Guardian: International outcry greets allegations of police abuse
· Ministers launch inquiry after detainees found
· Shia paramilitaries now control force, say Sunnis
Manfred Novak, the UN special envoy on torture, based in Geneva, yesterday called for an independent inquiry. He has received various allegations of torture and degrading treatment by both US and Iraqi forces in Iraq. "That torture is still practised in Iraq after Saddam Hussein is no secret," he said.
Reuters: Iraqi says he was held with hundreds in secret jail
An Iraqi man told on Thursday how he was tortured along with hundreds of other detainees in an Interior Ministry building similar to a secret bunker at the centre of a prisoner abuse scandal.
"There was an average of 800 prisoners at any one time in a building controlled by the Wolf Brigades (Interior Ministry special forces)," the man, who asked that he only be identified by his initials H.H., told Reuters.
"They had lists of people and lists of charges and they tortured people to get confessions."
The Times: On the spot: 'torture prison is tip of the iceberg'
"There is not the same kind of shock and controversy over the discovery of the basement prison in Jadriya as there was over abuse scandal Abu Ghraib, because everyone has known for some time that this has been going on. Everyone knows someone to whom this has happened. "There is more of a sense of relief that it has finally been brought into the open - although people are angry that it has taken so long.
FT: Torture photos fuel scandal of secret Iraqi jail
Graphic photographs of injuries allegedly suffered by detainees in Iraqi custody surfaced today as the government attempted to dismiss international criticism over a secret torture prison.
ICH: Torture Photos gathered from contacts in Iraq
Warning: The pictures are very disturbing and should only be viewed by a mature audience
Friday, November 18, 2005
IRAQ: US WAR CRIMES
Counterpunch: How the Pentagon Justifies Phosphorous Bombs on Fallujah
In Post Saddam Iraq, There are No Civilians
it is important to note how slippery the Pentagon is being about its claim not to have used this dreadful weapon against "civilians."
In a grotesque and blatant war crime, the U.S. began this assault by first encircling Fallujah, and then declaring that it would allow women, children and old people to leave, but not "men and boys of fighting age" (whatever that may be). Several hundred people in a group of families trying to flee the city over the weekend were actually detained, and then, after allowing the women and children to go, U.S. troops tested the men's hands for gunpowder traces. Finding none, they nonetheless sent them back to the doomed city to face their fate.
By trapping as many as 100,000 men and boys in the city before invading it, the U.S., acting for all the world more like a group of Bosnian Serb thugs than like the army of the Free World, has assured that it will be killing many, many civilians, but we won't be hearing much about that. As far as the Pentagon and Centcom in Iraq go, the dead in Fallujah are and will be all rebels. If they die, they must have died fighting.
In Post Saddam Iraq, There are No Civilians
it is important to note how slippery the Pentagon is being about its claim not to have used this dreadful weapon against "civilians."
In a grotesque and blatant war crime, the U.S. began this assault by first encircling Fallujah, and then declaring that it would allow women, children and old people to leave, but not "men and boys of fighting age" (whatever that may be). Several hundred people in a group of families trying to flee the city over the weekend were actually detained, and then, after allowing the women and children to go, U.S. troops tested the men's hands for gunpowder traces. Finding none, they nonetheless sent them back to the doomed city to face their fate.
By trapping as many as 100,000 men and boys in the city before invading it, the U.S., acting for all the world more like a group of Bosnian Serb thugs than like the army of the Free World, has assured that it will be killing many, many civilians, but we won't be hearing much about that. As far as the Pentagon and Centcom in Iraq go, the dead in Fallujah are and will be all rebels. If they die, they must have died fighting.
Besides the fact that denying civilians the right to flee a battlezone is in itself a war crime under the Geneva conventions, US actions before and during the assault and destruction of Fallujah mean that current assertions that white phosphorus weapons were not used against civilians are total lies. The Pentagon simply defined away all people left, or stranded, or trapped in the city as insurgents.
IRAQ
Washington Post: Among Insurgents in Iraq, Few Foreigners Are Found
Analysis of offensive in Tall Afar suggests U.S., Iraq may be inflating foreign role in insurgency.
Analysis of offensive in Tall Afar suggests U.S., Iraq may be inflating foreign role in insurgency.
Wednesday, November 16, 2005
IRAQ: WMD
Guardian: The US used chemical weapons in Iraq - and then lied about it
Did US troops use chemical weapons in Falluja? The answer is yes. The proof is not to be found in the documentary broadcast on Italian TV last week, which has generated gigabytes of hype on the internet. It's a turkey, whose evidence that white phosphorus was fired at Iraqi troops is flimsy and circumstantial. But the bloggers debating it found the smoking gun
Did US troops use chemical weapons in Falluja? The answer is yes. The proof is not to be found in the documentary broadcast on Italian TV last week, which has generated gigabytes of hype on the internet. It's a turkey, whose evidence that white phosphorus was fired at Iraqi troops is flimsy and circumstantial. But the bloggers debating it found the smoking gun
OCCUPIED TERRITORIES
Guardian: Not guilty. The Israeli captain who put 17 bullets into a Palestinian schoolgirl
An Israeli army officer who fired the entire magazine of his automatic rifle into a 13-year-old Palestinian girl and then said he would have done the same even if she had been three years old was acquitted on all charges by a military court yesterday.
The soldier, who has only been identified as "Captain R", was charged with relatively minor offences for the killing of Iman al-Hams who was shot 17 times as she ventured near an Israeli army post near Rafah refugee camp in Gaza a year ago.
The manner of Iman's killing, and the revelation of a tape recording in which the captain is warned that she was just a child who was "scared to death", made the shooting one of the most controversial since the Palestinian intifada erupted five years ago even though hundreds of other children have also died.
An Israeli army officer who fired the entire magazine of his automatic rifle into a 13-year-old Palestinian girl and then said he would have done the same even if she had been three years old was acquitted on all charges by a military court yesterday.
The soldier, who has only been identified as "Captain R", was charged with relatively minor offences for the killing of Iman al-Hams who was shot 17 times as she ventured near an Israeli army post near Rafah refugee camp in Gaza a year ago.
The manner of Iman's killing, and the revelation of a tape recording in which the captain is warned that she was just a child who was "scared to death", made the shooting one of the most controversial since the Palestinian intifada erupted five years ago even though hundreds of other children have also died.
Tuesday, November 15, 2005
TORTURE
Independent: Torture’s out. Now they call it abuse by Robert Fisk
No screaming, no cries of agony, no shrieks of pain. Yes, it sounds much better, doesn’t it?
CHECK IT
No screaming, no cries of agony, no shrieks of pain. Yes, it sounds much better, doesn’t it?
CHECK IT
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