919, a young British army officer, Francis Stockdale, was deployed to the Waziristan area of British India.
The title of his book, "Walk Warily in Waziristan" seems no less appropriate now than it did 90 years ago, because today the autonomous Pakistani tribal region of North and South Waziristan is the centre of militancy orchestrated by pro-Taleban and al-Qaeda militants.
It is also an area where many believe the al-Qaeda leader, Osama Bin Laden, may be hiding after the September 2001 World Trade Centre attacks.
China 'gold medal' for executions
BBC News April 15, 2008
 More than 60 crimes can carry the death penalty in China |
The Chinese authorities put to death at least 470 people last year, but probably killed many more, human rights group Amnesty International has said.
Amnesty said the hidden extent of executions in China, where figures are secret, might mean the Olympic host was behind the bulk of them worldwide.
But China's foreign ministry defended the death penalty, saying China limited it to a small number of criminals.
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The long run to freedom
BBC News April 14, 2008
Tuhabonye still bears the scars of his ordeal
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"There was no way to escape. People were waiting outside - if someone tried to jump out, they would attack them with machetes."
Of the 36,000 runners lining up in Sunday's London Marathon, 33-year-old Burundian Olympic hopeful Gilbert Tuhabonye has perhaps the most remarkable story.
In 1993, Tuhabonye, then 19, was looking forward to graduating from his high school in Kibimba and taking up an athletics scholarship at Tulane University in America.
But one October day, Tuhabonye and 100 of his fellow Tutsis were captured by rival Hutus, herded into a petrol station and set on fire.
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ABC News: Top administration officials conspired in war crimes
BTC News April 11, 2008
ABC News is reporting that senior Bush administration officials were intimately involved in planning torture regimens for use against terrorism suspects. The officials include vice president Dick Cheney; CIA director George Tenet and his successor, former CIA agent and Congressman Porter Goss; then-national security advisor Condoleezza Rice; former secretary of state Colin Powell; former secretary of defense Donald Rumsfeld; and former attorney general John Ashcroft. All were members of the Principals Committee of president Bush’s national security council.
Anguish over China activist sentence
BBC News April 11, 2008
Chinese campaigner Hu Jia could have been given five or more years for "subverting the state" - in the end he was sent to jail for less.
Mr Hu's wife said he had been subjected to "endless questions"
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But his lawyer, Li Fangping, was not happy.
"Although he's only been sentenced to three-and-a-half years, I still cannot accept this judgement," he told reporters outside the Beijing courthouse.
Before he heard the verdict, Mr Li was even blunter. "As a lawyer, I think Hu Jia is innocent and should be released."
Hu Jia was sent to prison for what many other people would not even consider a crime - he was convicted for writing five articles and giving two interviews.
The 34-year-old has long sought
The torture memos
ST. LOUIS POST-DISPATCH April 9, 2008
"Just when I thought I was out . . . they pull me back in."
— Michael Corleone, "The Godfather Part III"
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I'd have been happy to never write another column about torture, either because our country's leaders truly had repudiated it or because the U.S. officials who embraced the concept and rationalized its use were doing hard time for war crimes.
But on April Fool's Day last week, the release of a previously classified Justice Department legal memo offered yet more evidence of how the Bush administration has gone about perverting the law to allow, in this latest example, military.
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'Huge violence' in Zimbabwe poll
BBC News April 8, 2008
 The opposition was able to campaign across the country this year |
Zimbabwe's opposition says its activists have been attacked in a campaign of "massive violence" around the country since recent elections.
"Militias are being rearmed, Zanu-PF supporters are being rearmed," said MDC Secretary General Tendai Biti.
This year's election campaign has been relatively peaceful until now.
Meanwhile, a judge has agreed to hear an opposition request that the results of last month's presidential election be released, as an urgent matter.
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US 'must suspend' Iraq withdrawal
BBC News April 8, 2008
The top US military leader in Iraq Gen David Petraeus has recommended a suspension of troop withdrawals after July to protect gains in Iraq.
Gen Petraeus praised "significant" but "uneven" improvements in security and said troop levels would need a period of evaluation over the summer.
He also said the recent Iraqi operation in Basra was "not adequately planned".
His comments came in a progress report on Iraq, which he and ambassador Ryan Crocker are giving to Congress.
They have begun by testifying before the Senate Armed Services Committee.
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Protests cut short Olympic relay
BBC News April 7, 2008
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Hundreds of protesters were on Paris's streets
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French security officials have been forced to cut short the Paris leg of the Olympic torch relay following anti-Chinese protests along the route.
The torch was extinguished three times due to the protests before being taken on a bus to the relay's end point.
The cancellation comes after 37 people were arrested in London as protesters disrupted the torch relay on Sunday.
The Olympic flame is being carried through 20 countries before arriving for the Beijing Games in August.
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Olympics 'worsening China rights'
BBC News April 3, 2008
 China is determined to hold a successful Olympic Games |
China's human rights record is getting worse, not better, because of the Beijing Olympics, a rights group says.
According to Amnesty International, China is clamping down on dissent in a bid to portray a stable and harmonious image ahead of the Games in August.
It urged the International Olympic Committee (IOC) and world leaders to speak out against abuses, including China's handling of protests in Tibet.
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Still no election results in Zimbabwe
CNN News April 2, 2008
Despite increasing calls from the international community to release election results, Zimbabwe has yet to provide any data on the presidential race three days after voters went to the polls.
The lack of information is fueling confusion and widespread speculation about the future of President Robert Mugabe.
Several sources within the opposition Movement for Democratic Change said that a deal had emerged from talks with Mugabe's representatives for Mugabe to step down.
US charges Al-Qaeda leader with Africa bombings
The Sydney Morning Herald April 1, 2008
The Pentagon announced Monday war crimes charges carrying the death penalty against a Tanzanian inmate held in Guantanamo Bay arising from Al-Qaeda attacks on US embassies in East Africa a decade ago.
The Defense Department said Ahmed Khalfan Ghailani would face a special military tribunal on nine counts including murder related to the August 1998 bombing of the embassy in Dar es Salaam, Tanzania, which killed 11 people and injured hundreds.
Military prosecutors said that after the twin bombings in Tanzania and Kenya, which altogether killed more than 200, Ghailani worked as a bodyguard for Al-Qaeda leader Osama bin Laden, and forged documents and trained recruits.
"Six of the nine charges carry the maximum penalty of death," Brigadier General Thomas Hartman, legal adviser to the Office of Military Commissions at Guantanamo Bay, told reporters.
Torture victims will say anything to avoid abuse
Morning Sentinel March 30, 2008
"Three thousand prisoners have sat in that chair. They have all talked." So said the Egyptian interrogators to Ibn al Sheik al Libi.
Al Libi was illegally rendered to Egypt by the CIA. Did the CIA know torture was routine in Egyptian prisons?
The State Department has placed Egypt on its annual violators of human rights list for years.
After al Libi was buried alive in a small box for 17 hours, and then taken out and beaten, he became number 3,001 prisoner to break under torture. Once al Libi figured out what information his torturers wanted, he spun a tale claiming that two named al-Qaida members went to Iraq where they were trained in the use of chemical and biological weapons.
Fatal shelling at Somali market
BBC News March 29, 2008
Bakara market has seen frequent skirmishes |
At least 10 people have died and many have been hurt as Ethiopian forces backing the Somali government shelled Mogadishu's main market, witnesses say.
The attack was launched after mortar rounds landed on the Somali president's official residence while he was holding talks with Ethiopia's foreign minister.
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US plays quiet role in the Philippines
BBC News March 29, 2008
Hundreds of US troops have been working in the southern Philippines since 2002. Their role is to help train local soldiers in the battle against insurgents, and their presence divides local opinion. The BBC's Vaudine England reports from Manila.
It is one of the most ignored, but perhaps one of the most successful, fronts in the Bush administration's so-called War on Terror.
As part of the Joint Special Operations Task Force, US troops train their Philippine counterparts in counter-terrorism and provide financial and logistical support.
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US hails progress in Russia talks
BBC News March 29, 2008
 The US wants a missile system based in Europe that can counter threats |
US diplomats say they have made progress in intensive talks over future co-operation with Russia, but have not resolved the US defence shield dispute.
They said there was progress on issues such as combating terrorism and the spread of weapons of mass destruction.
But they said Russia's objections to US plans for missile defence bases in eastern Europe remained.
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Iraqi militia defy call to disarm
BBC News March 29, 2008
 Iraqi soldiers have met fierce resistance in Basra |
The radical Shia Iraqi cleric Moqtada Sadr has defied a call by the Iraqi government for his powerful Mehdi Army militia to lay down its weapons.
Arms would only be handed over to an Iraqi government willing to end the US occupation, a senior Sadr aide said.
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Pakistani PM vows to fight terror
BBC News March 29, 2008
Pakistan's new Prime Minister, Yusuf Raza Gillani, has told parliament in Islamabad that his top priority will be the fight against terrorism.
Setting out plans for the first 100 days of his coalition government, he told MPs that "terrorism and extremism" were the country's "greatest problems".
The National Assembly endorsed him with a vote of confidence.
Mr Gillani is a member of the Pakistan People's Party, whose leader Benazir Bhutto was assassinated in December.
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UK military admits Iraqis tortured
CNN News March 28, 2008
LONDON, England (AP) -- The British military admitted Thursday that it breached the human rights of an Iraqi man who died in custody, and that its soldiers also violated the rights of eight other detained Iraqis.
UK Armed Forces Minister Bob Ainsworth condemned the abuse.
The Ministry of Defense said it expects to negotiate compensation for the survivors of the dead man, Baha Mousa, and with the eight former detainees.
The MoD admitted breaching prohibition on torture laws in the cases of all nine men.
The nine -- taken into custody as alleged insurgents -- were held in stress positions and deprived of sleep for about two days in extreme heat at a British army barracks near the southern Iraqi city of Basra in September 2003, prosecutors told a British military court.
Mousa, a 26-year-old hotel receptionist, died from asphyxia after soldiers restrained him following an escape attempt.
One soldier, Cpl. Donald Payne, 35, was convicted of inhumane treatment in that case, making him the first British soldier to plead guilty to a war crime under international law.
Bush: Baghdad's move against Shiite militias a 'bold decision'
CNN News March 28, 2008
DAYTON, Ohio (CNN) -- President Bush Thursday called the Iraqi government's move to launch an offensive against Shiite militants in Basra a "bold decision."
President Bush makes remarks Thursday on the Iraq war at the U.S. Air Force Museum in Dayton, Ohio.
In a wide-ranging address about Iraq at the National Museum of the United States Air Force in Dayton, Ohio, the president stressed the integrity of the Baghdad government to take on crime, no matter who might be committing it.
"There is a strong commitment by the central government of Iraq to say that no one is above the law," said Bush, who called the fight against the "militia fighters and criminals" in the southern Iraqi city a "tough battle."
Angry Pakistanis: U.S. cozying up to new leaders
CNN News March 28, 2008
ISLAMABAD, Pakistan (CNN) -- Pakistanis are saying that the United States -- fearing resistance from Pakistan's new leadership -- is meddling in their nation's affairs so the U.S. can continue its deadly airstrikes in the northern tribal regions.
Protesters, angry with a visit by U.S. envoys to Pakistan, burn the U.S. flag Thursday.
In newspaper editorials and on the streets, Pakistanis say they are opposed to the terror threat that al Qaeda poses with its presence along Pakistan's porous border with Afghanistan. However, they also oppose U.S. bombing campaigns because, as one newspaper opined, it is Pakistani "blood that stains roadsides" after the airstrikes.
Relief agencies: Somalia too dangerous for us to work
CNN News March 28, 2008
(CNN) -- Nearly 40 relief agencies serving Somalia said Tuesday they can't help millions of Somalis, blaming the existence of too many checkpoints, danger that aid workers face and "a lack of respect for international humanitarian law by all parties to the conflict."
Somali children rummage through garbage to look for food in Mogadishu, Somalia, in September 2007.
"The crisis engulfing Somalia has deteriorated dramatically, while access to people in need continues to decrease," said a statement signed by organizations including World Vision, Oxfam International and Cooperative Assistance for Relief Everywhere, among others.
The statement was timed to coincide with a scheduled U.N. Security Council meeting this week to discuss a report issued on Somalia by U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon earlier this month.
The organizations want the humanitarian situation to be part of any discussion or decision on the situation in the African nation.
Somalia fighting prompts warning
BBC News UK March 27, 2008
The agencies said two million people needed daily help to survive |
Forty humanitarian agencies have warned of an impending catastrophe in Somalia unless urgent action is taken.
They say 20,000 people continue to flee violence in the capital every month.
The warning comes ahead of a UN Security Council meeting to consider sending 27,000 peacekeepers to Somalia to replace the stretched African force.
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Mugabe rival is 'denied adverts'
BBC NEWS UK March 27, 2008
 Campaigning has been allowed in rural areas |
Zimbabwean presidential contender Simba Makoni has been unable to place adverts in the state media, say campaigners.
"We book, we pay and they say they won't accommodate them," Mr Makoni's spokesman Denford Magora told AFP.
The comments come as rights group Amnesty International said opposition supporters were being harassed ahead of the elections on Saturday.
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'Many surrender' over Tibet riots
BBC NEWS UK March 27, 2008
 China has increased its security presence in Lhasa since the unrest |
More than 660 people have turned themselves in to police following recent violent protests in and around Tibet, Chinese state media has said.
Xinhua news agency reported 280 people in Lhasa had handed themselves in by late Tuesday, and earlier reports said 381 people in Sichuan had surrendered.
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Iraq PM gives militants ultimatum
BBC NEWS UK March 27, 2008
Iraq's Prime Minister Nouri Maliki has given Shia militants in the southern city of Basra 72 hours to lay down their arms or face "severe penalties".
Mr Maliki issued the threat on the second day of a government offensive, that has left at least 46 people dead.
The leader of the main militia, the Mehdi Army, says Mr Maliki must leave Basra and start negotiations.
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Egypt to snub Syria's Arab summit
BBC NEWS UK March 27, 2008
Egypt has said President Hosni Mubarak will not attend a summit of Arab leaders in Damascus on Saturday.
A junior cabinet minister will lead the Egyptian delegation instead.
Saudi Arabia had said it would only send its Arab League representative rather than King Abdullah, and Lebanon is boycotting the summit completely.
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Russia-Egypt nuclear deal signed
BBC NEWS UK March 27, 2008
 The deal gives Russia the chance to bid for Egyptian nuclear contracts |
Egypt and Russia have signed a deal clearing the way for Russian involvement in building up Egypt's nuclear power industry.
Agreement was reached during talks in Moscow between Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak and President Vladimir Putin.
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Easter Day
BBC NEWS March 23, 2008
US troops take a break from the Afghan conflict for an Easter service in Camp Egger
Am I a Torturer?
Mother Jones March 22, 2008
NEWS: Ben Allbright watches The Daily Show, worships Dave Eggers—and still wound up "softening up" prisoners in Iraq.
By Justine Sharrock
March/April 2008 Issue.
Hamas men 'tortured by Egyptians'
BBC NEWS March 21, 2008
The Palestinian militant movement Hamas has accused Egypt of torturing members of the group who were detained after crossing from the Gaza Strip.
Police 'shot at Tibet protesters'
BBC NEWS March 20, 2008
Chinese police opened fire and wounded four protesters "in self-defence" last Sunday in a Tibetan area of Sichuan province, the Xinhua news agency says. It is the first time China has admitted injuring anyone since anti-Chinese protests in Tibet began last week.
McCain reverses course on torture
CantonRep.com March 19, 2008
SWEET LAND OF LIBERTY
NAT HENTOFF
NEWSPAPER ENTERPRISE ASSOCIATION
At the White House on March 5, Republican presidential nominee John McCain, glowing with George W. Bush's endorsement of him, said that "on the fundamentals and the principles of our ...
Psychologists condemn torture
People's Weekly World March 17, 2008
The American Psychological Association’s (APA) Council of Representatives has introduced new wording in a resolution to clarify the ethical responsibilities of psychologists in harsh interrogation techniques.
US politician on al-Qaeda charge
BBC NEWS March 15, 2008
 Mr Siljander has yet to make a comment on the charges |
A former US congressman has been charged with helping to fund "a key al-Qaeda supporter" in Afghanistan.
A US grand jury indicted ex-Republican congressman from Michigan, Mark Deli Siljander, with money laundering, conspiracy and obstructing justice.
Shops on fire amid Tibet protests
BBC NEWS March 14, 2008
Fires have broken out in the Tibetan city of Lhasa amid reports of rioting, as rare street protests led by Buddhist monks appeared to gather pace.
Guantánamo prisoner refuses to cooperate with military show trial
World Socialist March 14, 2008
“I’ve been tortured. I’m a human being. I have not violated any law”Mohammed Jawad, one of the first of the prisoners at the Guantánamo Bay, Cuba, internment camp to face the US government’s new military commission system, is refusing to cooperate in the trial.
Yemeni describes CIA secret jails
BBC NEWS March 14, 2008
A Yemeni says he was held for nearly three years in secret CIA prisons and accuses the US of torture.
US report softens stance on China
BBC NEWS March 13, 2008
 The US said China had not undertaken democratic reform |
The US state department has released its annual report on human rights around the world, detailing abuses in China, Russia, Syria and Zimbabwe.
Unlike in previous years, China is not listed as one of the world's most systematic human rights violators.
Archbishop dead
BBC NEWS March 13, 2008
............. 'Horrible crime'
Many Christians in Iraq have left due to insurgent attacks
..........Pope Benedict had appealed for the archbishop's release
Blast on Ethiopia-Eritrea border
BBC NEWS March 13, 2008
There has been a deadly explosion in a bus on the disputed border between Ethiopia and Eritrea. Ethiopian officials said at least seven people were killed.
10 wounded when the bus exploded in the Ethiopian-controlled town of Humera.
Rwanda genocide priest given life
BBC March 12, 2008
A Roman Catholic priest has had his sentence increased to life imprisonment for his part in Rwanda's 1994 genocide.
Athanase Seromba had appealed against a 15-year sentence over the deaths of hundreds of Tutsis who had sought refuge in his church.
Democrats criticize Bush's CIA-bill veto
YAHOO! NEWS March 9, 2008
WASHINGTON - Democrats and human rights advocates criticized President Bush's veto Saturday of a bill that would have banned the CIA from using simulated drowning and other coercive interrogation methods to gain information from suspected terrorists. .....
"Torture is a black mark against the United States," she said.
Bush vetoes bill banning waterboarding
CNN March 8, 2008
WASHINGTON (AP) -- President Bush said Saturday he vetoed legislation that would ban the CIA from using harsh interrogation methods such as waterboarding to break suspected terrorists because it would end practices that have prevented attacks.
A Campaign's Choices
THE WASHINGTON POST March 8, 2008
A Campaign's Choices
By HAROLD NELSON
Is there not some irony in President Bush's endorsement of Sen. John McCain (R-Ariz.) for president [news story, March 6]? Perhaps the front-page photo of them that day.
Another Guantanamo prisoner charged with war crimes
Los Angeles Times March 7, 2008
MIAMI -- The Pentagon served war crimes charges on a 13th prisoner at the Guantanamo Bay detention camp Wednesday, signaling the Bush administration's intent to step up prosecution of terrorism suspects before the architects of the controversial military tribunals leave office.
Wiretap Compromise in Works
The Washington Post March 4, 2008
House and Senate Democratic leaders are headed into talks today that they say could lead to a breakthrough on legislation to revamp domestic surveillance powers and grant phone companies some form of immunity for their role in the administration's warrantless wiretapping program after the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks.
Bush urges wiretap immunity law
BBC NEWS March 1, 2008
President George W Bush has urged the "urgent" passing of a bill that would retroactively shield telecoms firms which helped the government eavesdrop.
He called on the House of Representatives to approve the law, already passed by the Senate.
An initial act, allowing warrantless tapping of phone calls and e-mails of suspected terrorists, expired on 17 February but did not grant immunity.
Lawsuits have been filed against some of the firms which took part. They are accused of violation of privacy.
He told the White House on Tuesday "abusive" lawsuits against telecoms firms would "aid our enemies" by teaching them how to duck surveillance.
Bahrain Shia call for activists' release
BBC News March 1, 2008
Human rights activists in the Gulf state of Bahrain are calling on the government to release 15 protesters jailed in late December.
They say the prisoners, who are Shia Muslims, have been subjected to torture and sexual abuse while in jail.
Bahrain is unique in all the states of the Arabian Peninsula in that it has a Shia majority, roughly 65% of the population. But the ruling elite is Sunni. Shia Bahrainis say they have been discriminated against for years.
The European Court of Human Rights today reaffirmed that the ban on deporting people to countries wh
Human Rights Watch February 29, 2008
The European Court of Human Rights today reaffirmed that the ban on deporting people to countries where they are at risk of torture or ill-treatment is absolute and unconditional.
The judgment in Saadi v. Italy is being hailed as a major reassertion of the importance of the rule of law by 11 international human rights groups, including Amnesty International, the Association for the Prevention of Torture, the AIRE Centre, Human Rights Watch, INTERIGHTS, the International Commission of Jurists, JUSTICE, the Medical Foundation for the Care of the Victims of Torture, Open Society Justice Initiative, REDRESS, and the World Organization Against Torture (OMCT).
Kenya rivals agree to share power
BBC NEWS February 28, 2008
Kenyan President Mwai Kibaki and opposition leader Raila Odinga have signed an agreement to end the country's post-election crisis.
At a ceremony in Nairobi, the two men put their signatures to a power-sharing deal brokered by ex-UN head Kofi Annan.
A coalition government comprising members of the current ruling party and opposition will now be formed.
Some 1,500 people died in political violence after Mr Odinga said he was robbed of victory in December's polls.
Children held hostage in Cameroon
BBC NEWS February 28, 2008
At least 2,000 boarding school children are being used as human shields by demonstrators in Cameroon.
Thousands of protesters went into three schools in Bamenda in the north-west to escape police pursuing them after violent demonstrations overnight.
There have been days of protests across the country, sparked by a taxi-driver strike over a fuel price rise.
President Paul Biya has blamed the opposition for violence which has left at least seven dead.
Italian Rwanda convict flown home
BBC NEWS February 28, 2008
The only European convicted of involvement in the 1994 Rwanda genocide has been flown to Italy to serve out the rest of his 12-year sentence.
Georges Omar Ruggiu, 50, was a presenter with Radio Libre des Mille Collines, which called for the killing of Rwanda's Tutsis.
He was sentenced in 2000 by the International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda, based in Tanzania.
He had admitted incitement to commit genocide and crimes against humanity.
Turkish troops kill 77 Kurdish rebels
YAHOO! NEWS February 27, 2008
CUKURCA, Turkey - Turkish troops have killed 77 Kurdish rebels in night-long clashes in northern Iraq, the military said Wednesday. Five soldiers were also killed.
Meanwhile, more than 40 military trucks ferried troops toward the Iraqi border Wednesday, a day after heavy snow slowed down Turkey's ground incursion against Kurdish rebels.
F-16 warplanes and helicopters were seen flying over the border town of Cukurca toward Iraq.
The death toll for the rebels reached to 230, the military said. The death toll for soldiers stood at 24. The military said three pro-government village guards were also killed during the operation that began last week.
Pentagon General Counsel Resigns
The Nation February 27, 2008
William J. Haynes, the Pentagon's chief legal officer and overseer of Guantanamo's Military Commissions, is stepping down, amid mounting controversy over the tribunal process, so he can "return to private life," the Department of Defense announced late on Monday. Haynes' resignation comes exactly two weeks after landmark charges were brought against six "high-value" .
THE WASHINGTON TIMES
The washington Times February 26, 2008
Degraded justice
By Bruce Fein
President Bush's successor in the White House should transfer the impending prosecutions of six "high value" al Qaeda detainees allegedly implicated in the September 11, 2001, abominations before military commissions to federal district courts.
The commissions are denuded of due process protections and would set ominous precedents for subordinating civilian to military justice.
Free speech 'shrinking' in Russia
BBC NEWS February 26, 2008
Russian freedom of speech is "shrinking alarmingly" under President Vladimir Putin, says Amnesty International.
The murders of outspoken journalists go unsolved, independent media outlets have been shut and police have attacked opposition protesters, said the report.
It also said "arbitrary" laws were curbing the right to express opinion and silencing NGOs deemed to be a threat by the authorities.
The report comes ahead of Russian's presidential elections on 2 March.
Khmer Rouge leader 'enacts role'
BBC NEWS February 26, 2008
Former Khmer Rouge prison chief Kaing Guek Eav, also known as Duch, has been taken to one of Cambodia's killing fields to re-enact his alleged actions.
The visit to Choeung Ek, where some 16,000 people were buried after being tortured, is part of investigations by the UN-backed genocide tribunal.
Duch is the first of five senior Khmer Rouge officials to be charged.
The Khmer Rouge regime ruled Cambodia between 1975 and 1979 and is blamed for more than one million deaths.
Somali town overrun by Islamists
BBC NEWS February 25, 2008
Somali Islamists seized control of a southern town on Sunday, killing nine government troops.
The rebels, armed with rocket launchers and machine guns, voluntarily retreated after three hours, said a police officer in Dinsoor, Mohamed Ahmadey.
He said the town had been under "no-one's control" since the incident, in which eight soldiers were wounded.
For more than a year, government forces backed by Ethiopian troops have struggled to assert control in Somalia.
Kenya peace talks reach impasse
BBC NEWS February 25, 2008
Talks aimed at ending the political crisis in Kenya have stalled, forcing mediator Kofi Annan to intervene.
He is to seek the input of President Mwai Kibaki and rival Raila Odinga in an attempt to salvage the process.
Negotiators from Mr Odinga's Orange Democratic Movement and the government disagree on the powers to be granted to a proposed new post of prime minister.
Police have increased their estimate of the death toll of post-election clashes and now say at least 1,500 have died.
Holding Medvedev to His Words
The Washington Post February 25, 2008
Dmitry Medvedev, the man Vladimir Putin has appointed to be elected as Russia's president next Sunday, is so slavishly devoted to his patron that he has begun imitating his physical quirks. That includes "how he lays his hands on the table or how he stresses key words in speeches," not to mention walking with "fast and abrupt steps," according to the Reuters journalist Oleg Shchedrov.
Medvedev presumably won't be exercising his power as president to dismiss the prime minister -- the position Putin is about to assume -- anytime soon. Yet the diminutive 42-year-old former law professor has been making some interesting statements the past couple of weeks. For example: "Russia is a country of legal nihilism. No European country can boast such a universal disregard for the rule of law."
Turkey admits loss of helicopter
BBC NEWS February 24, 2008
Turkey says that one of its helicopters taking part in an offensive against Kurdish rebels in northern Iraq has been destroyed near the border.
It said the incident happened "due to an unknown reason". Earlier, Kurdistan Workers' Party (PKK) rebels claimed to have shot down a Turkish helicopter.
Iraq has meanwhile issued a statement urging Turkey to withdraw its forces and engage in talks on the PKK issue.
And the US has urged Turkey to keep its military campaign as short as possible.
The Turkish authorities launched the cross-border attack on Thursday night after accusing the Iraqi government of failing to stop members of the PKK from using the area as a safe haven.
Miliband's apology over 'rendition'
BBC NEWS February 21, 2008
The British government hates having to apologise to Members of Parliament for telling them something which is not true.
When they have been misled on different occasions, over several years, and it turns out Britain's number one ally is to blame, it makes it even more uncomfortable.
To make matters worse, doubters never had accepted American denials that any of the CIA's "extraordinary rendition" flights had touched down on British territory.
Human rights charities and campaigners insisted they had credible evidence that the British overseas territory of Diego Garcia had been used as part of the US's secret movements of suspects abducted abroad.
Iraqi police detain street people
BBC NEWS February 20, 2008
Iraqi security forces have been ordered to detain beggars and mentally ill people found on Baghdad's streets who could be exploited by militants.
The Iraqi interior ministry confirmed the order went into effect on Tuesday and that a handful of such people had been picked up from the streets so far.
Those detained will be sent to mental institutions or back to their families.
The policy follows allegations that two recent suicide bombings were carried out by mentally disabled women.
Supreme Court Won't Hear Wiretapping Case
newser February 20, 2008
The Supreme Court has dismissed the ACLU's legal challenge of President Bush's warrantless wiretapping program, reports the Los Angeles Times. The ACLU had said that by issuing a secret order that allowed wiretapping without abiding by a 1978 law, the president was directly disobeying US law. The court today issued a one-line order declining to hear the suit. • With Congress and the administration battling over wiretapping rules, the court may have decided not to interfere. "The president is bound by the laws that Congress enacts. He may disagree with those laws, but he may not disobey them," the ACLU said in its appeal. Bush had argued that the Constitution requires the president to work in the national interest, even when his actions are at odds with a particular law.
Justice at Guantanamo
The Washington Post February 19, 2008
Once again the Bush administration is trying to curtail it.THE BUSH administration has asked the Supreme Court to take a case it says needs to be decided quickly because it presents a serious threat to national security. The justices should grant the administration its wish, and promptly rule against it.
Castro steps down as Cuban leader
BBC NEWS February 19, 2008
Cuba's ailing leader Fidel Castro has announced he will not accept another term as president, ending the communist revolutionary's 49 years in power.
The 81-year-old handed over power temporarily to his brother Raul in July 2006 when he underwent surgery and has not been seen in public since then.
Cuba's new parliament will meet on Sunday to elect a new president.
Washington has called for Cuba to hold free elections, and said its decades-long embargo would remain.
Ugandans reach war crimes accord
BBC NEWS February 19, 2008
Ugandan rebels have agreed to let local courts deal with alleged war crimes - one of the obstacles to a final peace deal, a government spokesman says.
Captain Chris Magezi says a final deal would now be signed "soon".
The Lord's Resistance Army rebels have refused to disarm, while three of their leaders are wanted by the International Criminal Court.
The government has given the LRA until 28 February to end the war which has uprooted some two million people.
Capt Magezi said a special division of the Ugandan High Court would be set up to deal with serious rebel crimes, while traditional justice would be used for lesser offences.
Deported nationals 'bounced back'
BBC NEWS February 19, 2008
More than 100 foreign nationals deported to their home countries have been returned immediately to the UK, in the past five years.
Most of the failed deportations were blamed on problems with travel documents from the British government.
The cost to the taxpayer is estimated at more than £1m, research by BBC Radio Five Live has found.
The government said the returned foreign nationals were a "tiny percentage" of those deported.
Israel detains dozens of Gazans
BBC NEWS February 18, 2008
The Israeli military says it has taken about 80 Palestinians to Israel for questioning following a ground operation in the Gaza Strip.
Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert said the army had a "free hand" to target militants in Gaza.
He faces growing pressure to put an end to rocket attacks from the territory.
Three Palestinian militants and a civilian were killed in the incursion on Sunday morning. A fifth person died of his wounds on Monday.
US judge blocks CIA flight case
BBC NEWS February 14, 2008
A US judge has dismissed a case alleging that a subsidiary of Boeing illegally helped the CIA fly terror suspects abroad on rendition flights.
The American Civil Liberties Union brought the case against Jeppesen Dataplan, saying it "falsified flight plans... to avoid public scrutiny".
But a San Francisco judge halted the case, as the CIA director had urged.
"The very subject matter of this case is a state secret," Judge James Ware wrote in a ruling.
Bangladesh told to tackle torture
BBC NEWS February 14, 2008
US-based rights group has called on Bangladesh's caretaker government to tackle what it calls the endemic problem of torture in the country.
The Human Rights Watch says tens of thousands of people are being detained arbitrarily since the government imposed emergency a year ago.
Many of those arrested have been tortured, the group says.
The army-backed government came to power last year promising to reform the country's corrupt political system.
Africa war zones' 'rape epidemic'
BBC NEWS February 13, 2008
Sexual violence is spreading in African conflict zones like an epidemic, the United Nations has warned.
The UN's children's fund, Unicef, says rape is no longer just perpetrated by combatants but also by civilians.
The organisation said rape was most common in countries affected by wars and natural disasters.
"When societies collapse there seems to be a licence to rape. This is a major concern to us," Unicef Deputy Executive Director Hilde Frafjord Johnson said.
Sexual violence appeared to accompany a significant uprooting of society when some of the social norms crumble, she said.
Bush warns Congress on wiretaps
BBC NEWS February 13, 2008
US President George W Bush has told Congress he will not accept another temporary bill allowing warrantless wiretapping of foreign terror suspects.
Mr Bush said he wanted Congress to approve legislation which was permanent and provide retroactive immunity to telephone companies that co-operated.
"The time for debate is over," Mr Bush told reporters in Washington. "I will not accept any temporary extension."
The current legislation, last extended in August, will expire on Saturday.
Obama criticizes prosecution of 6 detainees
San Francisco Chronicle February 13, 2008
The Pentagon's plans for death-penalty prosecutions of six men accused of plotting the 2001 terrorist attacks were criticized by Democratic presidential candidate Barack Obama, who said capital punishment is appropriate for such crimes but that military tribunals are the wrong forum for the case.
The Defense Department announced murder, terrorism and conspiracy charges Monday against alleged attack mastermind Khalid Shaikh Mohammed and five other inmates of the U.S. military prison in Guantanamo Bay, Cuba. It gave the leading presidential candidates a chance to show how they would balance anti-terrorism zeal and civil liberties concerns in a heated political climate.
Fair trial pledge to 9/11 accused
BBC NEWS February 12, 2008
US Secretary of Homeland Security Michael Chertoff has promised a fair trial for Guantanamo prisoners accused of organising the 9/11 attacks in 2001.
He was speaking to the BBC after six men, including alleged plot mastermind Khalid Sheikh Mohammed, were charged.
They could face the death penalty if convicted of murder and conspiracy by controversial military tribunals.
But human rights groups have questioned whether such trials can be fair and said the defendants were tortured.
The BBC's Vincent Dowd in Washington says a confession gained from Khalid Sheikh Mohammed may prove problematic as the CIA admitted using "water-boarding" - or simulated drowning - as an interrogation technique.
Russia in Ukraine missile threat
BBC NEWS February 12, 2008
Russia has said it may target its missiles at Ukraine if its neighbour joins Nato and accepts the deployment of the US missile defence shield.
Russian President Vladimir Putin made the comments alongside Ukraine's President, Viktor Yushchenko.
After urgent talks in Moscow, the two leaders reached a deal to avoid disrupting gas supplies to Ukraine.
Mr Putin has condemned US plans to include Poland and the Czech Republic in its missile defence shield.
Military Commissions To Get First Major Test
National Journal February 11, 2008
The Pentagon formally announced today it was seeking the death penalty for six Guantanamo detainees for their alleged roles in the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks. The cases, to be tried jointly at the government's request, are the first to hit the U.S. government's as-yet-untested military tribunals system.
The creation of a separate judicial system for foreign terrorism suspects has been slowgoing, fraught with do-overs and heavily criticized around the world. Last June, the first two cases to be brought before the newly established military commissions -- under orders from the Supreme Court and Congress -- were summarily tossed out on technicalities. Now, DOD is signaling its intention of finally putting the military commissions to the test, and with its biggest fish in the war on terror so far.
The highest-profile defendant is Khalid Sheikh Mohammed, who as al-Qaida's No. 3 confessed to planning and facilitating the 9/11 attacks as well as personally beheading American journalist Daniel Pearl in Pakistan.
Moussaoui prosecutor knew of CIA tapes
YAHOO! NEWS February 7, 2008
WASHINGTON - The lead prosecutor in the terror case against Zacarias Moussaoui likely knew the CIA destroyed tapes of its interrogations of al-Qaida suspects more than a year before the government acknowledged it to the court, newly unsealed documents show.
The documents, which were declassified and released Wednesday by the 4th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals, detail efforts by Moussaoui's attorneys to send the case back to a lower federal court to find out why the tapes weren't disclosed and whether they would have influenced his decision to plead guilty.
In a Dec. 18, 2007, letter to the appeals court's chief judge, the Justice Department acknowledged that its lead prosecutor in the case had been informed about the CIA's tapes of al-Qaida lieutenant Abu Zubaydah being interrogated.
The letter said the prosecutor, Robert A. Spencer, may have been told of the tapes' destruction in late February or early March of 2006, just as the U.S. District Court in Alexandria, Va., was beginning its trial on whether Moussaoui would be eligible to face the death penalty.
Spencer, who was one of three prosecutors on the government's team, "does not recall being told this information," U.S. Attorney Chuck Rosenberg wrote in the Dec. 18 letter to 4th U.S. Circuit Chief Judge Karen J. Williams.
Deadly blasts hit port in Somalia
BBC February 6, 2008
The Somali port of Bossaso has been hit by deadly twin blasts as grenades planted in a building housing mainly Ethiopian migrants exploded overnight.
More than 20 people were killed in the explosions and more than 100 are seeking treatment for severe wounds.
The motive for the attack is not clear, but the port is a gathering point for those seeking to cross the Gulf of Aden to find work on the Arabian peninsula.
Spain judge indicts Rwanda forces
BBC NEWS February 6, 2008
A judge in Spain has issued international arrest warrants for 40 Rwandan soldiers accused of mass killings following the 1994 genocide.
Judge Fernando Andreu also indicted them for the murder of nine Spanish citizens, including six missionaries.
He said he had evidence implicating Rwanda's current President Paul Kagame, who has immunity from prosecution.
Under Spanish law, a court can prosecute human rights crimes even if the alleged offences took place abroad.
Judge Andreu began considering the case in response to a complaint from a human rights group in 2005.
EU offers closer ties to Serbia
BBC NEWS February 4, 2008
The European Union has said it wants to accelerate Serbia's progress towards membership following the re-election of pro-Western President Boris Tadic.
Mr Tadic claimed victory after taking slightly more than half the votes cast in a tight run-off contest with nationalist Tomislav Nikolic.
He had campaigned on a ticket promising EU-backed prosperity against Mr Nikolic's pro-Moscow campaign.
It comes as Serbia's Kosovo province prepares to declare independence.
In a message to Mr Tadic, Jose Manuel Barroso, President of the European Commission - the EU's executive arm - said the result was "a victory for democracy in Serbia and for the European values we share".
Arrests for Senegal 'gay wedding'
BBC NEWS February 4, 2008
Police in Senegal have arrested several men following the publication of pictures claiming to depict a wedding ceremony between two men.
The pictures were published in Icone magazine, whose editor, Mansour Dieng, has since received death threats.
Mr Dieng has also been questioned by police over the issue.
Homosexuality is illegal in Senegal but it is not clear whether the arrests were in connection with the ceremony or the death threats.
The BBC's Tidiane Sy in Senegal said that at least five of the men arrested appeared in the photographs.
Colombians say 'No More' to Farc
BBC NEWS February 4, 2008
Colombians around the world have begun a day of protests against the Marxist rebel group Farc.
The 'No More' movement, launched on the internet, will culminate with a major protest in the capital, Bogota.
Some groups have opposed the march, including some relatives of hostages, who fear the demonstrations may provoke Farc into treating them more harshly.
Farc rebels pledged at the weekend to release three high-profile political hostages for health reasons.
No handover date was given.
Top Khmer Rouge figure in court
BBC NEWS February 4, 2008
The most senior surviving member of Cambodia's Khmer Rouge regime has appeared in court for the first time.
Nuon Chea, who was second-in-command to Khmer Rouge leader Pol Pot, asked for a postponement to his appeal hearing because of a row over his legal team.
Nuon Chea is one of five senior Khmer Rouge officials to be arrested and charged by a special genocide tribunal.
More than a million people are thought to have died during the four years of Khmer Rouge rule between 1975 and 1979.
Why Bilkis Bano 'kept on fighting'
BBC NEWS February 4, 2008
A Muslim woman from the Indian state of Gujarat who was gang-raped six years ago has told the BBC about her experience following the conviction of 11 people involved in the crime.
Bilkis Bano, who was six months pregnant at the time, was raped and many of her family - including her three year-old daughter - were killed in the attack by a Hindu mob.
She only survived as her attackers thought they had left her for dead.
Speaking to the BBC World Service's Outlook programme, she said, "God saved me."
Migrants' advice packs proposed
BBC NEWS February 4, 2008
Immigrants should be told not to touch people without permission, spit in the street or play loud music, Communities Secretary Hazel Blears has said.
Ms Blears proposed that councils issue welcome packs to migrants explaining UK customs, including advice on queuing.
The government says it wants to help newcomers integrate into Britain.
Public funding should also be aimed at the whole community, not single ethnic groups, to "strengthen what we have in common", Ms Blears added.
The proposals are being introduced following the Commission on Integration and Cohesion, which held a 10-month review into the challenges caused of diversity.
Chad rebels fight inside capital
BBC NEWS February 2, 2008
Chadian rebels have entered the capital N'Djamena and are heading for the presidential palace after battling government troops, eyewitnesses say.
But the country's foreign minister said President Idriss Deby was inside the palace and the situation in the city was under control.
France called on its citizens in Chad to stay indoors, reversing an earlier order to gather at evacuation points.
The African Union called for an end to the rebel advance.
"The assembly strongly condemns the attacks perpetrated by armed groups against the Chadian government and demands that an immediate end be put to these attacks and resulting bloodshed," the AU said in the final declaration of its summit in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia.
Waterboarding torture used on cattle
heraldsun.com.un January 31, 2008
From correspondents in Washington
January 31, 2008 08:21am
A CALIFORNIA slaughterhouse has been accused of using controversial waterboarding torture on unfit cattle to rouse them long enough to pass inspection.
The Humane Society has released a video showing workers kicking cows, ramming them with forklift blades, applying electric shocks and even using a hose to simulate the feeling of drowning so the animals would revive long enough to pass federal inspection for slaughter.
"The attempt was to make them so distressed and to cause them so much suffering that these animals would get up and walk into the slaughterhouse," said Humane Society president Wayne Pacelle.
The company was not immediately available for comment.
Stop Kenya burning, says AU head
BBC NEWS January 31, 2008
African leaders at their summit in Ethiopia have been told they must get involved with the crisis in Kenya.
AU commission chairman Alpha Oumar Konare told them they could not just sit by. "If Kenya burns, there will be nothing for tomorrow," he said.
More than 850 people have died in political and ethnic clashes since last month's elections, which the opposition says were rigged.
In Nairobi, talks between government and opposition have been postponed.
Substantive negotiations started for the first time on Thursday but were adjourned until Friday after an opposition MP was shot dead by a policeman in the western town of Eldoret.
SA police arrest 1,500 in church
BBC NEWS January 31, 2008
South African police have raided Johannesburg's Central Methodist Church, arresting around 1,500 homeless people and Zimbabweans.
Dozens of police, some heavily armed, raided the church compound, rounded up those there and took them away.
The police said they were looking for drugs, guns and illegal immigrants.
But Paul Verryn, the church's bishop, described the raid as a violation of the sanctity of the church. "I think it is despicable," he told the BBC.
'Violation of rights'
US denounces Kenya 'cleansing'
BBC NEWS January 30, 2008
The top US envoy to Africa has said the forced removal of people from Kenya's Rift Valley after last month's disputed presidential poll was ethnic cleansing.
Assistant Secretary of State for Africa Jendayi Frazer also denounced the continuing violence which has since forced thousands to flee their homes.
She urged President Mwai Kibaki and opposition leader Raila Odinga to focus on mediation efforts to end the crisis.
Formal negotiations between the two parties were due to begin on Wednesday.
But unconfirmed reports in the Kenyan media say the talks, brokered by former UN chief Kofi Annan, have now been delayed until Thursday because neither side can agree on an agenda.
'Abused lives' of Jordan's maids
BBC NEWS January 30, 2008
An announcement has been pinned to the door of a refuge for Philippine maids in the Jordanian capital.
It blandly states that the "deployment of Filipino household workers is hereby temporarily suspended".
Inside, the reality of life for many Philippine domestic workers in Jordan soon becomes clear.
There are more than 150 women here who have fled their jobs.
"I was maltreated by my employer," said one, who like all the women that we met did not want to be named.
"My boss pulled me by my hair, she slapped me, she beat me, she pulled me crudely by my clothes and tried to put her slipper on my mouth."
Somali insurgents in deadly fight
BBC NEWS January 29, 2008
At least 10 people have been killed and more than 55 injured in clashes between insurgents and government forces in a residential area of the Somali capital.
The latest fighting came as the head of the country's UN refugee agency said he has never felt so frustrated with Somalia's lack of political progress.
Guillermo Bettoki told the BBC it was still too dangerous for the UNHCR to move its operations back to Somalia.
On Monday, three aid workers and a journalist were killed in Kismayo.
A Somali boy also died in the roadside blast in the port city in an attack UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon condemned as "brutal".
Congo ceasefire broken, rebels and militia clash
YAHOO! NEWS January 28, 2008
KINSHASA (Reuters) - Congolese Tutsi rebels and Mai Mai militia clashed on Monday in eastern Democratic Republic of Congo, breaking a ceasefire signed last week aimed at ending a long-running conflict, the two factions said.
Tutsi fighters loyal to renegade General Laurent Nkunda and Pareco Mai Mai militia, who both signed a peace accord on Wednesday, blamed each other for the fighting around villages 70 km (44 miles) west of the town of Goma.
No details of casualties were immediately available and the U.N. peacekeeping mission in Congo said it could not confirm who had attacked first.
Nkunda's rebel National Congress for the Defence of the People (CNDP) and the Pareco Mai Mai faction were among 25 armed groups that agreed to an immediate ceasefire in Wednesday's accord, which was also signed by the Congolese government.
The United Nations and Western governments were hoping the pact, which followed more the two weeks of talks, would end conflict in eastern North and South Kivu provinces which has persisted despite the formal end of Congo's 1998-2003 war.
Israel drops Arab killings case
BBC NEWS January 27, 2008
Israel's attorney general says no policemen will be prosecuted over the killing of 13 Arab Israeli protesters in 2000.
Menachem Mazuz said there was insufficient evidence to pursue a prosecution against officers who opened fire during anti-government riots.
The unrest erupted in sympathy with the Palestinian uprising against Israel.
Relatives of the victims were angry at the decision. One said it "gives the green light for attacks on Arabs".
In northern Israel, thousands of Israeli Arabs took to the streets for several days in October 2000, expressing solidarity with the "intifada" that had broken out in the occupied Palestinian territories.
Protesters threw stones and petrol bombs at police and passers by, leaving several people injured and one Jewish motorist dead.
BBC NEWS January 26, 2008
Former UN head Kofi Annan has condemned "gross and systematic abuses of human rights" in Kenya, after a visit to violence-hit parts of the country.
Mr Annan said conflict may have been triggered by disputed elections, but it had evolved into "something else".
The facts had to be established and those responsible held to account, Mr Annan said on his return to Nairobi.
On Saturday, police brought 16 badly burnt bodies to the mortuary in Nakuru, the capital of Rift Valley province.
Mr Annan - in Kenya to mediate attempts for a political solution - was flown over Nakuru on Saturday as part of a tour that also included visits to Eldoret and Molo district.
Kouchner in Rwanda to revive ties
BBC NEWS January 26, 2008
France's foreign minister has arrived in Rwanda on a visit aimed at normalising relations that have been broken off since 2006.
Bernard Kouchner's brief visit on Saturday will include talks with President Paul Kagame.
Mr Kouchner is also expected to lay a wreath at the country's genocide memorial in the capital, Kigali.
His visit marks the first time a senior French official has travelled to the central African nation in four years.
Bilateral relations between Paris and Kigali broke down amid French allegations that Mr Kagame had been behind the assassination of Rwanda's President Juvenal Habyarimana in 1994.
U.S. Will Seek Wide-Ranging Rights in Iraq Agreement
YAHOO! NEWS January 25, 2008
Jan. 25 (Bloomberg) -- The U.S. will ask the Iraqi government for the right to conduct combat operations and detain prisoners and will seek legal protections for American troops in an agreement that defines a long-term relationship between the two countries, a U.S. defense official said.
The official, who spoke on condition of anonymity, said those provisions will top the list of U.S. demands in talks with Iraqi officials for an accord that will extend beyond the presidency of George W. Bush.
U.S. officials will argue that these demands -- reported by the New York Times yesterday on its Web site -- flow logically from the fact that Iraq is still a combat zone, the defense official said. If U.S. forces operating there didn't have the legal authority to engage in combat and detain prisoners when necessary, there would be little point in their being in Iraq, the official said.
Kenyan rivals meet face-to-face
BBC NEWS January 24, 2008
Kenyan President Mwai Kibaki and the opposition leader, Raila Odinga, have met for the first time since last month's disputed presidential election.
The talks in Nairobi were mediated by former UN chief Kofi Annan, who said some first steps had been taken towards a peaceful solution to the crisis.
Weeks of violence followed the election results, rejected by Mr Odinga and described as flawed by observers.
Earlier, a rights group accused Mr Odinga's party of ethnic violence.
"We have evidence that Orange Democratic Movement politicians and local leaders actively fomented some post-election violence," said Human Rights Watch's acting Africa director.
Pope urges 'more ethical' media
BBC NEWS January 24, 2008
Pope Benedict XVI has called on the media to underpin its work with ethical considerations and do more to promote the "dignity of the human being".
The pontiff said there was a need for what he called "info-ethics" - as much as bio-ethics in the fields of medicine and biological research.
He said the media was often used to promote vulgarity and violence and to legitimise "distorted models of life".
But he also said the media helped to spread democracy and promote dialogue.
Correspondents say the Vatican has frequently accused the media of promoting consumerism and lifestyles that it considers unethical, such as pre-marital sex and homosexuality.
Zimbabwe protesters tear-gassed
BBC NEWS January 23, 2008
Zimbabwean police have fired tear gas at hundreds of opposition protesters on the streets of the capital, Harare, after a court banned a protest march.
The judge ruled an opposition stadium rally could go ahead but agreed with police warnings that a march would present a threat to public security.
Opposition leader Morgan Tsvangirai was detained for five hours then released ahead of the planned demonstrations.
The opposition want political reforms before elections scheduled for March.
After the court ruling, several hundred opposition protesters began walking from the headquarters of the Movement for Democratic Change (MDC) in central Harare.
Clashes end Kenya prayer meeting
BBC NEWS January 23, 2008
Skirmishes between police and youths have broken up an opposition prayer meeting for victims of the post-poll violence in Kenya's capital, Nairobi.
Tear gas was fired at Orange Democratic Movement (ODM) supporters who stoned police vehicles and torched a nearby government building.
Meanwhile, former UN chief Kofi Annan is beginning a fresh attempt to end the chaos arising from the disputed poll.
The ODM says it will consider calling off protests if Mr Annan asks them to.
Opposition protest rallies were due to resume on Thursday.
"Our official position is that we shall meet Mr Annan this afternoon, and if he asks us to call them off, that is a request that will be seriously considered by the ODM leadership, but as of now the rallies are still on," spokesman Salim Lone told the BBC.
Morales defends Bolivian reforms
BBC NEWS January 23, 2008
Bolivian President Evo Morales has defended his first two years in office, saying his government's reforms are irreversible.
He said there was room for everyone in what he called his "democratic and cultural revolution", but only if Bolivians were united.
"There's no turning back on the path we started upon two years ago," Mr Morales said in a televised address.
But he avoided mentioning the sometimes violent opposition to his reforms.
And he largely ignored a feud with provinces demanding autonomy.
Dutch MP warned over Islam film
BBC NEWS January 23, 2008
Right-wing Dutch politician Geert Wilders has been told that he may have to leave the country if he releases his film about Islam, reports say.
National Counterterrorism Co-ordinator Tjibbe Joustra is said to have warned the politician amid growing concern.
The Dutch prime minister has spoken of fears the film could be offensive and "lead to reactions that endanger public order, security and the economy".
One Iranian politician has warned of repercussions from the Muslim world.
Alaeddin Boroujerdi, head of the Majlis National Security and Foreign Policy Commission, has called on the Dutch government to prevent Mr Wilders showing his film.
"Otherwise, the Majlis deputies will call on the Iranian government to review its relations with the Netherlands," he told the Iranian news agency IRNA.
5M dead as Congo peace deal signed
CNN January 23, 2008
(CNN) -- The government of the Democratic Republic of the Congo and armed groups in the country signed a deal Wednesday to end years of fighting in the country's east, according to Peter Kessler, with the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR).
Rebel soldiers loyal to renegade general Laurent Nkunda pictured in December near Goma
The news comes on the heels of a new report by the International Rescue Committee which said that the conflict and humanitarian crisis in Congo had taken the lives of some 5.4 million people since 1998, and that 45,000 people continue to die there every month.
IRC President George Rupp said the loss of life is equivalent to the entire population of Denmark, or the state of Colorado, dying within a decade.
Even with the country's violence, the IRC found that most of the deaths were from non-violent causes such as malaria, diarrhea, pneumonia, and malnutrition.
Nearly half the deaths were among children younger than five, even though they are only 19 percent of the population, the IRC said.
The group said the national rate of mortality is nearly 60 percent higher than the average in the sub-Saharan region.
Gang rape spirals in violent Kenya
BBC January 23, 2008
Rape is on the rise in Kenya, troubled by violence which followed December's disputed elections.
 Women and children are most at risk of sexual attack |
Every day women turn up at the doors of Nairobi's hospitals and clinics telling the same story.
"I could not run away. They gagged my mouth and pinned me down," one woman remembers.
"After raping me they blindfolded me and led me to a nearby forest. That's where they left me."
Her experience - doctors, officials and the UN say - is echoed by hundreds of other women who have survived a spiralling number of sexual attacks.
Many are gang rapes, carried out by groups of armed men
Saudi rape case lawyer 'reinstated'
CNN January 22, 2008
(CNN) -- The Saudi lawyer who represented a woman kidnapped and raped by seven men said his license to practice has been reinstated.
A protest appeared in India in November against the Saudi sentence.
Lawyer and human rights activist Abdul Rahman al-Lahem told CNN's Nic Robertson that the Justice Ministry has reinstated his license.
Al-Lahem had previously told CNN that the Saudi judge revoked his license as punishment for speaking to the media about his client's case, which attracted international attention.
His client, an engaged teenager, was raped by seven men who found her alone with a man unrelated to her. She has said she was meeting with the man to retrieve a photograph. The attack took place in Qatif in March 2006.
The seven rapists were sentenced to two to nine years in prison but she also was sentenced to 200 lashes and six months in prison for having violated the kingdom's strict Islamic law by being alone with an unrelated man.
The woman's sentence provoked outrage in the West and cast light on the treatment of women under Saudi Arabian law.
Gunfire at Egypt's Gaza crossing
BBC NEWS January 22, 2008
Egyptian security guards have fired into the air and used water cannon to drive back Palestinian women who tried to surge across the border from Gaza.
Hundreds of Palestinians demanded the Rafah crossing to Egypt be reopened for vital supplies that are scarce because of Israel's blockade of Gaza.
Four Palestinians and an Egyptian policeman were injured in the firing, according to AFP news agency.
It came as Israel eased a four-day blockade by allowing fuel deliveries.
Since Hamas seized control of Gaza last June, the Rafah crossing has remained closed for most of the time at Israel's insistence.
But a violent confrontation erupted as Palestinians clashed with Egyptian security forces at the terminal, Gaza's only crossing that bypasses Israel.
Musharraf hoping to win over West
CNN.Com /asia January 21, 2008
(CNN) -- Less than a month before key elections in Pakistan, embattled President Pervez Musharraf on Monday began an eight-day visit to Europe to shore up international support for his country, wracked by political turmoil and a strengthening Islamic insurgency.
Anti-Musharraf ptotesters staged a rally while the Pakistan president met with European officials.
Following "very frank and sincere" talks with the European Union's foreign policy chief, Javier Solana, in Brussels on Monday, Musharraf said he wants more EU involvement in Pakistan.
"Pakistan understands the significance of the European Union, the significance of its role in the future, especially in the political disputes around the world," he told reporters.
"And that is why I urged the secretary-general (Solana) to play his role and the EU's role more actively."
Musharraf also praised Solana for being "extremely well-informed" about the complicated situation in Pakistan. "It is always a pleasure to come here and meet Mr. Solana ... because we have a total unanimity of views," he said.
Gaza City plunged into darkness
BBC NEWS January 20, 2008
The only power plant in the Hamas-run Gaza Strip has shut down because of a lack of fuel, Palestinian officials say, blaming Israeli restrictions.
Gaza City was plunged into darkness after the plant's turbines stopped.
Israel's closure of border crossings amid continued rocket fire from Gaza has brought the delivery of almost all supplies, including fuel, to a halt.
But Israel, which provides 60% of Gaza's power, says the territory still has sufficient fuel stocks.
The UN believes Gaza's 1.5m inhabitants face serious hardship and one of its officials said unheated hospitals were having to rely on generators for operations.
Mahmoud Abbas, the West Bank-based Palestinian Authority president who lost control of Gaza to Hamas last year, called on Israel to "end its blockade of Gaza immediately and allow the entry of fuel to facilitate the lives of the innocent".
Fujimori accused of kidnap plot
BBC NEWS January 19, 2008
Peru's Prime Minister Jorge del Castillo has accused ex-President Alberto Fujimori of kidnapping and attempted assassination.
Mr del Castillo said he had been kidnapped by a paramilitary death squad controlled by Mr Fujimori in 1992.
The same group had tried to assassinate the current Peruvian president, Alan Garcia, Mr del Castillo told a court in the capital, Lima.
Mr Fujimori is on trial for human rights abuses. He denies the charges.
Mr del Castillo said that he had been at Mr Garcia's house on the night of 5 April 1992, when Mr Fujimori closed the country's courts and parliament.
CIA boss names Bhutto's killers
BBC NEWS January 18, 2008
The CIA has added its support to the view that a Pakistani militant, Baitullah Mehsud, and al-Qaeda organised Benazir Bhutto's killing.
CIA Director Michael Hayden told the Washington Post that the former Pakistani prime minister was killed by fighters allied to Baitullah Mehsud.
The Pakistani government accused Mehsud of the attack shortly after Ms Bhutto's death in Rawalpindi on 27 December.
Mr Hayden did not reveal the sources for his claim.
Correspondents say that Mr Hayden's comments are the most comprehensive public assessment by US intelligence of Ms Bhutto's death.
Controversy still surrounds the circumstances of the killing.
One or more attackers shot at her and detonated a bomb as she was leaving a rally in Rawalpindi.
Baitullah Mehsud has denied involvement. The Pakistani government says it intercepted a phone conversation proving that he was behind the attack.
Kenya protesters to mount boycott
BBC NEWS January 18, 2008
The Orange Democratic Movement (ODM) says that from next week it will boycott companies run by prominent allies of President Mwai Kibaki.
More than 600 people have died in violence since the 27 December poll.
Meanwhile Kenya's National Commission on Human Rights cast further doubt on the results, alleging widespread fraud.
At a news conference in Nairobi, the state-sponsored body listed a catalogue of irregularities in the tallying and announcement of results.
At least 360,000 votes could not be verified, the commission said. About 230,000 separated the two candidates.
The officials results have outraged supporters of ODM candidate Raila Odinga, who has demanded a re-run.
Israel closes crossings with Gaza
BBC NEWS January 18, 2008
Israel has temporarily shut its crossings with Gaza, after a series of rocket attacks on nearby Israeli towns from the Hamas-run territory.
The UN relief agency providing for Palestinian refugees in Gaza said it was unable to deliver humanitarian aid as a result of the closure.
The measure came as at least one militant was killed and several others injured in an Israeli air strike.
They had just launched rockets into Israel, officials on both sides said.
A militant from the al-Aqsa Martyrs Brigades, a group linked to the Fatah faction of Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas, was also killed by Israeli troops in the West Bank town of Nablus.
Ethiopia holds 'many Westerners'
BBC NEWS January 18, 2008
Many US and European citizens of Ethiopian and Somali origin are being held in Ethiopia for alleged terrorist offences, a senior official has said.
President of Ethiopia's Somali region Abdullahi Hassan refused to give exact numbers of those detained.
"Those who are waging the terrorist war against our people are coming from Europe, are coming from America," he told journalists.
A rebel group is fighting for more autonomy for the Somali region.
Mr Hassan said people originally from the region, also known as the Ogaden, were raising money for the rebel Ogaden National Liberation Front (ONLF).
"They are buying with this money weapons, mines and explosives," he said.
'Seven dead' in Kenyan protests
BBC NEWS January 17, 2008
Kenya's opposition leader Raila Odinga says police in Nairobi have shot dead seven people on the second day of protests against disputed polls.
BBC correspondents reported Kenyan riot police firing into the air to disperse protesters in several cities.
They said at least two people had been shot in Nairobi's Kibera slum and there were clashes in Kisumu in the west as police tried to clear barricades.
The European Parliament has asked the EU to cut aid to Kenya's government.
On the first day of the protests on Wednesday, at least four people were killed.
East Timor 'must forgive Suharto'
BBC NEWS January 17, 2008
East Timor's president has urged his countrymen to forgive ailing ex-Indonesian leader Suharto, who ruled them with an iron fist for 23 years.
Suharto, who ordered the invasion of East Timor in 1975, is critically ill in hospital in Jakarta.
Jose Ramos-Horta said he would not go to see Suharto personally but would "ask the Pope to pray for him" on an forthcoming visit to the Vatican.
He said the former leader contributed "many positive things" to Indonesia.
Mr Ramos-Horta credited Suharto with developing Indonesia and its economy, but said he had also "made many mistakes, such as massacres in Indonesia and East Timor".
"It is impossible for us to forget the past but East Timor should forgive him before he dies," said Mr Ramos-Horta, a Nobel Peace Prize winner.
France stops genocide transfer
BBC NEWS January 17, 2008
France's Supreme Court has overruled a decision to hand over a Rwandan genocide suspect to an international tribunal in Tanzania, his lawyers say.
Dominique Ntawukuriryayo is accused by the International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda of co-ordinating the killing of up to 25,000 Tutsis in April 1994.
His lawyer, Thierry Mausis, told the BBC an earlier ruling was overturned because of procedural violations.
Two other Rwandan suspects held last year in France were subsequently freed.
'Invalid' warrants
Mr Ntawukuriryayo, born in 1942, was a sub-prefect in the area of Gisagara at the time of the five-day killings at Kabuye Hill.
Hardliners leave Israel coalition
BBC NEWS January 16, 2008
An Israeli right-wing party has pulled out of the coalition government in protest at the starting of peace talks on core issues with the Palestinians.
Yisrael Beitenu leader Avigdor Lieberman said the land-for-peace talks would lead to Israel's destruction.
Israeli Arab politicians condemn the party as racist for advocating the expulsion of Arab citizens from Israel to a future Palestinian state.
Despite its departure, the coalition still retains a parliamentary majority.
However, it is only by seven seats, meaning Ehud Olmert's government is now vulnerable to any similar withdrawal by the religious party Shas.
Shas has 12 seats and has also threatened to leave the coalition over the issue of peace talks.
Kenyan PoliceFire Warning Shots
BBC NEWS January 16, 2008
Kenyan police in the western city of Kisumu have fired shots over the heads of protesters at a rally against disputed presidential election results.
Some 300 people were trying to march into the town centre when police opened fire. A BBC reporter there saw two people being carried away.
In Nairobi, two women were wounded by stray bullets fired by police in a brief stand-off in the Kibera slum.
The rallies are part of nationwide protests called by the opposition.
They were called by the opposition Orange Democratic Movement (ODM), after President Mwai Kibaki was declared the winner of a disputed poll.
Special Counsel Sought in CIA tTapes Case
YAHOO! NEWS January 15, 2008
By PAMELA HESS,
WASHINGTON - The chairman of the House Judiciary Committee and 18 other House Democrats on Tuesday asked the attorney general to replace a government prosecutor with an outside lawyer to investigate the CIA's destruction of interrogation videotapes.
The request comes a day before the CIA's top lawyer, John Rizzo, is due to testify to the House Intelligence Committee about the tapes, which the CIA destroyed in November 2005. Recorded in 2002, they showed the harsh interrogation of two al-Qaida suspects.
Attorney General Michael Mukasey on Jan. 2 appointed a Connecticut federal prosecutor to oversee the criminal investigation. Judiciary Committee Chairman John Conyers, D-Mich., said in a Tuesday letter to Mukasey that the Justice Department's ability to conduct an independent investigation is compromised because the CIA apparently consulted Justice and White House lawyers about the tapes and their destruction.
"The department has no business conducting the investigation and should instead turn to a special counsel," Conyers wrote. "Nothing less than a special counsel with a full investigative mandate will meet the tests of independence, transparency and completeness."
Bush Delivers Arms Deal for Saudis
YAHOO! NEWS January 14, 2008
By TERENCE HUNT, AP White House Correspondent
RIYADH, Saudi Arabia - President Bush delivered a sophisticated weapons sale for Saudi Arabia on Monday, trying to bolster defenses against threats from U.S. adversary Iran and muster support in this oil-rich kingdom for a long-stalled Mideast peace agreement.
on a surprisingly cold day with blustery winds, Bush received a warm embrace from King Abdullah, whose family wields almost absolute rule. Among ordinary Saudis and across much of the Mideast, Bush is unpopular, particularly because of the Iraq war and unflinching U.S. support for Israel.
Bush and Abdullah were going to some lengths over two days to emphasize their strong personal ties.
Saudi Arabia holds the world's largest oil reserves and surging fuel costs are putting a major strain on the troubled U.S. economy. But White House officials said it was unclear if Bush raised the subject with the king. The issue has come up in earlier stops on Bush's eight-day trip, largely in the context of his quest for alternate fuels and sources of energy, the officials said.
White House counselor Ed Gillespie said Mideast leaders have "talked about the nature of the market and the vast demand that's on the world market today for oil." He said that was "a legitimate and accurate point."
Water-boarding 'would be torture'
BBC News January 13, 2008
US national intelligence chief Mike McConnell has said the interrogation technique of water-boarding "would be torture" if he were subjected to it.
Mr McConnell said it would also be torture if water-boarding, which involves simulated drowning, resulted in water entering a detainee's lungs.
He told the New Yorker there would be a "huge penalty" for anyone using it if it was ever determined to be torture.
The US attorney-general has declined to rule on whether the method is torture.
However, Michael Mukasey said during his Senate confirmation hearing that water-boarding was "repugnant to me" and that he would institute a review.
In December, the House of Representatives approved a bill that would ban the CIA from using harsh interrogation techniques such as water-boarding.
Joint Chiefs Chairman: Close Guantanamo
Yahoo! News January 13, 2008
GUANTANAMO BAY NAVAL BASE, Cuba - The chief of the U.S. military
said Sunday he favors closing the prison here as soon as possible
because he believes negative publicity worldwide about treatment of
terrorist suspects has been "pretty damaging" to the image of the
United States.
"I'd
like to see it shut down," Adm. Mike Mullen said in an interview with
three reporters who toured the detention center with him on his first
visit since becoming chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff last October.
His visit came two days after the sixth anniversary of the prison's
opening in January 2002. He stressed that a closure decision was not
his to make and that he understands there are numerous complex legal
questions the administration believes would have to be settled first,
such as where to move prisoners.
Abu Ghraib Officer: Probe Was Incomplete
YAHOO! NEWS January 11, 2008
BALTIMORE - The revelation that the Army threw out the conviction of the only officer court-martialed in the Abu Ghraib scandal renewed outrage from human rights advocates who complained that not enough military and civilian leaders were held accountable for the abuse of Iraqi prisoners.
Those critics found an unlikely ally in the officer himself, Lt. Col. Steven L. Jordan, whose conviction on a minor charge of disobeying an order was dismissed this week, leaving him with only an administrative reprimand.
Jordan told The Associated Press on Thursday he believes many officers and enlisted soldiers did not face adequate scrutiny in the investigation that led to convictions against 11 soldiers, none with a rank higher than staff sergeant.
He said the probe was "not complete" and that a link between abusive interrogations at Abu Ghraib and in military prisons at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, and in Afghanistan was not adequately established.
If rough interrogation techniques were taught to the soldiers who abused prisoners at Abu Ghraib, Jordan said, "the question at that point is, who's responsible for that? Is it Donald Rumsfeld? (Lt.) Gen. (Ricardo) Sanchez? ... I don't know."
Air Travel Security Showdown
YAHOO! NEWS January 11, 2008
WASHINGTON - Millions of air travelers may find going through airport security much more complicated this spring, as the Bush administration heads toward a showdown with state governments over post-Sept. 11 rules for new driver's licenses.
By May, the dispute could leave millions of people unable to use their licenses to board planes, but privacy advocates called that a hollow threat by federal officials.
Homeland Security Secretary Michael Chertoff, who was unveiling final details of the REAL ID Act's rules on Friday, said that if states want their licenses to remain valid for air travel after May 2008, those states must seek a waiver indicating they want more time to comply with the legislation.
Chertoff said that for any state which doesn't seek such a waiver by May, residents of that state will have to use a passport or certain types of federal border-crossing cards if they want to avoid a vigorous secondary screening at airport security.
Bush Urges Israeli Occupation End
BBC News January 10, 2008
US President George W Bush has said Israel must end occupation of Arab land taken in 1967 so that a viable Palestinian state can be created.
He also urged a solution to the Palestinian refugee issue which would involve paying compensation.
This is thought to be the first time Mr Bush has publicly pressed the Israelis to give up occupied land.
Mr Bush was speaking in Jerusalem after two days of talks with Israeli and Palestinian leaders.
He also re-affirmed US commitment to an Israel inside secure and defensible borders.
And he called on Arab states to reach out to Israel - a step he said was "long overdue".
Earlier, Mr Bush said he believed the two sides would be able to sign a peace deal before he leaves office in January 2009.
Torture
The New York Times January 10, 2008
The website of the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights contains a four-page document listing various definitions of the term "torture.'' Most of them center on two points: that torture is any act that intentionally inflicts "severe pain or suffering, whether physical or mental,'' in the words of a 1975 U.N. declaration, to serve a state purpose like gathering information or intimidating dissenters; and that pain or suffering that arises from lawful punishment does not count.
The debate over how to define torture has taken on new meaning since the Sept. 11th attacks lent a new urgency to counterterrorism efforts. In 2002, officials in the Justice Department's Office of Legal Counsel issued a memo which argued that coercive interrogations only constitute torture if they intentionally caused suffering "equivalent in intensity to the pain accompanying serious physical injury, such as organ failure, impairment of bodily function, or even death." That memo was rescinded in 2004, and since then members of the Bush administration have insisted that torture is "abhorrent'' and prohibited by existing regulations.
Ex-C.I.A. Aide Won’t Testify on Tapes Without Immunity
The New York Times January 10, 2008
WASHINGTON — A lawyer for Jose A. Rodriguez Jr., the former Central Intelligence Agency official who in 2005 ordered the destruction of videotapes of harsh interrogations of prisoners at a secret site overseas, has told Congress that Mr. Rodriguez will not testify about the tapes without a grant of immunity, a person familiar with the discussions said Wednesday.
The House Intelligence Committee has scheduled a closed hearing on the tapes’ destruction for next Wednesday, and John A. Rizzo, the C.I.A.’s acting general counsel, has agreed to testify.
Honduras Seeks to Revive Cases from 1980s Dirty War
Reuters January 8, 2008
TEGUCIGALPA, Jan 7 (Reuters) - Honduras wants to revive cases accusing
officials of murder and torture in a 1980s dirty war against leftists
when 184 people disappeared and were presumed dead at the hands of
death squads, the president said on Monday.
Human rights groups say death squads with links to police and the
military were behind the disappearances as a civilian government
launched a crackdown on leftist activists between 1982 and 1990.
"We have to reopen these cases, not to reopen the wounds, but to
concentrate on real peace, punishing those responsible for violating
human rights in this country," Honduras' left-leaning President Manuel
Zelaya said in a speech.
Argentine Torture Defendant May Have Been Silenced
Reuters January 7, 2008
BUENOS AIRES, Jan 7 (Reuters) - A former coast guard officer found dead
in jail days before the verdict in his trial for torture may have been
killed to keep him from talking about human rights violations during
Argentina's 1976-1983 dirty war, a judge's resolution said.
Hector Febres, defendant in a high-profile human rights case, died on
Dec. 10 of cyanide poisoning in the comfortable suite where he was held
in a coast guard complex.
Judge Sandra Arroyo ordered the
arrest of two coast guard officials who were his jailers, accusing them
of giving Febres' killers access to the area, a court source told
Reuters.
The judge wrote in a resolution that the motive was:
"to silence one who tried to reveal data or information about the facts
surrounding the human rights violations during the last military
government."
Saudi Arabia: Amnesty Appeal for Detained Blogger at Risk of Torture
AIUK January 7, 2008
Amnesty International today issued an urgent appeal for Internet
blogger Fouad Ahmad al-Farhan, who is reportedly being held in
incommunicado detention at Dhaban Prison in the Saudi city of Jeddah.
He has been held for more than one month and is at risk of torture.
Fouad
Ahmad al-Farhan is believed to be held for his peaceful criticism of
government policies, including detentions without charge or trial of
prisoners of conscience - such as nine men who have been held since 3
February 2007. Amnesty International believes they may be detained
solely for their peaceful activities in defence of human rights.
Amnesty is asking its members to send urgent appeals to the Saudi authorities,
expressing
concern that Fouad Ahmad Al-Farhan is being held incommunicado and
seeking assurances that he will be protected from torture or
ill-treatment. They are calling for his immediate and unconditional
release if he is being held solely for the peaceful expression of his
beliefs. Amnesty is also urging that Fouad Ahmad Al-Farhan be given
regular access to his family, lawyers and any medical attention he
needs.
Amnesty International UK Director Kate Allen said:
'Blogs
are some of the few places in Saudi Arabia where people can truly speak
out about human rights - newspaper and TV journalists are often
arrested or censored if they write about reform.
'This arrest is a massive step backwards for Saudi media and a dark day for freedom of expression in the country.
'If
his only 'crime' is expressing his beliefs in a blog, the authorities
should release Fouad Ahmad al-Farhan immediately. If they really
believe that he has done something else wrong they should give him a
fair trial.'
John Yoo Sued for the "Torture" of Jose Padilla
shortnews.com January 6, 2008
Padilla was detained for 3 1/2 years during which he was subjected to
treatment including stress positioning, sleep deprivation, exposure to
extreme temperatures, and sensory deprivation.
John Yoo
authored memos used to justify Padilla's detention and treatment.
Yoo
said only inflicting severe pain such as the kind resulting from "organ
failure, impairment of bodily function or even death" was legally
prohibited torture.
Lawyers for Padilla have filed suit
against Yoo seeking $1 and a statement that Yoo's actions were illegal.
Similar suits were filed last year against Donald Rumsfeld and other
officials involved with Padilla's treatment.
Letter from a Torture Survivor to Those Seeking Democratic & Republican Nominations for President
Tikkun January 5, 2008
For the tortured, fundamental beliefs about trust, faith, and human decency have
been betrayed. It may not be surprising then that your position on this subject
is of central importance to us.
None of you has said you favor torture, but
it appears that, for some of you, it’s the word “torture” that you
oppose and not its practice. (President Bush provides a good example. He has
insisted that the United States does not torture but it seems clear that he has
not only condoned but ordered its practice.)
While no one has argued in favor of torture
per se, some of you have used the kind of euphemisms that signal that
you countenance its practice. We know by now what “enhanced interrogation techniques” mean, just as we
know that by calling water-boarding “a dunk in the water,” Vice President
Cheney was approving the technique. (And as we also know that when Michael
Mukasey claimed not to know what water-boarding was, or whether it was torture,
he was protecting the Bush administration.)
Of course, not all of you are torture’s
advocates. John McCain’s first-hand experience with torture has under-girded
his opposition to it. Others, in one way or another, have taken small steps in
that direction, from announcing opposition to its practice to introducing or
co-sponsoring bills that would limit its practice by the government.
Torture Victim to Speak in Walpole
The Daily News Transcript January 4, 2008
Demissie Abebe Gebremedhin knows all about torture, which is why he
is in a unique position to condemn it and does so every chance he gets.
"I was so damaged," he said.
He said he was tortured in his native Ethiopia three years ago after
he attempted to expose corruption in an agency that was supposed to
help poor people cope with natural disasters. He was so injured that he
was immobile in a hospital for four days.
Gebremedhin is now the director of Torture Abolition and Survivors
Support Coalition International, an organization based in Washington,
D.C., with the goal of ending torture and helping those who survive it.
He will speak about his own experiences and the mission of his
organization at the Walpole Public Library on Tuesday at 7:30 p.m.
He is appearing as part of a speaker series sponsored by the Walpole Peace and Justice Group.
CIA to Face Full Criminal Probe Over Torture Tapes
Times Online January 3, 2008
The American Justice Department has opened a full criminal investigation into
the destruction of CIA videotapes believed to show the use of torture during
the interrogation of two al-Qaeda suspects in secret overseas prisons.
Michael Mukasey, the United States Attorney General, also announced that the
inquiry would be headed by a mob-busting career prosecutor, who will lead a
team of FBI agents investigating the decision to destroy the tapes made at
CIA 'ghost prisons' overseas five years ago.
The decision to institute a criminal inquiry represents a blow for the CIA,
which is also accused of impeding a high-profile investigation into the
terror attacks of September 11, 2001.
The White House is at risk of being dragged into the scandal after the
revelation that at least four of its staff were approached for advice on
what to do with the tapes - although none has admitted to recommending their
destruction.
Dorfman’s Purgatorio Makes UK Premiere at Arcola
"What's On Stage" January 3, 2008
Chilean playwright Ariel Dorfman’s Purgatorio, a “thematic sequel” to his award-winning Death and the Maiden,
will receive its British premiere this month at north London’s Arcola
Theatre, where its limited season runs from 18 January to 9 February
2008 (previews from 15 January).
Death and the Maiden
premiered in 1991 at the Royal Court before transferring to the West
End's Duke of York's and scooping Oliviers for Best New Play and Best
Actress for Juliet Stevenson. That play - set in the aftermath of a
vicious South American dictatorship in which the protagonist Paulina
was tortured and raped by a government official who has now turned up
as her husband's house guest - drew on Dorfman's own experiences in
Pinochet-ruled Chile. Death and the Maiden was subsequently made into a film, directed by Roman Polanski and starring Sigourney Weaver and Ben Kingsley.
Report: China Allowing 40 North Korean Refugees to Seek Asylum
The Christian Post January 1, 2008
China’s government has reportedly decided to allow about 40 North
Korean refugees to leave for a third country months before the upcoming
Beijing Olympics.
According to reports, the refugees
have been sheltered in the South Korean embassy compound and been under
the protection of the United Nation’s refugee agency, UNHCR (United
Nations High Commissioner for Refugees), in Beijing. If all the
proceedings go accordingly, the North Korean defectors are expected to
leave China in January or February for a third country such as South
Korea or the United States, reported Radio Free Asia (RFA).
The Chinese government is suspected of making the decision to prevent the issue from overshadowing the 2008 Beijing Olympics.
It
is said that at least 500,000 North Koreans have crossed the border
over to China in the past 10 years. Although the U.N. Special
Rapporteur on North Korea considers the North Koreans who flee to China
“refugees” deserving of protection, China has a signed agreement with
its communist ally to return refugees back to North Korea, where they
face imprisonment, torture, and sometimes execution for leaving the
country – a state crime.
Revenge is Not for Mortals
Fiji Times Limited. December 31, 2007
One year has passed since I and some other activists
and friends were detained at the military camp and abused for our views
and beliefs.
What happened that Christmas morning has strengthened me and taught me many lessons about life.
During
the early days of the coup, a group of us youths gathered at a local
NGO office in Suva and formed a plan to inform citizens of Fiji
peacefully about what the coup would bring to the nation and how the
military's actions were illegal and irrational.
We knew we would
be targeted by the military and abused but our unwavering commitment to
the youths of this nation and understanding that we, as the future, had
to have a voice and make a stand for justice and democracy, was the
fuel of our ambition and vision.
Still in a State of Denial?
The Manila Times December 31, 2007
A FEW days ago, the Court of Appeals implicated retired Army Major
General Jovito Palparan and his men in the abduction of brothers
Reynaldo and Raymond Manalo. The Manalo brothers were allegedly
abducted in 2006 and detained for a year on the suspicion that they
were communist sympathizers.
The court established Palparan’s participation
in the abduction. “At the very least, he was aware of the
petitioners’ captivity at the hands of men in uniform assigned to
his command. In fact, he or any other officer tendered no
controversion to the firm claim of Raymond that he [Palparan] met
them in person in a safehouse in Bulacan and told them what he
wanted and their parents to do or not to be doing.”
The CA’s (Second Division) statement against
Palparan and his men is contained in the decision authored by
Associate Justice Lucas Bersamin in granting the writ of amparo to
the Manalo brothers, who sought protection from the court from
another possible military abduction.
Defense Bill's Demise Stymies Ex-POWs' Suit
LA Times December 30, 2007
WASHINGTON -- President Bush surprised Congress by refusing to sign a
Defense Department authorization bill, in part because the legislation
could revive a lawsuit brought by American prisoners of war during the
1991 Persian Gulf War who say they were tortured by the Iraqis.
Their suit sought to establish the principle that war prisoners who
were tortured in violation of the Geneva Convention were entitled to
sue the country that tortured them.
By keeping the bill from
becoming law, the president delayed pay raises for the troops and
improvements in the care of wounded veterans. On Thursday, he pointed
to a little-noted provision in the huge bill and said it could trigger
a wave of lawsuits that might "imperil billions of dollars of Iraqi
assets."
Mexico: Ten Years Later, It’s Time to Recognize the U.S. Government’s Responsibility for Acteal
Narco News December 30, 2007
Last week, a commemoration ceremony in Acteal marked the tenth
anniversary of a brutal massacre in Chiapas, Mexico that took the lives
of 45 indigenous civilians, most of whom were women and children. The
ceremony was a bitter reminder of the fact that many of those
responsible for the crime have not been brought to justice, an impunity
that has been roundly criticized and condemned by both domestic and
international human rights organizations.
In spite of such widely
leveled condemnations, responsibility for the crime with top-level
Mexican planners of the massacre and crucial military support and
diplomatic oversight generously given by the U.S. have also been
systematically overlooked by U.S.-based news media. Meanwhile, Mexican
mainstream media have reluctantly covered the massacre with scores of
articles in recent weeks, but with coverage that has been replete with
apologetics and parroted official aversions.
The moving
religious ceremony in remembrance of the massacre was coupled by the
“National Encuentro Against Impunity,” which continues long-waged
efforts at holding the intellectual authors of the massacre accountable
for their actions. Survivors of the massacre have consistently released
scathing critiques of the Mexican government, including the most recent
one, which was given before this year’s commemoration:
Australian Gitmo DetaineeFfreed
Press TV December 29, 2007
An
Australian who became the first person convicted at an American war
crimes trial since World War II has been freed from prison.
David
Hicks was captured with Taliban forces in Afghanistan in 2001 and
pleaded guilty in March to providing material support to al-Qaeda.
The 32-year-old was released from the maximum security prison at
Yalata in his home town of Adelaide on Saturday, after completing a
nine-month sentence struck under a plea deal that followed more than
five years' detention at Guantanamo Bay without a trial.
In a statement released by his lawyer he thanked supporters
including rights activists and anti-torture groups who helped get him
out of Guantanamo Bay, stressing that "I will not forget, or let you
down."
'Everyday Poetry' Honors Dirty War Dead
Associated Press December 29, 2007
BUENOS AIRES, Argentina (AP) — Thousands of dissidents silenced
under Argentina's military dictatorship — tortured, executed and made
to "disappear" in the so-called Dirty War against dissent — are gaining
new voice through poetry.
A new book, "Poesia Diaria" ("Everyday
Poetry"), tells the victims' story through the memories and verse of
families who lost sons and daughters, sisters and brothers, husbands
and wives. It comes as Argentines re-examine their country's dark past
and push for trials of those who committed human rights abuses during
the 1976-1983 junta.
For years, newspapers in this South American
nation have published small notices, called "recordatorios" in Spanish,
on the anniversaries of disappearances: poems and messages to the dead
that Virginia Giannoni, the book's editor, said chilled her to the bone.
"To
find such intimate letters published in a public space is so jarring,"
Giannoni said. "Many of these are beautiful texts that give voice to
deep feelings. They express a need not only to remember family members,
friends and colleagues who have been made to 'disappear' but to bear
witness to their lives."
Giannoni first created a traveling wall
of "death tributes" that toured San Diego, Toronto, Medellin, Colombia,
and other cities. She then collected in "Poesia Diaria" about 200 of
the more than 1,500 poems that had been published in newspapers.
Most
are just a few lines saved from yellowed newsprint and old photocopies.
Some recall the victims as children or moments together. Others retell
their kidnappings or express longing to be reunited.
Reports: Italy Seeks 140 Suspects in South America's Dirty War
International Herald Tribune December 29, 2007
ROME:
Italian police made one arrest Monday as prosecutors issued warrants
for 140 former South American leaders and officials accused of being
behind a region-wide crackdown on dissent in the 1970s and 1980s, news
reports said.
Police in the southern city of Salerno arrested Nestor Jorge
Fernandez Troccoli, a former naval intelligence officer in Uruguay, as
part of an investigation into the kidnapping and murder of Italian and
non-Italian opponents of South America's military dictatorships, the
news agencies ANSA and Apcom reported.
Prosecutors in Rome issued warrants for the arrests of 140 officials
who worked for the military dictatorships or the secret services of
Chile, Uruguay, Argentina, Brazil, Bolivia and Paraguay, Apcom reported.
The suspects are under investigation for murder and kidnapping, and
include Argentina's former junta leader Jorge Videla and Uruguay's
former dictator Juan Bordaberry, ANSA said.
Phones were not answered Monday evening at the offices of Rome prosecutors, and police in Salerno could not confirm the reports.
Pakistan in Turmoil after Benazir Bhutto’s Assassination
Democracy Now December 28, 2007
Hundreds and thousands of Pakistanis attend the funeral of former
Pakistani Prime Minister Benazir Bhutto.
Pakistan’s political future
remains unclear and riots erupted as news of Bhutto’s assassination
spread across the country. Pakistani President Pervez Musharraf has
blamed Islamic militants for carrying out the assassination, but
several associates of Bhutto have accused Musharraf himself of having a
role.
In an email sent to a confidant in the US two months ago, Benazir
Bhutto wrote that Musharraf should be held “responsible” if she was
assassinated, because his government did not do enough to provide for
her security.
Worthy and Unworthy Victims
Counter Punch December 28, 2007
The U.S. delivered an early Christmas
present to the people of Iraq this year in the form of logistical
support for Turkey's war against the Kurds.
The Turkish government
has succeeded Saddam Hussein as the primary oppressor of the
Kurdish people, and it undertook its most recent round of U.S.
supported attacks this last week with a renewed round of bombing
of Kurdish areas in Northern Iraq. U.S. support for the Turkish
campaign has been justified under the rubric of fighting terrorism,
as Turkish officials claimed the December 23rd bombing targeted
only Kurdish secessionist rebels, and resulted in no civilian
deaths.
EGYPT: U.S. Congress Conditions Aid on Border Containment
IPS News December 27, 2007
Last week, both houses of U.S. Congress agreed
to withhold 100 million dollars in financial assistance to Egypt
following Israeli claims that Egyptian authorities were failing to
prevent weapons smuggling to the Gaza Strip. Cairo, for its part,
denounced the decision, while local political analysts saw the move as
a heavy-handed pressure tactic on the part of Washington's pro-Israel
lobby.
"U.S. financial aid to Egypt has always been
subject to pressure by the Israeli lobby," Mohamed Abu al-Hadid,
political analyst and head of state-owned print house Dar al-Tahrir,
which publishes prominent daily al Gomhouriya, told IPS. "The decision
violates Egyptian sovereignty -- and dignity -- and requires an
unequivocal response."
Egypt normally receives 1.7 billion dollars of U.S. financial
aid annually, making it the second largest recipient of U.S. largesse
after Israel, which receives 3 billion dollars a year in military
assistance.
The congressional decision came in response to longstanding Israeli
claims that Egypt was not doing enough to stop weapons smuggling from
Egypt to the Gaza Strip. The new bill also alludes to Egypt's spotty
record vis-à-vis police torture, and the lack of judicial independence.
Navy JAG Resigns Over Torture Issue
Military.Com December 27, 2007
"It was with sadness that I signed my name this grey morning to a
letter resigning my commission in the U.S. Navy," wrote Gig Harbor,
Wash., resident and attorney-at-law Andrew Williams in a letter to The
Peninsula Gateway last week. "There was a time when I served with pride
... Sadly, no more."
Williams' sadness stems from the recent CIA videotape scandal in
which tapes showing secret interrogations of two Al Qaeda operatives
were destroyed.
The tapes may have contained evidence that the U.S. government used
a type of torture known as waterboarding to obtain information from
suspected terrorists.
Torture, including water-boarding, is prohibited under the treaties of the Geneva Convention.
It was in the much-publicized interview two weeks ago between Sen.
Lindsey Graham (R-South Carolina) and Brig. Gen. Thomas Hartmann, who
is the chief legal adviser at the Pentagon's Office of Military
Commissions, that led Williams to resign.
Jordan Urged to Adopt Prison Reforms
Arab News December 26, 2007
Jordan’s National Center for Human Rights (NCHR) yesterday called on
the government to take effective measures to improve conditions in the
country’s prisons.
In its fifth report on the situation of human
rights in the kingdom, the NCHR expressed dissatisfaction with the
utter disregard for the center’s reports on correcting the prison
system shown by government agencies.
The report said that all
efforts aimed at reforming prisons would face setbacks unless they were
coordinated under a national strategy that “takes into consideration”
the legislative and social aspects of criminal justice in the kingdom
and relevant international standards.”
The NCHR mentioned a
number of shortcomings, including torture, lack of communication with
the outside world, low-quality infrastructure, crowding, improper
medical care, deteriorating educational programs and lack of social and
psychiatric services.
It also criticized the arbitrary use of powers by governors to detain people.
RenditionLawsuit Targets Aerospace Giant Boeing
The Register December 26, 2007
Alone, in the middle of the night and nowhere, Khaled El-Masri
discovered himself once again to be a free man. He had been left on a
hilltop in Albania by his CIA captors, after nearly six months of
torture in squalid detention at one of the CIA's black site prisons.
The German citizen eventually sued the CIA and lost after the CIA
invoked the state secrets privilege in its own defense. But a new
rendition case - this time targeting American aerospace powerhouse
Boeing - is now working its way through a rather more sympathetic
branch of the American legal system.
Last week, in the relatively liberal Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals, the American Civil Liberties Union filed
a scathing indictment of both the Boeing subsidiary that milked the
rendition flights for all they were worth, and the Bush
administration's neurotic attempts to cloak even private litigants
behind the state secrets doctrine.
The state secrets doctrine is an evidentiary privilege invoked by
the government in the interests of national security, and El-Masri
found himself in the Fourth Circuit Court of Appeals, which encompasses
most of the American south and is the most conservative appellate
circuit in the United States. Perhaps not surprisingly, the Fourth
Circuit, tortured in its own intellectually paranoid way, took a
traditionally narrow evidentiary privilege and expanded it beyond all
recognition, effectively rendering the El-Masri case non-justiciable. The Supreme Court declined to hear his appeal.
Another Lawyer Tortured in Pakistan
UPI Asia OnLine December 25, 2007
As the Muslim world celebrated Eid and the Western world celebrates
Christmas, Pakistan's forcibly ousted chief justice, Iftehkar
Chowdhury, is being treated as a prisoner. Held under house arrest, he
has not been allowed even to visit the mosque to perform his religious
duties.
Chowdhury Aitezaz Ahsan, a well-known senior lawyer, was severely
beaten and taken away in a car when he was on his way to meet the
former chief justice, who is his client. The lawyer, now severely
injured, is also under house arrest. He has not committed any crime
other than to offend the military regime lead by President Pervez
Musharraf by being the legal representative for the chief justice, who
has become Pakistan's symbol for the struggle for the independence of
the judiciary.
After Munir Malik, who was severely beaten and poisoned by the military
and held in prison, Ahsan became president of the Supreme Court Bar
Association. This is therefore the second attempt by Musharraf to crush
the Supreme Court lawyers of Pakistan by torture. The resilience of the
top-most lawyers of the country has been a thorn in the side of the
military regime. The regime is aware that the will of these lawyers to
uphold the law and to protect the independent judicial institutions
challenges its very existence.
Nkunda Still Using Child Soldiers in Kivu
Nation Media Group Ltd. December 24, 2007
Insurgents
loyal to dissident Gen Laurent
Nkunda, who are fighting government
troops in North Kivu, eastern
Democratic Republic of Congo,
are still recruiting children
into their ranks.
This
is going on even as serious human-rights
violations, including some committed
by agents of the state, are rife
in the region, according to the
UN Mission in Congo (Monuc).
“Forced
recruitment [of children] takes
place outside schools; in the
village of Burungu, tudents returned
to their homes were rounded up,
causing many to flee into the
bush,” said Kemal Saiki, Monuc’s
spokesman.
In
some cases, demobilised, underage
former fighters are being re-recruited,
according to the spokesman, who
cited the case of 20 children
who had rejoined Gen Nkunda’s
ranks in the North Kivu village
of Kirambu.
He
expressed concern over cases of
serious abuses, including rape,
summary executions, torture, inhumane
and degrading treatment and arbitrary
arrests that continue to be reported
every day throughout the country,
despite an improvement in the
overall human-rights record since
the signing in 2003 of a peace
agreement designed to end civil
war in DRC.
“Every
month, hundreds of women and girls
continue to be victims of rape
and other forms of sexual violence
in all provinces of the DRC,”
said Mr Saiki.
“The
main perpetrators of human- rights
abuses are no longer armed groups
[non-government forces], but mainly
agents of the state, whose mandate
is to ensure the protection of
the Congolese population,” he
added.
Fragile Hicks Faces Torture of Freedom
The Sydney Morning Herald December 24, 2007
DAVID HICKS'S mental condition is so fragile that - only five
days before his scheduled release from jail - he suffers from
agoraphobia and retreats to the kind of solitary confinement he
endured for five years in Guantanamo Bay.
The former Muslim extremist has suffered panic attacks and has
ventured into the sunshine, in the prison yard, only once since his
return to Australia in May this year to serve the balance of his
nine-month sentence at Yatala Labour Prison in Adelaide. He could
not cope and preferred the enclosed prison and artificial lighting,
where he felt more safe.
"He tried to go out but he just said everything closed in on
him," his father, Terry Hicks, told the Herald.
The Somalia Syndrome
Press TV December 24, 2007
(By Noam Chomsky) This poor country keeps taking one blow after another," Peter Goossens
observed two months ago in an interview with The New York Times'
Jeffrey Gettleman. "Ultimately, it will break.
The
country is Somalia, and Goossens directs the World Food Programme,
which is now feeding some 1.2 million people there, 15 per cent of the
population.
This tragic and tortured land is "marching right up to the edge of
a crisis", Goossens said. "Any additional little thing, any little
flood or drought, will push them over."
Somalia, war- and famine-torn, is beset from within and without.
With a vigilance especially stepped up since September 11, the United
States has reformulated its long-standing efforts to control the Horn
of Africa (Djibouti, Ethiopia, Eritrea and Somalia) as a front line in
the "war on terror", and Somalia is at its very tip. The crisis in
Somalia may be regarded partly as collateral damage from that "war on
terror" and the geopolitical concerns reframed in these terms.
As Somalia sinks deeper into chaos, members of the African Union
have sent small peacekeeping forces there, and pledged to send more if
funding is made available. But they are unlikely to do so, "because
there is no peace to keep (in Somalia) in the first place," Richard
Cornwell, of the Institute for Security Studies in South Africa, told
Scott Baldauf and Alexis Okeowo of The Christian Science Monitor in
May.
CHILE COURT CLOSES ESMERALDA TORTURE INVESTIGATION
The Santiago Times December 24, 2007
The Valparaíso Court of Appeals has given Judge Eliana Quezada until
Dec. 31 to complete her investigation into torture onboard the
“Esmeralda,” despite the fact that she has not finished her enquiries.
The Esmeralda is the Chilean Navy’s emblematic ship, serving as a
training vessel for sailors and as a “floating embassy” for the
country. But it also holds a dark secret: it served as a detention and
torture center in the aftermath of Gen. Augusto Pinochet’s 1973
military coup. The Chilean Navy has always been reluctant to admit to
human rights abuses onboard its iconic “White Lady,” as the ship is
also known.
The investigation into torture on board has focused particularly on the
case of Miguel Woodward, a British-Chilean priest who was tortured and
killed on the vessel shortly after the coup. Just last Wednesday Judge
Quezada boarded the Esmeralda together with relatives of Mr. Woodward
and other victims of abuse. Their aim was to determine the location of
former torture chambers and prison cells.
Menchu Criticizes Guatemalan High Court
Associated Press December 22, 2007
Nobel Peace Prize laureate Rigoberta Menchu lashed out Monday
against a Guatemalan high court decision not to arrest or extradite
former military officers accused of genocide, torture and terrorism
committed at the height of Guatemala's civil war.
Menchu, an
Indian rights activist, filed charges in Spain against former officials
allegedly involved in such abuses, including a 1980 raid that left her
father and other protesters at Spain's embassy in Guatemala dead.
A
Spanish Judge agreed to issue arrest and extradition warrants for
former dictator Efrain Rios Montt and other ex-leaders, but Guatemala's
high court on Dec. 12 declined to honor his order.
Spain's
constitutional court in 2005 ruled that its tribunals can hear crimes
against humanity cases even when Spanish citizens are not among those
affected.
"This only confirms the reason why I did not trust the
Guatemalan justice system and filed the complaint in Spain in 1999,"
Menchu said of the ruling, which was handed down last week but not
announced until Monday.
Thousands in U.K. Face Deportation to DRC
United Press International, Inc. December 22, 2007
A British immigration ruling could lead to
thousands of failed Congolese asylum-seekers being forcibly deported
back to their home country.
The ruling in the case of a woman
known only as "BK" says insubstantial evidence was present for her to
appeal the rejection of her asylum application, The Independent
reported Thursday.
It was decided after a judicial review
earlier this year all deportations to the Democratic Republic of Congo
would be put on hold until BK's case was resolved. The appeal rejection
means thousands are now at risk of deportation to the country, where
they claim rape, torture and possibly death await them.
Torture Chamber Found North of Baghdad
International Herald Tribune December 21, 2007
Blood-splotches on walls, chains hanging from a ceiling and swords
found on the killing floor of a suspected al-Qaida in Iraq torture
chamber are the latest horrors discovered by U.S. soldiers pushing into
a province that remains an extremist stronghold.
Scrawled in white paint on one wall above a bed used for torture was
a Quranic phrase normally used to welcome a guest, but given the
horrific surroundings, conveyed only sadistic mockery: "Come in, you
are safe" was the message in Arabic.
The filthy dirt floor of the torture complex — found near nine mass
graves containing the remains of 26 people — was littered with food
wrappers, plastic soda bottles and electric cables that snaked to a
metal bed frame, presumably where detainees were shocked.
Villagers nearby knew about the torture complex, but did not tell
authorities as they were afraid of reprisals from the militants, a
local policeman on Thursday told The Associated Press on condition of
anonymity as he was afraid of being targeted by extremists. He said he
thought the chamber had been used for a year.
U.S.'s Dirty Work Behind Pakistani Political Crisis?
Mother Jones December 21, 2007
The New York Times reports today that Pervez Musharraf is
acting quickly to release detainees who were held and interrogated with
no paper trail or legal protections to get rid of evidence of the
secret program. Detainees have been warned not to talk about their
experiences, and in at least one case, an Arab man was released in
Gaza, a direly impoverished region surrounded on all sides by Israel.
The Times article
reveals that much of the ongoing political struggle in Pakistan stems
from conflicts about the detention program. The political conflict
began, you may remember, as a power struggle between Musharraf and
Iftikar Chaudhry, the chief justice of the Supreme Court—who, in turns
out, was attempting to force the dictator to bring the detainees into
the court system. Musharraf subsequently removed Chaudhry, and lawyers
took to the streets—lawyers who, in some cases, were attempting to
represent the disappeared suspects.
South Sudan Dangers Still Lurking
BBC News December 21, 2007
Sudan's former southern rebels have said they will
rejoin the national coalition government, ending one of the biggest
political crises to hit the country since the end of a two-decade civil
war. However, Sudan specialist Gill Lusk writes that a return to war
remains a possibility.
The crisis over the 2005 peace deal may have been
staved off in the short term - but in the longer term it may well
decide the future of the Sudan.
This is far more than a disagreement over the details of
implementation between the two signatories to the January 2005
agreement: the dominant party, the National Congress (NC, still widely
known as the National Islamic Front), and the Sudan People's Liberation
Movement/Army (SPLM/A).
The importance of the crisis is quite simply because the
SPLM/A wants the Comprehensive Peace Agreement to succeed and the NC
wants it to fail.
Bush Sidesteps 'Torture Tape' Issue
Al Jazeera and Agencies December 19, 2007
George Bush has
refused to comment on his knowledge of interrogation videos and their
destruction by the CIA, arguing that current investigations will get to
the truth.
During an end of
the year news conference on Thursday, the US president was asked about
the tapes, made while al-Qaeda suspects were undergoing so-called harsh
interrogation.
The CIA's destruction
of the tapes is currently being investigated and on Thursday, the House
of Representatives Intelligence Committee subpoenaed the former CIA
official who directed that the tapes be destroyed.
"Until these inquiries are complete, until the oversight's finished, I will be rendering no opinion from the podium," Bush said.
The White House has already denied it misled anyone on who knew about the CIA's action.
The New York Times newspaper
recently reported that at least four White House lawyers had
participated in talks with the CIA between 2003 and 2005 about whether
the tapes should be destroyed.
UK Guantanamo Detainee Near Suicide After Years of Torture, Doctors Warn
Independent News and Media Limited December 18, 2007
A British resident being held in Guantanamo Bay may be close to
suicide after five years of captivity and torture at the hands of the
Americans, the Foreign Secretary David Miliband has been warned in a
medical report sent to the Government this week.
The
report concludes that Binyam Mohamed, from Kensington, west London, is
at the end of his "psychological tether" after guards at the US naval
base in Cuba switched off the water supply to his cell when he began
spreading his own faeces over the walls. Mr Mohamed is one of at least
seven detainees being held at Guantanamo Bay who claim British
residency. Three of the men are expected to be reunited with their
families before Christmas after the Government successfully negotiated
their release. But the Americans have made it clear that Mr Mohamed
must remain in detention to face a military tribunal on charges of
terrorism.
In his letter to Mr Miliband, Clive Stafford Smith, the legal
director of the UK-based Reprieve representing Mr Mohamed, now 29,
calls for an "urgent humanitarian intervention" in his case.
Mr Stafford Smith said: "The urgency is underlined today because Mr
Mohamed has been repeatedly smearing his cell walls with faeces. This
is not because Mr Mohamed is trying to violate the rules (as the US
military apparently believes), but because of his mental instability.
The military's response is to cut the water to his cell off,
compounding an obvious health hazard."
Jilin Prison Uses 'Death Beds' to Torture Falun Gong Practitioners
The Epoch USA, Inc. December 18, 2007
The death bed, a torture method originating from Jilin Prison, is
frequently used to torture imprisoned Falun Gong practitioners at the
Jilin Prison and Jilin Province Women's Prison, also known as Heizuizi
Women's Prison, in Changchun City. Similar to the ancient, cruel
punishment of being drawn and quartered, many Falun Gong practitioners
have been tortured to death this way.
According to a Clearwisdom.net report on December 11, 2007,
the death bed involves piecing together two twin-size beds and
handcuffing or tying a practitioner's hands and feet onto the four
opposite corners of the two beds. After the practitioner is tied up,
the beds are moved in opposite directions and bricks are inserted
between the two beds. Each brick adds severe pain and injury.
Once tied to the death bed, the victim is unable to move her
hands and legs. The beds can be pulled in various directions to cause
additional pain and injury throughout the body. Blood circulation from
the ankles and wrists are cut off as the muscles tear and bones break.
Some practitioners were tortured to the point of dementia while others
left handicapped.
Angolan Fears DeathIif Deported; Officials Don't Believe Story
Houston Chronicle - (Cron.com) December 18, 2007
When she first met Angolan immigrant Isaac Manuel, Paula Nourse did
not know his story of torture and tragedy, but she sensed something
different about him — something in his eyes.
"What I did
know was, clearly he was an individual who suffered greatly, but he
never said it," recalled the Dallas businesswoman. "What he wanted most
in life was to bring medical care and clean water to his village. He
was extremely driven."
Then, on Nov. 14, Manuel disappeared.
His
friends soon learned he had been detained by U.S. immigration
officials. They read his lengthy court file detailing terrifying events
in Angola and a five-year battle to avoid deportation for fear he'd be
killed in his home country for his Christian beliefs. They read
Manuel's account of how he was tortured, his relatives were murdered,
his wife was raped and how he lost contact with family members.
Manuel's
friends say he should be offered the political asylum often granted to
refugees fleeing persecution because of race, religion or nationality.
But U.S. officials have found his story inconsistent and implausible,
and plan to deport him.
"He had a final order of
deportation issued by a federal immigration judge. He had ignored the
judge's order, and was picked up by ICE's Fugitive Operations Team,"
said Carl Rusnok, a spokesman for U.S. Immigration and Customs
Enforcement.
Last year, the country granted asylum to
26,113 people, according to Homeland Security Department statistics. A
total of 5,252 asylum seekers claimed to have credible fear of
persecution last year. Of those, 3,182 established credible fear and
1,062 did not. The remaining claims were withdrawn.
ARGENTINA: Human Rights Trials Dangerous for Witnesses and Accused Alike
IPS - Inter Press Service December 18, 2007
The poisoning death of an Argentine coast guard officer who was expected to be
convicted of crimes against humanity Friday once again highlighted the lack of
guarantees for moving ahead with human rights trials in
Argentina.
Since the 2005 repeal of the two amnesty laws that let
human rights violators from the 1976-1983 dictatorship off the hook, only four
trials have been held -- and there have already been two victims.
The
first was Jorge Julio López, a key witness in one of the trials, who went
missing 15 months ago.
The second was Héctor Febres, who was found dead
in his cell on Dec. 10, just four days before he was to face a verdict for
torture and forced disappearance committed at the dictatorship’s most notorious
torture centre, the Navy School of Mechanics (ESMA). The autopsy results
showed he had ingested large amounts of cyanide. His wife and two grown
children were arrested Friday. They had eaten dinner with him the night before
his body was found. Two of the officers guarding him had been arrested earlier.
"We had hoped that Febres would talk today (Friday) before the sentence
was handed down, and our doubt is whether he might have been killed because of
that," Luis Bonomi, one of the lawyers for the plaintiffs in the trial, told
IPS.
Bonomi did not rule out the possibility of suicide. But in any case, he
considered the death to be the responsibility of the coast guard, which was
holding Febres in custody, the federal justice system, and the Interior
Ministry, for failing to provide the necessary safeguards and protection.
Víctor Basterra, a witness who testified in the trial, warned that
Febres may have been killed to silence him, because the officer could have
provided information on the fate of the victims of forced disappearance and the
stolen babies of political prisoners. Basterra also said there are groups that
want to keep the human rights cases from being reopened.
Lawyers
representing survivors and families of victims, and human rights organisations,
have been unsuccessfully demanding witness protection measures and simplified,
unified trials covering entire detention centres in order to avoid summoning the
same victims of human rights abuses to testify over and over again in multiple
cases.
House Speaker Undermines Democrats' Fight Against Torture
The Baltimore Sun December 17, 2007
Few serious observers of Congress would deny that
Speaker Nancy Pelosi has been a disappointing leader for House
Democrats. But now she appears to be something more troubling: a
serious hindrance to the fight against the use of crude and
objectionable torture techniques.
Democrats, and Republicans with a conscience, have gotten a good deal
of traction in recent months in their battle to identify the use by
U.S. interrogators of waterboarding - a technique that simulates
drowning in order to cause extreme mental distress to prisoners - as
what it is: torture. Arizona Sen. John McCain, a GOP presidential
contender, has been particularly powerful in his denunciations of this
barbarous endeavor.
Now, however, comes the news that Ms. Pelosi knew as early as 2002 that
the United States was using waterboarding and other torture techniques
and, far from objecting, appears to have cheered on the use of such
tactics.
The Washington Post reported last week that Ms. Pelosi, who was then a
senior member of the House Intelligence Committee, was informed by CIA
officials at a secret briefing in September 2002 that waterboarding and
other forms of torture were being used on suspected al-Qaida operatives.
Defense inTorture Case Against Charles Taylor's Son Faces Unusual Problems in Africa
International Herald Tribune December 17, 2007
Witnesses are difficult or impossible to find, some having moved to
remote African villages accessible only by muddy roads rarely patrolled
by police. Many survivors of Liberia's bloody civil war who witnessed
acts of torture are reluctant to talk to anyone about what happened,
let alone a defense lawyer for the notorious son of former Liberian
President Charles Taylor.
Then there are the language and cultural barriers. These and other
problems have forced a delay until spring in the trial in Miami federal
court of Taylor's son Charles McArthur Emmanuel, or Chuckie Taylor, the
first person to be prosecuted under a law making it a crime for a U.S.
citizen to commit torture or war crimes overseas.
People who have dealt with similar issues in war-torn western Africa
say the difficulties are not surprising, given rampant official
corruption and an almost complete lack of functional government
institutions.
"It will take a generation for Sierra Leone and Liberia to recover
from the horrors that Charles Taylor and his henchmen, including
Chuckie, have wrought on their fellow man," said David Crane, a law
professor at Syracuse University in New York and former chief
prosecutor for the United Nations Special Court for Sierra Leone.
Emmanuel, 30, is charged in an eight-count indictment with
involvement in horrific acts of torture and killings from spring 1999
to late 2002 as head of the Anti-Terrorist Unit — also called the Demon
Forces — during his father's presidency. Emmanuel was born in Boston to
an ex-girlfriend of Taylor, who studied economics at Bentley College
there.
Judge Told Not to Ask About Tapes
The Canberra Times December 17, 2007
The controversy over destroyed CIA interrogation tapes is turning into
a battle involving the courts, the US Congress and the White House,
with the Administration of President GeorgeW.Bush telling its
constitutional co-equals to stay out of the investigation.
The Justice Department says it needs time and the freedom to
investigate the destruction of hundreds of hours of recordings of two
suspected terrorists.
After Attorney-General Michael Mukasey refused congressional demands
for information on Saturday, the Justice Department filed late-night
court documents urging a federal judge not to begin his own inquiry.
The Administration argued it was not obligated to preserve the tapes
and told US District Judge Henry Kennedy that demanding information
about them "could potentially complicate the ongoing efforts to arrive
at a full factual understanding of the matter".
The documents
represent the first time the Government has addressed the issue in
court. In the papers, acting Assistant Attorney-General Jeffrey
Bucholtz said Mr Kennedy lacked jurisdiction and he expressed concern
that the judge might order CIA officials to testify.
MukaseySilent in CIA Tape Case
BBC News December 16, 2007
The US attorney general has refused to tell Congress about a government probe into why the CIA destroyed recordings of interrogations of terror suspects.
Michael Mukasey said giving details might suggest that political pressure could sway law enforcement decisions.
The tapes were said to show techniques such as water-boarding, which simulates drowning. The CIA denies torture.
Meanwhile, Republican Senators have blocked a bill restricting the interrogation methods the CIA can use.
The House of Representatives passed the bill on Thursday before passing it to the Senate.
Among its provisions the bill would restrict the use of water-boarding, regarded as a form of torture by many human rights advocates.
Palestinian Doctor Sues Libyan Leader for Torture Over AIDS Case
AFP News December 14, 2007
The Palestinian-born doctor held with five Bulgarian nurses in a
Libyan prison for over eight years said Thursday that he was suing
Libyan leader Moamer Kadhafi for torture.
Ashraf Juma Hajuj told
AFP that his lawyer Francois Cantier, of the pro bono organisation
Lawyers Without Borders, had filed a lawsuit Wednesday in Paris against
Kadhafi, five police officers and a doctor, accusing them of torture.
"France should arrest that dictator," he said.
The
Libyan leader arrived Monday on a five-day official visit to Paris,
during which he met with French President Nicolas Sarkozy, sparking
fierce criticism from human rights groups.
Sarkozy and former
first lady Cecilia Sarkozy were seen to play a crucial part in securing
the release in late July of Hajuj and five Bulgarian nurses, who had
been sentenced to death and had spent over eight years in a Libyan jail
for allegedly infecting over 400 Libyan children with AIDS.
The
six medics, who always maintained their innocence, said they were
subjected to torture, including beatings, electric shocks, food and
sleep deprivation, and even sexual abuse, in order to confess to their
alleged crime.
"It is not a matter of revenge. I need justice. They must pay for what they did," Hajuj told AFP.
Chicago City Council Postpones Police Torture Settlement
Chicago Tribune December 14, 2007
A settlement totaling nearly $20 million with four alleged victims of
police torture hit a roadblock Wednesday, but the city's top lawyer
said she hoped it would be removed in time for City Council approval of
the long-awaited deal next month.
Last-minute legal glitches surfaced in settlements with former Death
Row inmates Stanley Howard and Aaron Patterson, said Corporation
Counsel Mara Georges. Patterson's attorney threatened to walk away from
his part of the deal, something that brought with it the risk of a
lengthy delay settling all four cases.
Aldermen also put off considering a proposal to require police officers
involved in shootings to submit to post-incident alcohol testing after
questions surfaced about its legality.
Washington Diary: Water Torture
BBC News December 13, 2007
The first time I came across the concept of water-boarding was in Cambodia in 1996.
I was on a visit to Tuol Sleng, the school that had been
turned into a concentration and liquidation camp by the Khmer Rouge in
the 1970s.
It was situated, oddly, right in the heart of the capital, Phnom Phen.
I met one of the seven people - out of about 23,000 - known to have left the camp alive.
He was a sculptor and he was saved because he was particularly good at depicting the smile of Brother Number One, Pol Pot.
He took me on a tour of the camp, where most of his friends and seven members of his family were butchered.
In one room, there was a small painting, barely noticeable amongst all the skulls, bones, chains and hammers.
It was a naive drawing of a man strapped to a plank, a
board, if you like, with another man pouring water over his face with a
metal watering can. The kind you use for watering flowers.
The face of the man lying down was covered in a blue
cloth. The painting looked fairly comical, as if someone was irrigating
a human face.
"Water torture," my friend explained. "You think you die."
Commentary: Torture, Bloodshed and Ethnic Exclusion in Guyana
Caribbean Net News December 13, 2007
The history of civilization is mottled with catastrophes and carnages
which have placed entire peoples in peril of extinction. Slavery or the
"Maafa" is the most evil atrocity known to man. Scholars of African
history instruct that 50 to 100 million Africans were killed or
abducted in the slave trade; the majority being men.
This
decimation of the African civilization was a manifestation of
inhumanity and hate; symptoms of which have today burgeoned into other
evils. Racism, ethnic cleansing, ethnic torture and genocide have
gained primacy as apoplectic winds of hate fuel a recycling of history.
itler's odium of the Jewish people led to a pogrom. Nazi Gestapo squads
killed 6 million Jews in the Holocaust. On Kristallnacht (crystal
night) , November 9-10, 1938, 30,000 Jewish men in Germany and Austria
were eliminated.
Besides, the Ottoman Empire (modern Turkey),
from 1915 to 1923, methodically annihilated its Armenian population.
One million people, mostly men, were slaughtered. Hundreds of thousands
were made stateless refugees. By 1923, the Armenian population became
extinct.
Genocidal ethnic cleansing, a corollary of hate, has
been ravaging modern civilization. Ethnic cleansing of the Tutsi tribe,
by Hutu guerrilla terrorists, exploded into genocide in Rwanda .
According to the UN, between April and June 1994, 800,000 Rwandan
Tutsis were massacred. Men were especially targeted for dismemberment
and executions. By 1995, 1.7 million Tutsis were displaced. As it was
in slavery, the world watched on in apathy. It was "just" Africa!
Fujimori Convicted and Sentenced in Illegal Search
Los Angeles Times December 12, 2007
LIMA, PERU -- Former President Alberto Fujimori was convicted of abuse
of power Tuesday and sentenced to six years in prison after a judge
found him responsible for an illegal search at the home of the wife of
his onetime intelligence chief. It was the first conviction in a series of criminal charges Fujimori has faced since being extradited from Chile in September.
Human rights advocates have hailed the multiple cases against Fujimori
as blows against impunity. But supporters of the ex-president call him
the victim of political persecution. The abuse of power charge is among the least serious faced by Fujimori, but his conviction was a setback for the ex-president.
His daughter, Keiko Fujimori, a popular congresswoman, was visibly upset afterward, and called the decision "unjust."
However,
she added that her father had conceded the "irregularity" of the
disputed search, which took place in the waning, convulsive days of his
administration. The ex-president, whose legal team had hoped for
a suspended sentence, indicated that he would file a partial appeal of
the conviction.
The conviction came a day after Fujimori stunned
Peruvians with an emotional outburst in a separate, far more serious,
case in which he stands accused of dispatching death squads to kill 25
suspected leftists. The ex-president faces a 30-year prison term in
that case.
Gambia: Jammeh's Role On The Torture And Subsequent Demise Of EX-Perm Sec
All Africa.Com December 12, 2007
Few years ago, the late Lamin Sanneh was running
around addressing APRC Party functions. I remember Lamin addressing a
group of APRC supporters in Basse, where he talked about his Department
of State's beautiful plans to improve the road network in that
locality. Lang was President Jammeh's friend. For some reasons, the
President started withdrawing himself from Lang. He later ordered for
his arrest and subsequent prosecution. Lang was arrested on his way
back from a trip in Dakar Senegal. He was detained for five months at
the Mile Two Prisons on allegations of economic crimes. While at the
Mile Two, Lang was exposed to systematic torture by the State Guards
led by the late Musa Jammeh. The President ordered for his torture and
imprisonment.
Acting out of fear and
cowardice, the President was made to believe that Lang was networking
with Gambian dissidents in Dakar. He also believe that Lang was
supplying classified state secrets to the Wade Government. His Dakar
visit was a subject of investigation at the NIA. The Agency interviewed
him about his Dakar trip, among other national security matters.
Fugitive Ndure Cham's name featured on the interrogation process.
UNHCR Meets 2007 Resettlement Referral Target for Iraqi Refugees
Relief Web December 12, 2007
GENEVA -- The UN refugee agency on Tuesday announced that it
had exceeded its target of 20,000 Iraqi refugee resettlement referrals
for 2007. By December 7, UNHCR had transferred the files of 20,472 of
the most vulnerable Iraqi refugees for consideration by 16 resettlement
countries, including the United States, Australia, Canada, Sweden, New
Zealand, Ireland, Brazil, Chile, Finland, Norway, Denmark, the United
Kingdom, Netherlands, Ireland, Spain and Germany.
A total of 14,798 files have been submitted to the United
States, while Australia (1,796), Canada (1,512), Sweden (938) and New
Zealand (266) are also among the top five receiving countries.
"With three weeks to go before the end of the year, we are,
however, extremely concerned about the low rate of departures to date,"
said Vincent Cochetel, Deputy Director of UNHCR's Division of
International Protection.
Damning Report Details Rights Abuses in Zimbabwe
Afriquenligne December 12, 2007
Cape Town, South Africa - A group of foreign doctors and researchers, wh
o secretly travelled to Zimbabwe earlier this year, has presented the
report on the never ending cycle of torture and human rights abuses in
the Southern Afric a n nation, PANA reported Wednesday.
The report, presented by the Open Society Initiative for Southern
Africa, the O pen Society Institute, and the Bellevue/NYU programme for
survivors of torture 1 0 December 2007, to coincide with the World
Human Rights Day, is entitled: “We H ave Degrees in Violence: A Report
on Torture and Human Rights Abuses in Zimbabwe ' '.
The report raised profound concerns and questions on whether an
election in Zimbabwe in 2008 under the ruling Zanu-PF could possibly be
free and fair.
"The victims of torture and political violence whom we spoke with and
examined in Zimbabwe were not only prominent members of the political
opposition but also low-level political organisers and ordinary citiz
ens," noted Dr. Allen Keller, director of the Bellevue/NYU (New York
Universit y ) programme for survivors of torture and co-author of the
report.
Egypt: Torture and Coerced Confessions Used in High-Profile Terrorism Investigation
Reuters Foundation December 11, 2007
A high-profile terrorism case announced by the Egyptian authorities in
2006 was likely based on torture and false confessions, Human Rights
Watch said in a report released today. The 74-page report
"Anatomy of a State Security Case: The 'Victorious Sect' Arrests,"
examines the case of the so-called Victorious Sect, a group of 22 young
Egyptians charged with plotting to carry out violent attacks on
tourists and other civilian targets in Cairo.
Human Rights
Watch found that the Egyptian authorities had little or no evidence for
their striking allegations. Instead, the evidence indicates that
Egypt's State Security Investigations (SSI), the country's domestic
intelligence agency, subjected the detainees to torture and other
serious abuses. And, although government prosecutors in mid-2006
dismissed all charges against the 22 detainees, many remain in custody
nearly two years after their arrest.
Argentinian Torture Suspect Found Dead in Cell
Radio Netherlands Worldwide December 11, 2007
Buenos Aires (11 December) - In Argentina, a former navy officer Hector
Fébres has been found dead in his prison cell. He was one of the first
people to be tried for torture during Argentina's dirty war between
1976 and 1983.
The
navy officer was accused of torturing four prisoners. He was one of the
leaders of a navy school, where 5,000 political prisoners were
tortured. It is unclear how the 66-year-old suspect died. The prosecution had demanded 25 years in prison and the judge was due to pass sentence on Friday.
In
her inauguration speech Argentina's new president Cristina Kirchner
urged haste with the trials against the perpetrators of the military
dictatorship's human rights violations.
Jamiri Lawyer Believes ex-Basilan Mayor's Torture Claim
ABS-CBN News On-line December 11, 2007
A member of the Integrated Bar of the Philippines (IBP) on Tuesday said
he is willing to testify in court to belie former Tuburan, Basilan
Hajaron Jamiron's claim that policemen tortured him into signing an
affidavit that linked three Basilan politicians in the bombing at the
House of Representatives on November 13.
"If I will be asked as witness, I’m
duty-bound to tell the truth," said lawyer Confesor Sansano, IBP-Quezon
City member and Jamiri's original lawyer.
"I maintain the integrity and regularity of the taking of the two statements of Jamiri," he added.
The lawyer made the statement at the
office of Senior Superintendent Asher Dolina, chief of the Criminal
Investigation and Detection Group-National Capital Region (CIDG-NCR)
chief, in Camp Crame, Quezon City. Sansano said that before Jamiri made his
statement on November 20, CIDG-NCR members allowed him and the former
mayor to talk privately.
The lawyer said he asked Jamiri if the
policemen hurt him before deciding to make a statement. He said that he
even asked the former mayor to pull up his shirt to check for torture
marks.
Hill Briefed on Waterboarding in 2002
The Washington Post December 10, 2007
In September 2002, four members of Congress met in secret for a first look at a unique CIA program designed to wring vital information from reticent terrorism
suspects in U.S. custody. For more than an hour, the bipartisan group,
which included current House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.), was given a virtual tour of the CIA's overseas detention
sites and the harsh techniques interrogators had devised to try to make
their prisoners talk.
Among the techniques described, said two officials present, was
waterboarding, a practice that years later would be condemned as
torture by Democrats and some Republicans on Capitol Hill.
But on that day, no objections were raised. Instead, at least two
lawmakers in the room asked the CIA to push harder, two U.S. officials
said.
Rwanda: Genocide Suspects Handled With Kid Gloves, Ibuka Says
All Africa. Com December 10, 2007
Genocide survivors have sharply criticised the
way Gacaca courts are operating, saying they handle suspects with kid
gloves and end up failing to end the culture of impunity.
Theodole
Simburudare, the president of Ibuka, a national Genocide survivors'
umbrella, said on Friday that Gacaca courts render sentences that are
by far less compared to the magnitude of the crimes committed by the
accused.
He was speaking during Ibuka Congress at
Kabusunzu Centre, Kigali, which aimed at examining the achievements,
challenges and the way forward of Gacaca courts.
"We
have observed many problems in the Gacaca process including torture and
death of witnesses, which is perpetrated by Genocide suspects and
sympathisers.
This has stopped many from telling the truth in
Gacaca courts," Simburudare said. He added that survivors have been
told by different people that testifying against those who killed their
families does not solve anything, but only fuels conflicts.
"They
ask them what they are after saying that they want to keep people in
prisons. Survivors go through difficult situations, but despite this,
they have continued to testify in Gacaca (courts)," he decried.
Rape of Nanking Leaves Bitter Taste
The Gazette December 10, 2007
Seventy years after vicious war crimes, the Japanese refuse to acknowledge them. Seventy years ago this month, Japan's imperial army captured the
Chinese capital of Nanking, China, in a curtain-raiser to the Second
World War. With orders to "kill all captives," troops pursued a policy
of "burn all, loot all, kill all."
For six weeks, unobserved by
world media, Japanese machine-gunned or murdered by bayonet an
estimated 70,000 Chinese PoWs, as well as untold thousands of
civilians. Troops raped 20,000 Chinese women and girls, many of whom
they murdered.
Pakistani Detainee Claims He Was Tortured By CIA
DAWN Group of Newspapers December 9, 2007
As a furore over the secret CIA torture tapes destroyed by the agency
becomes more pronounced, a Pakistani detainee has claimed that he was
subjected to “state-sanctioned torture,” the New York Times said on
Sunday.
Majid Khan who lived in Baltimore, Maryland, through his lawyers
claimed he “was subjected to an aggressive CIA detention and
interrogation programme notable for its elaborate planning and ruthless
application of torture”.
The documents also suggest that Mr Khan, and other ‘high-value’
detainees are now being held in a previously undisclosed area of the
Guantanamo prison in Cuba he called Camp 7.
The newspaper said that those detainees included 14 men, some suspected
of being former Al Qaeda officials, who President Bush acknowledged
were held under a secret CIA programme. They were transferred to
military custody at Guantanamo last year. The Times also said that when
asked about Mr Khan’s assertions, Mark Mansfield, a CIA spokesman, said: “The United States does not conduct or condone torture.”
In Arrogant Defense of Torture
The New York Times December 9, 2007
The White House is already complaining about reports that House and
Senate conferees have come to an agreement on an intelligence measure
mandating that all agencies, including the Central Intelligence Agency,
comply with the Army Field Manual’s outlawing of torture. The manual
properly reflects American law by explicitly proscribing the gamut of
torture measures — including waterboarding — that have proved dear to
the heart of administration zealots.
Waterboarding, in which interrogators subject suspects to the grisly
conditions of simulated drowning, is illegal under both federal laws
and international compacts, including the Geneva Conventions. But the
administration has foolishly flouted these laws, which were adopted to
protect American citizens captured overseas, as much as suspects
captured by Americans, from barbaric abuse by interrogators.
The
administration denies it has stooped to torture in intelligence
gathering — despite its post-9/11 record of secret detention programs
and rendition kidnappings that outsource interrogations to governments
known to use torture. The Times reported last week that the C.I.A.
destroyed hundreds of hours of videotapes documenting the interrogation
of two Al Qaeda operatives. Congress must find out what was on those
tapes and who is responsible for their destruction.
Biden Wants Special Counsel in Tape Case
The Washington Post December 9, 2007
A Senate Democratic leader said Sunday the attorney general should
appoint a special counsel to investigate the CIA's destruction of
videotaped interrogations of two suspected terrorists.
Sen. Joe Biden, a Democratic presidential candidate and chairman of
the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, cited Michael Mukasey's refusal
during confirmation hearings in October to describe waterboarding as
torture.
Mukasey's Justice Department and the CIA's internal watchdog announced
Saturday they would conduct a joint inquiry into the matter. That
review will determine whether a full investigation is warranted. "He's
the same guy who couldn't decide whether or not waterboarding was
torture and he's going to be doing this investigation," said Biden, who
noted that he voted against making Mukasey the country's top law
enforcer.
Democrats Want Probe of Tape Destruction
The Washington Post December 8, 2007
Angry congressional Democrats demanded Friday that the Justice
Department investigate why the CIA destroyed videotapes of the
interrogation of two terrorism suspects.
The Senate's No. 2 Democrat, Dick Durbin
of Illinois, called on Attorney General Michael Mukasey to find out
"whether CIA officials who destroyed these videotapes and withheld
information about their existence from official proceedings violated
the law."
What The Tapes Would Have Shown
CBS News December 8, 2007
Yesterday we learned that in 2005, despite earlier warnings from Congress, the White House, and the Justice Department,
the CIA destroyed two videotaped interrogations of al-Qaeda operatives
who had been captured shortly after 9/11. Why? CIA director Michael
Hayden says the tapes were destroyed because of fears that they might
leak and give away the identity of CIA interrogators, but that's an
excuse so thin that I hesitate to even call it laughable. In fact, the
decision was made just as questions were starting to be raised about
the torture of CIA prisoners, and the tapes were almost certainly
destroyed for fear that they'd be subpoenaed and it would become clear
just how harsh our "harsh interrogation" measures really were.
So
what would investigators have seen if they'd had access to the tapes?
One of the captured prisoners was an al-Qaeda operative named Abu
Zubaydah, and it turns out we have a pretty good idea of what the tape
would have shown. First, Spencer Ackerman gives us this from James Risen's State of War:
Risen
charges that Tenet caved to Bush entirely on the torture of al-Qaeda
detainees. After the 2002 capture of Abu Zubaydah, a bin Laden deputy,
failed to yield much information due to his drowsiness from medical
treatment, Bush allegedly told Tenet, "Who authorized putting him on
pain medication?" Not only did Tenet get the message — brutality while
questioning an enemy prisoner was no problem — but Tenet also never
sought explicit White House approval for permissible interrogation
techniques, contributing to what Risen speculates is an effort by
senior officials "to insulate Bush and give him deniability" on torture.
And here is Barton Gellman's gloss of Ron Suskind's The One Percent Doctrine:
Abu Zubaydah, his captors discovered, turned out to be mentally ill and
nothing like the pivotal figure they supposed him to be....Abu Zubaydah
also appeared to know nothing about terrorist operations; rather, he
was al-Qaeda's go-to guy for minor logistics.
[Other unrelated bungling described, all of which is worth clicking the link to read.]
Which
brings us back to the unbalanced Abu Zubaydah. "I said he was
important," Bush reportedly told Tenet at one of their daily meetings.
"You're not going to let me lose face on this, are you?" "No sir, Mr.
President," Tenet replied. Bush "was fixated on how to get Zubaydah to
tell us the truth," Suskind writes, and he asked one briefer, "Do some
of these harsh methods really work?"
Interrogators did their
best to find out, Suskind reports. They strapped Abu Zubaydah to a
water-board, which reproduces the agony of drowning. They threatened
him with certain death. They withheld medication. They bombarded him
with deafening noise and harsh lights, depriving him of sleep. Under
that duress, he began to speak of plots of every variety — against
shopping malls, banks, supermarkets, water systems, nuclear plants,
apartment buildings, the Brooklyn Bridge, the Statue of Liberty. With
each new tale, "thousands of uniformed men and women raced in a panic
to each...target." And so, Suskind writes, "the United States would
torture a mentally disturbed man and then leap, screaming, at every
word he uttered."
CIA Destroyed Videotapes of Al-Qaeda Interrogation: Hayden
AFP December 7, 2007
The CIA admitted Friday it destroyed videotapes of the interrogation
of Al-Qaeda operatives in 2005, defending the controversial move as
necessary to protect CIA staff.
Central Intelligence Agency Chief
General Michael Hayden made the admission as US media headlined the
destruction of two interrogations in 2005 -- at a time when Congress
was probing allegations of torture.
In a statement to CIA staff,
Hayden confirmed press reports that the agency videotaped
interrogations in 2002 and destroyed the tapes three years later but
said the detainees were not subject to illegal abuse.
"The
decision to destroy the tapes was made within CIA itself," said
Hayden's statement issued on Thursday and obtained by AFP on Friday.
"Beyond
their lack of intelligence value -- as the interrogation sessions had
already been exhaustively detailed in written channels -- and the
absence of any legal or internal reason to keep them, the tapes posed a
serious security risk," Hayden said.
"Were they ever to leak,
they would permit identification of your CIA colleagues who had served
in the program, exposing them and their families to retaliation from
Al-Qaeda and its sympathizers," he said.
Hayden did not say how
many detainees were videotaped but alluded to media reports which said
interrogations of at least two Al-Qaeda operatives were videotaped.
The
revelation raises difficult questions for the US administration which
has faced fierce criticism from rights groups over its treatment of
terror suspects. Lawmakers have accused the White House of withholding
information about its interrogations and detention practices.
C.I.A. Was Urged to Keep Interrogation Videotapes
The New York Times December 6, 2007
White House and Justice Department officials, along with senior members of Congress, advised the Central Intelligence Agency. in 2003 against a plan to destroy hundreds of hours of videotapes showing the interrogations of two operatives of Al Qaeda, government officials said Friday.
The chief of the agency’s clandestine service nevertheless ordered
their destruction in November 2005, taking the step without notifying
even the C.I.A.’s own top lawyer, John A. Rizzo, who was angry at the decision, the officials said.
A Key Moment for Justice
The New York Times December 5, 2007
The Supreme Court hears arguments today in a case that offers a chance to
redress an enormous wrong done by President Bush and Congress when they denied
justice to a group of prisoners. It is the latest phase of a battle over whether
detainees held in Guantánamo Bay, Cuba, have the right to bring a habeas corpus
challenge to their confinement.
The narrow legal issues have changed since the
court considered the question last year, but the principle remains the same: The
detainees have a right to have a court determine whether the government has a
valid basis for imprisoning them.
Habeas corpus is an important bulwark against authoritarianism, so vital that
the Constitution expressly protects it. Since the Sept. 11 attacks, however, the
Bush administration has fought to weaken it both for foreigners held by the
United States and for American citizens.
UN Report Finds Sudan Failing to Protect Darfur Civilians from Violence
PR-inside.com News December 5, 2007
GENEVA (AP) - Sudan's government has failed to protect civilians in Darfur from
rape, torture and other forms of violence as required under international law,
according to a report by U.N. investigators.
The 106-page document _ written
by seven U.N. rights experts and made available Tuesday _ details numerous
incidents of civilians being caught up in fighting between
government forces, or government-backed militias, and rebel groups.In one
case, at least 30 civilians died on Oct. 8 when the rebel stronghold of
Muhajiria was attacked by about 900 militias, who were backed by a government
plane that bombed the town's market area, the report said.
The Philippines: Human Rights Situation
Amnesty International.UK December 5, 2007
Amnesty International UK Media Briefing
President Gloria Macapagal Arroyo's UK visit, 5-6 December 2007
Under
President Arroyo's administration, there have been political killings
and enforced disappearances, together with widespread impunity for
perpetrators.
There are also reports of arbitrary arrest and
detention, as well as torture and other ill-treatment within the
criminal justice system and at the hands of the Armed Forces of the
Philippines.
Political killings and impunity
Since
2001 there has been an increase in the number of killings and enforced
disappearances of activists in the Philippines. As part of a national
counter-insurgency policy, the targets of these killings are
predominantly groups allied with legal leftist or left-oriented groups,
community leaders and journalists. The killings are mostly carried out
by unidentified men, who shoot the victims before escaping on
motorcycles. Reports indicate that the Armed Forces of the Philippines
is involved in these killing, which are rarely the subject of thorough
investigations.
Amnesty International is calling on the
Philippine government to put an end to political killings and enforced
disappearances, including by ensuring that perpetrators are held
accountable. In order to prevent further injustice and human rights
violations, Amnesty International is urging the government to ensure
the security of witnesses and their families through an adequate
witness protection programme. The organisation further calls for
scrutiny of the Armed Forces of the Philippines, and its role in human
rights violations.
Torture and ill-treatment
Amnesty
International is concerned at torture and ill-treatment within the
criminal justice system and at the hands of the Armed Forces of the
Philippines. Despite the ratification by the country of the United
Nations Convention against Torture, the revised Penal Code does not
outlaw the crime of torture. Torture often accompanies abductions of
suspected rebels or sympathisers. In addition, reports indicate that
the police often use torture to extract confessions, particularly when
pressured to solve a case quickly or in high-profile cases.
Amnesty
International is calling for the prompt, impartial and effective
investigation of all complaints of the use of torture by official
personnel, and for suspected perpetrators to be brought to justice in
fair trials.
ACLU to Monitor Guantánamo Military Hearing Wednesday
ACLU December 4, 2007
The American Civil Liberties Union will monitor the military commission hearing
of Yemeni national Salim Ahmed Hamdan at Guantánamo Bay on Wednesday. Hamdan,
alleged to have served as a personal driver and bodyguard for Osama bin Laden,
will appear before a U.S. military judge who will determine whether the
commission has the authority to hear Hamdan’s case.
Hamdan is only the third
Guantánamo detainee to face charges before the commissions, which Congress
reinstated in 2006 after the U.S. Supreme Court struck down, in Hamdan’s own
case, the system established by the Bush administration.
Third Uzbekistan 'Torture Death'
BBC News December 3, 2007
A third person has died after being tortured in prison, a human rights organisation in Uzbekistan has said.
Two other such deaths have been reported in the country
in the past month, all linked to the same prison in the eastern town of
Andijan.
There was no reaction from the Uzbek authorities, but they regularly deny any allegation of torture.
Human rights groups say torture is routinely used against political and religious prisoners in Uzbekistan.
The organisation reporting the latest death, the
Initiative Group of Independent Human Rights Defenders of Uzbekistan,
told the BBC Uzbek service the body of the prisoner was returned to the
family in a coffin, which they were told not to open.
Kenya Police Kill 8,000 in 5-year Crackdown on Sect: (Report)
The Jurist December 3, 2007
[JURIST] Some
8,000 Kenyans have been killed over the last five years as a result of
a police crackdown on the outlawed Mungiki sect, according to the Oscar Foundation Free Legal Aid Clinic-Kenya (OFFLACK). In a report [PDF text] issued over the weekend, OFFLACK said:
The Oscar
Foundation has documented eight thousand and forty (8,040) cases of
death by executions and torture perpetuated by state security agents
and another 4070 cases of disappearance where the victims remain
unaccounted for in the period between August 2002 and August 2007.
OFFLACK
currently receives daily reports of between 200 to 400 cases of
torture, extra-judicial executions, arbitrary arrests, and illegal
confinement of young people on the pretext that they belong to the
outlawed Mungiki sect. It was noted that most cases of torture occurred
when officers attempted to extract confessions by force or while
extorting bribes from suspected adherents. Those who refuse to part
with bribes were blindfolded and led away to the killing fields where
they were summarily executed.
The
Oscar Foundation has documented eight thousand and forty (8,040) cases
of death by executions and torture pe
