They Dare Educate us on Human Rights...

...when they already have a legacy of human rights violations in Afghanistan and Iraq on their track record.

I'm talking about the Coalition and how they have turned this "war on terror" into a war on Arab and Muslim human rights in places like Afghanistan and Iraq.

After the so-called "liberation" phases of the two battles, we have seen nothing but the security of the Iraqis sacrificed along with their freedoms for the sake of the imperialist conquest of Iraq and Afghanistan. We have seen prisoners being detained in places like Abu Ghraib. We have seen checkpoints being set up all over, and people dying at these places. Bombs and chaos all over. Air strikes and missiles are added to the fire. What next? I mean, lives are being lost in this farcical "WOT", and there is no price worth the cost of human suffering and death.

Disclaimer: I do not condone terrorism, whatever and wherever it arises, whether it be from insurgents or Coalition troops.

Let's turn first to Abu Ghraib, what was deemed to be something that all Iraqis will remember for years and years to come. For one, let's turn to the symbol of Abu Ghraib, Ali Shalal Al Qaissi. Of course, you can see why the legacy of Abu Ghraib will still live on:



Yep, he's the famous guy with the black cloth hung out with his arms stretched. Of course, that's just the tip of the iceberg.

The prisoners were sleep deprived, he said, and the punishments they faced ranged from bizarre to lewd: an elderly man was forced to wear a bra and pose; a youth was told to hit the other adults; and groups of men were organized in piles. There was the dreaded "music party," he said, in which prisoners were placed before loudspeakers. Mr. Qaissi also said he had been urinated on by a guard. Then there were the pictures.

[...]

With a thick shock of gray hair and melancholy eyes, Mr. Qaissi is today a self-styled activist for prisoners' rights in Iraq. Shortly after being released from Abu Ghraib in 2004, he started the Association of Victims of American Occupation Prisons with several other men immortalized in the Abu Ghraib pictures.

Financed partly by Arab nongovernmental organizations and private donations, the group's aim is to publicize the cases of prisoners still in custody, and to support prisoners and their families with donations of clothing and food.

Ah, the pictures. Let's just roll the slides, shall we?





You can view the rest of the pics here. The abuse documented in Abu Ghraib was one of the worst the war has ever seen: in an almost inhumane and profoundly racist manner, Arabs were mistreated by prison guards, and stripped to utter nakedness. Make no mistake: Arabs are usually modest when it comes to clothing, and nudity is just not an Arab strongsuit. The guards treated the prisoners like animals, even though many of them were really innocent civilians and not "terrorists". On the other hand, many on the right claim that they are facing too much opposition to this farcical war... and yes, they certainly have reaped what they sowed. How can the Americans expect to secure their nation when they are aggressively assaulting the human rights of those in other nations? I'm talking about rightwingers here.

However, this war itself is being perceived as racist in the sense that people being killed are not being counted as deaths. It seems, though, that American deaths are more worth than the deaths of others. Norman Solomon outlines it nicely.

The U.S. government doesn't drop bombs on people because of their race. Washington's geopolitical agendas lead to military actions. But racial biases make the war process easier when the people being killed and maimed aren't white people. An oversize elephant in the American media's living room is a reality that few journalists talk about in public: The USA keeps waging war on countries where the victims resemble people who often experience personal and institutional racism in the United States.

[...]

During the few minutes allotted to him as a guest on NPR's "Talk of the Nation" program, the executive director of Amnesty International USA explained that efforts had been made to alert top Washington officials to barbaric treatment of Iraqi prisoners in U.S. custody. During the May 3 broadcast, William Schulz said: "Close to a year ago, human rights groups went to the Pentagon, to the National Security Council; the president himself issued a statement in which he indicated that this kind of behavior was utterly inappropriate and, of course, it is seen to have continued long after that statement was issued. And one of the reasons, I'm afraid, is because those who undertake this kind of activity, whether they be the prison guards themselves or military intelligence or higher-ups, are able to get away with it."

Human rights are violated on the basis of racism against Iraqi detainees and civilians, on the basis that they are suspected "terrorists". Who gave the U.S. the "moral high ground" to attack human rights?

Let's go on to another abuse of human rights violations: GITMO. There was an instance where children were detained there as well as routine torture and oppression akin to that in Abu Ghraib, the legacy of U.S. imperialism in Iraq.

It is sad, really, that people in GITMO are being treated like animals, lesser than human beings. Such racism must stop, nevertheless. Amnesty International released a report on the human rights violations occurring at this desolate prison. None of the prisoners are being given a fair trial, and none have had their demands for a lawyer met. This press release on the conditions of the prisoners in GITMO are shocking, and here are some excerpts:

On 1 December 2005 the US Department of Defense (DoD) estimated the number of long term participants in the ongoing hunger strike at Guantánamo - described among the guards as ‘voluntary fasting’ – to be between thirty to thirty-three(2). Of those, twenty-two were said to be receiving liquid nutrition through a nasal tube. The DoD also stated that the intravenous and nasogastric feeding methods being used are humane and within common standards of medical care and that only in rare cases were the tubes inserted against the detainees’ will, "Some, because of their character and temperament, they would be less than cooperative and would need to be restrained".

Is that so? "Voluntary fasting" is not hunger strike.

Saudi Arabian national Yousuf al-Shehri has also described the situation for the hunger strikers. He said that, after approximately seven days without food, he and four other prisoners were taken to the camp hospital where they were verbally insulted and placed in shackles or other restraints on their arms, legs, waist, chest, knees and head. After this he said they were given intravenous medicine and described how, if they moved, they were hit in the chest area. His lawyers have described how Yousef al-Shehri, who is believed to have been a juvenile when first detained, was forcefully administered the nasal tube for feeding, reportedly with no anaesthetic gel or sedative.

Wow... I never knew that the U.S. would go this low to detaining these people, even if they were not "terrorists" or those who have yet to commit a single act of murder or terrorism.

There are believed to be nine men now determined no longer to be ‘enemy combatants’(17) who remain detained in Guantánamo despite a decision by US authorities at Guantánamo that they should be released and despite a District Court ruling in two of the cases that their continued detention at Guantánamo is unlawful. They are held in Camp Iguana, the facility at Guantánamo once used to hold juvenile detainees.(18)

However, their condition remains to this date critical while they are still being held at that unlawful camp.

The press release continues to denounce the inhumanity of GITMO and its guards towards the prisoners. Moreover, Amnesty International claims that the U.S. itself is the leader in violations of human rights.

Human rights watchdog Amnesty International accused the United States of violating human rights, ignoring international law and sending a "permissive signal to abusive governments".

The last part struck me a bit: the U.S. sees itself as an example, and whenever it accelerated its violations of human rights, it sends a message to tyrannical governments that two wrongs make a right as long as the U.S. is wrong in that instance. I'm talking about governments like Egypt, who recently arrested activists and a prominent blogger. There are also governments like China and Pakistan, with both Egypt and Pakistan being ALLIES of the United States.

Here is the report. It outlines much more on this growing problem. I quote now the official report:

Today the United Nations Committee Against Torture has added to the growing pressure on the United States authorities to prohibit, prevent and punish all acts of torture and other cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment or punishment at home and abroad; to close Guantánamo; to end secret, incommunicado and indefinite detention; to prevent "disappearances"; and to stop the practice of "rendition".

Clearly, the Committee did not accept the USA’s assertion that the problem of torture and ill-treatment of detainees in US custody was restricted to "relatively few actual cases of abuse and wrongdoing". The Committee’s findings point to a systematic failure of the USA to live up to its international obligations, including under the Convention against Torture and Other Cruel, Inhuman or Degrading Treatment or Punishment, and to protect detainees from abuse. The USA should take these findings to heart.

Amnesty International welcomes the Committee’s findings and urges the US government to begin immediately to implement its recommendations and to report back to the Committee, as required. In relation to the "war on terror", the Committee’s recommendations include that the USA should:

-End secret detention, which is per se a violation of the Convention against Torture. The Committee stressed that all secret detentions must be disclosed and that all detainees must be fully registered. The latter is a crucial safeguard against torture and other cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment. This would include all detainees in US custody in Afghanistan, Iraq, Cuba and at undisclosed locations. The Committee regretted the US government’s "no comment" policy on whether or not it is operating secret detention facilities. It called on the US government to "publicly condemn any policy of secret detention".

-Prevent "disappearances", which are per se violations of the Convention. The Committee rejected the US government’s notion that "disappearances" do not constitute a form of torture.

-End the practice of "rendition", the extra-judicial transfer of detainees between countries. All detainees in US custody must be protected from transfer to situations where they will be put at risk of torture.
Cease detentions at Guantánamo and close the facility. Indefinite detention without charge per se violates the Convention.

-Prevent the use of any interrogation techniques that amount to torture or other cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment. The Committee regretted the USA’s lack of clarity in relation to interrogation techniques which has led to "serious abuses of detainees" in US custody.

-Ensure full investigations into acts of torture and ill-treatment and prosecute "all those responsible" for such acts, with punishments commensurate with the crime. The Committee expressed its concern about the lenient sentences that have been handed out in many cases of torture or other ill-treatment by US personnel in Afghanistan and Iraq.

-Recognize and ensure that the Convention applies "at all times" – whether in times of war or peace – and that its provisions apply fully to "all persons under the effective control of [US] authorities, of whichever type, wherever located in the world". The Committee rejected the US government’s view that the Convention is not applicable in the context of armed conflict.

On US domestic issues, the Committee was concerned about numerous aspects of prison and detention policies. Its recommendations include:

-Ensure the separation of children from adults in detention. In addition, it called upon the USA to review its use of life imprisonment in the case of children, given that such sentences can amount to cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment or punishment. In a joint report issued in October 2005, Amnesty International and Human Rights Watch reported that more than 2,000 child offenders were serving sentences of life imprisonment without the possibility of parole, in violation of international law.

-Ensure that women in custody are treated fully in accordance with international standards. The Committee expressed particular concern at the practice of shackling of pregnant women detainees during labour.

-Review the regime in "super-maximum" security prisons, particularly the resort to prolonged isolation of prisoners. This reiterates the Committee’s 2000 recommendation.

-Strictly regulate the use of electro-shock weapons, such as tasers and stun belts, and limit their use to a substitute for lethal force. The Committee stressed that the practice of using electro-shock weapons to restrain those already in custody was a breach of the Convention and should be eliminated. The USA rejected the Committee’s findings in 2000 on electro-shock weapons. It should not reject its recommendations a second time.

In its opening statement to the Committee in Geneva on 5 May, the US delegation stressed that the USA "is committed to upholding our national and international obligations to eradicate torture and to prevent cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment or punishment". It recalled that the USA "was founded on the principle of respect for human dignity" and that the country "has a long tradition of international leadership against torture".

Regrettably, the years between the USA’s first appearance in front of the Committee against Torture in 2000 and its second in May 2006, tell a different story. The USA’s record in relation to detentions, particularly in the context of the "war on terror", has been a matter for serious and growing international and domestic concern. The USA’s selective approach to international law and standards, its frequent resort to secrecy, and its resistance to judicial review must now end. Full and effective measures to protect any and all detainees from torture and other cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment or punishment, full and prompt investigation of all abuses, and full accountability for any such abuses, must be the order of the day.

The bolded parts are of greatest importance. The double-standards that the U.S. uses to "protect" itself is just stinking. Don't take me wrong: I don't hate America or its people, but I hate its GOVERNMENT, and we Arabs tend to separate the American public from the government.

It's already clear that the U.S. is planning for Iran, but I just hope that this cycle of violence stops and that the war criminals responsible for all this violence are brought to justice. Now, on the issue of human rights, I, too, would like to see every abuser of human rights be brought to court and given an appropriate punishment... yes, even American officials who are responsible for what is happening to innocents in this "war on terror".

Salaam, from
Saracen