(crazydrumguy.com) Water-boarding, also known as water torture, leaves no marks. Aljazeera Magazine
16/09/2008
The mistreatment of prisoners of war and detainees in prisons like Abu Graib and Guantanamo Bay is an indication that the U.S. foreign policy has gone bad.
By Maryam Jahedi
Torture is denial of democracy. If a country like the United States of America is promoting democracy then its actions in achieving that goal must comply with its words.
The mistreatment of prisoners of war and detainees in prisons like Abu Graib and Guantanamo Bay is an indication that the U.S. foreign policy has gone bad.
Some of the techniques used in these interrogation sites are banned under U.S. and International law, such as water-boarding, forced nudity and sexual humiliation, use of military dogs, abuse of cultural and religious beliefs, solitary confinement, sleep deprivation and stress positions held for up to 40 hours.
Rules regarding interrogation are central to fighting the war on terrorism and with no clear guidelines the interrogators are uncertain of what techniques are allowed and to what extent.
The rule of law is to treat each individual as an individual, and that means that the Geneva Convention should apply to even those suspected of terrorism.
When these prisoners of war are imprisoned with no right to a trial or hearing they are deprived of their liberty, which is a torment in itself. To conduct a war in a civilized manner everybody involved has to understand fully what the laws of the war are.
The problem is that legal loopholes allow these practices to continue. By redefining the meaning of torture and by downgrading the implications of such acts, U.S. policy- and law-makers have undermined what constitutes U.S. policy. There are two problems with torture. Firstly, by torturing the present prisoners of war we are putting our future soldiers at risk of being tortured if captured. And secondly, information attained through torture is known to be unreliable. Abiding by the Geneva Convention standards is what protects our future military forces.
When the extremist Ibn Al-Shaykh Al-Libi was tortured in U.S. custody, the information he provided regarding training his fellow extremists on chemical and biological weapons was untrue and misleading. The information gleaned led to the invasion of Iraq for the wrong reasons.
The belief that extreme pain guarantees truth is no longer valid.
In Cambodia’s Security Prison 21, the victims of tortures carried out by the Khmer Rouge regime would interweave true events with imaginary elements in their confessions. For example, torture victim Hu Nim ended his confession with the sentence, “I am not a human being, I’m an animal.”
In psychological torture illusion is everything. The technique of force-feeding water to induce the sensation of drowning has been used throughout the centuries. Water-boarding, also known as water torture, leaves no marks and the victim recovers rapidly for further interrogation.
Suffocating pain, rapid expansion of the stomach, and mental anguish are only few of the effects on the victim of water-boarding. However, the Bush administration does not regard water-boarding as torture and allows its interrogators to use the technique on prisoners of the war on terrorism.
Because torture includes a great deal of physical and psychological pain and affects mental acuity, what these victims say during their suffering could well be inaccurate. This raises the question of whether U.S. forces can legitimately use the information obtained during acts of torture. How reliable is it?
We have developed a pre-emptive philosophy but what we have forgotten is that revenge goes a long way. Torture discourages our enemies to surrender to us on the battlefield. Torture discourages noncombatants from trusting our military forces and cooperating willingly. And torture induces revenge and retaliation and excels at creating future terrorists.
Treatment of prisoners at Abu Ghraib and Guantanamo Bay, shocking arrests and disappearances of civilians in Afghanistan and Iraq, extraordinary renditions and extreme interrogation techniques have all resulted in a loss of trust between the U.S. and many of the world’s Muslims and the international community.
Let us avoid becoming a nation haunted by the tragedy of its past. We must not allow the decisions of a few politicians to destroy our beliefs, our cultures, and our identity.
Let us realize that both victim and perpetrator of torture carry the consequences for the rest of their lives, and remember that torture is a great injustice. And after all as Martin Luther King Jr. said, “Injustice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere”.
Let us warn future generations of this horror and write it in history that we had a part in eliminating these inhuman acts.
16/09/2008
The mistreatment of prisoners of war and detainees in prisons like Abu Graib and Guantanamo Bay is an indication that the U.S. foreign policy has gone bad.
By Maryam Jahedi
Torture is denial of democracy. If a country like the United States of America is promoting democracy then its actions in achieving that goal must comply with its words.
The mistreatment of prisoners of war and detainees in prisons like Abu Graib and Guantanamo Bay is an indication that the U.S. foreign policy has gone bad.
Some of the techniques used in these interrogation sites are banned under U.S. and International law, such as water-boarding, forced nudity and sexual humiliation, use of military dogs, abuse of cultural and religious beliefs, solitary confinement, sleep deprivation and stress positions held for up to 40 hours.
Rules regarding interrogation are central to fighting the war on terrorism and with no clear guidelines the interrogators are uncertain of what techniques are allowed and to what extent.
The rule of law is to treat each individual as an individual, and that means that the Geneva Convention should apply to even those suspected of terrorism.
When these prisoners of war are imprisoned with no right to a trial or hearing they are deprived of their liberty, which is a torment in itself. To conduct a war in a civilized manner everybody involved has to understand fully what the laws of the war are.
The problem is that legal loopholes allow these practices to continue. By redefining the meaning of torture and by downgrading the implications of such acts, U.S. policy- and law-makers have undermined what constitutes U.S. policy. There are two problems with torture. Firstly, by torturing the present prisoners of war we are putting our future soldiers at risk of being tortured if captured. And secondly, information attained through torture is known to be unreliable. Abiding by the Geneva Convention standards is what protects our future military forces.
When the extremist Ibn Al-Shaykh Al-Libi was tortured in U.S. custody, the information he provided regarding training his fellow extremists on chemical and biological weapons was untrue and misleading. The information gleaned led to the invasion of Iraq for the wrong reasons.
The belief that extreme pain guarantees truth is no longer valid.
In Cambodia’s Security Prison 21, the victims of tortures carried out by the Khmer Rouge regime would interweave true events with imaginary elements in their confessions. For example, torture victim Hu Nim ended his confession with the sentence, “I am not a human being, I’m an animal.”
In psychological torture illusion is everything. The technique of force-feeding water to induce the sensation of drowning has been used throughout the centuries. Water-boarding, also known as water torture, leaves no marks and the victim recovers rapidly for further interrogation.
Suffocating pain, rapid expansion of the stomach, and mental anguish are only few of the effects on the victim of water-boarding. However, the Bush administration does not regard water-boarding as torture and allows its interrogators to use the technique on prisoners of the war on terrorism.
Because torture includes a great deal of physical and psychological pain and affects mental acuity, what these victims say during their suffering could well be inaccurate. This raises the question of whether U.S. forces can legitimately use the information obtained during acts of torture. How reliable is it?
We have developed a pre-emptive philosophy but what we have forgotten is that revenge goes a long way. Torture discourages our enemies to surrender to us on the battlefield. Torture discourages noncombatants from trusting our military forces and cooperating willingly. And torture induces revenge and retaliation and excels at creating future terrorists.
Treatment of prisoners at Abu Ghraib and Guantanamo Bay, shocking arrests and disappearances of civilians in Afghanistan and Iraq, extraordinary renditions and extreme interrogation techniques have all resulted in a loss of trust between the U.S. and many of the world’s Muslims and the international community.
Let us avoid becoming a nation haunted by the tragedy of its past. We must not allow the decisions of a few politicians to destroy our beliefs, our cultures, and our identity.
Let us realize that both victim and perpetrator of torture carry the consequences for the rest of their lives, and remember that torture is a great injustice. And after all as Martin Luther King Jr. said, “Injustice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere”.
Let us warn future generations of this horror and write it in history that we had a part in eliminating these inhuman acts.
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