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Politics : Foreign Affairs Discussion Group -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: Nadine Carroll who wrote (244221)	10/6/2007 10:29:11 PM
From: Webster Groves	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 281500

<The idea is for detainees to view interrogations as pleasant diversions,> Cough, gag, sputter !!! If everything is so up and up about Guantanamo, why it it there on Cuban soil rather than here on American soil ? We all know the answer for that. Perhaps the detainees are having difficulty getting their viewpoint out to the public. Did you ever talk to one without a guard present ? Here's one way of making a statement when statements are banned: washingtonpost.com wg

To: Nadine Carroll who wrote (244221)	10/9/2007 10:32:59 AM
From: Wharf Rat	Respond to of 281500

I guess Petula missed this article.It was a long time ago. Of course, you can always change the definitin of torture. From a left wing rag, tho, so maybe that is why the article was ignored. US acknowledges torture at Guantanamo; in Iraq, Afghanistan - UN 06.24.2005, 11:37 AM GENEVA (AFX) - Washington has, for the first time, acknowledged to the United Nations that prisoners have been tortured at US detention centres in Guantanamo Bay, as well as Afghanistan and Iraq, a UN source said. The acknowledgement was made in a report submitted to the UN Committee against Torture, said a member of the ten-person panel, speaking on on condition of anonymity. 'They are no longer trying to duck this and have respected their obligation to inform the UN,' the Committee member said. 'They they will have to explain themselves (to the Committee). Nothing should be kept in the dark,' he said. UN sources said this is the first time the world body has received such a frank statement on torture from US authorities. The Committee, which monitors respect for the Convention against Torture and Other Cruel, Inhuman or Degrading Treatment or Punishment, is gathering information from the US ahead of hearings in May 2006. Signatories of the convention are expected to submit to scrutiny of their implementation of the 1984 convention and to provide information to the Committee. The document from Washington will not be formally made public until the hearings. newsdesk@afxnews.com forbes.com

To: Nadine Carroll who wrote (244221)	10/9/2007 10:35:35 AM
From: Wharf Rat	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 281500

"I suppose retired interrogators such as thosed profiled above believe the worst about Gitmo because that's the narrative the Washington Post and other mainstream media outlets continue to drive — including in this story." Maybe they read FBI files. You have an extremely bad case of denial. FBI files detail Guantánamo torture tactics Mark Tran Wednesday January 3, 2007 Guardian Unlimited Captives at Guantánamo Bay were chained hand and foot in a fetal position to the floor for 18 hours or more, urinating and defecating on themselves, an FBI report has revealed. The accounts of mistreatment were contained in FBI documents released yesterday (pdf) as part of a lawsuit involving the American Civil Liberties Union, a civil liberties group. In the 2004 inquiry, the FBI asked nearly 500 employees who had served at Guantánamo Bay to report possible mistreatment by law enforcement or military personnel. Twenty-six incidents were reported, some of which had emerged in earlier document releases. Article continues -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Besides being shackled to the floor, detainees were subjected to extremes of temperature. One witness said he saw a barefoot detainee shaking with cold because the air conditioning had bought the temperature close to freezing. On another occasion, the air conditioning was off in an unventilated room, making the temperature over 38C (100F) and a detainee lay almost unconscious on the floor with a pile of hair next to him. He had apparently been pulling out his hair throughout the night. In October 2002, one interrogator squatted over a copy of the Qur'an during intensive questioning of a Muslim prisoner, who was "incensed" by the tactic, according to an FBI agent. On another occasion, an agent was asked by a "civilian contractor" to come and see something. "There was an unknown bearded longhaired d (detainee) gagged w/duct tape that had covered much of his head," the FBI document said. When the FBI officer asked if the detainee had spit at interrogators, the "contractor laughingly replied that d had been chanting the Qur'an non-stop. No answer how they planned to remove the duct tape," the report said. After an erroneous report of Qur'an abuse prompted deadly protests overseas in 2005, the US military conducted an investigation that confirmed five incidents of intentional and unintentional mishandling of the book at the detention facility. It acknowledged that soldiers and interrogators had kicked the Qur'an, had stood on it and, in one case, had inadvertently sprayed urine on a copy. An FBI agent called W also heard that female interrogators would sometimes wet their hands and touch detainees' faces in order to disrupt their prayers. Such actions would make some Muslims consider themselves unclean so they would stop praying. The detention of terrorist suspects at Guantánamo Bay has been strongly criticised by human rights groups. In a rebuff for the Bush administration, the US supreme court last year rejected its claims that detainees at the facility were not entitled to the protection under the Geneva convention. The department of defence consequently issued a memo stating that prisoners would in the future be entitled to such protection. As of November 2006, out of 775 detainees who have been brought to Guantánamo, approximately 340 had been released, leaving 435 detainees. Of those 435, 110 have been labelled as ready for release. Of the other 325, only about 70 will face trial by military commissions, criminal courts run by the US armed forces. That leaves about 250 who may be held indefinitely. guardian.co.uk