BBC: Bush bans terror suspect torture (better late than never)

[boutons_]

http://newsvote.bbc.co.uk/nol/shared/img/printer_friendly/news_logo.gif

Bush bans terror suspect torture

US President George W Bush has signed an executive order banning "cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment" of terror suspects.

It says torture and personal abuse - including sexual acts and attacks on religious beliefs - are intolerable.

CIA Director Michael Hayden said the order gave the agency the legal clarity it had been seeking.

The administration has faced pressure at home and abroad over interrogation techniques used on suspected militants.

The most controversial practice allegedly used by the CIA is "water boarding" - in which prisoners are strapped to a plank over water and made to fear that they will drown.

The American authorities have never confirmed they use the technique and it is unclear whether the guidelines allow it.

Leonard Rubenstein, director of Physicians for Human Rights, told the Associated Press news agency that the executive order was inadequate.

"What is needed now is repudiation of brutal and cruel interrogation methods."

"General statements like this are inadequate, particularly after years of evidence that torture was authorised at the highest levels and utilised by US forces," he said.

Protection

The White House declined to say whether the CIA currently had a detention and interrogation programme.

But it said that if it did, the agency had to adhere to the guidelines.

Mr Hayden said the executive order gave CIA officers "the assurance that they may conduct their essential work in keeping with the laws of the United States".

Military lawyers say the main point of the orders is to offer protection to CIA officers who might get sued in US courts if they were deemed to have abused prisoners.

Mr Hayden will issue written policies to govern the programme and has asked the justice department to prepare a legal opinion on techniques the agency can use, according to a senior CIA official.

The order says that any interrogation practices used must be determined safe on an individual basis.

But the BBC's Duncan Kennedy in Washington says critics are likely to argue the new rules are still vague and give the administration far too much scope for using what they regard as unacceptable techniques.


Story from BBC NEWS:
http://news.bbc.co.uk/go/pr/fr/-/2/hi/americas/6909331.stm

Published: 2007/07/20 21:47:52 GMT

© BBC MMVII

====================

dubya re-taking the high moral ground, right.

Of course, this won't change the behavior of the CIA/FBI or military interrogators anymore that the interrogators were restrained or punished by their executives over the past 6 years.

Anyway, what's the point here, since dubya and his accomplices have claimed repeatedly "the USA doesn't torture"?

[Aggie Hoopsfan]

dubya re-taking the high moral ground, right.

I almost thought you were going to give Bush credit for doing something right. Almost.

[Yonivore]

I almost thought you were going to give Bush credit for doing something right. Almost.
C'mon...it's boutons.

[boutons_]

dubya has fucking long way to go to off-set Iraq, Katrina, etc, etc, before I give the dumbfuck ANY credit, or before he even breaks even with me.

In the 18 hellish months remaining, iit's more probable that he and dickhead and their neo-cunt accomplices will bomb Iran.

How long ago was Abu Graib and "extraordinary rendition" before today? The distance makes the executive order totally fake.

Gitmo remains open, its inmates uncharged.

[PixelPusher]

I'd be curious to know if Yoni and the gang consider this "good" news, or a deeply disappointing betrayal?

[boutons_]

Guantanamo Hunger Strikers Stay Defiant

By Ben Fox
The Associated Press

Friday 20 July 2007

Guantanamo Bay Naval Base, Cuba - Twice a day at the U.S. military prison here, Abdul Rahman Shalabi and Zaid Salim Zuhair Ahmed are strapped down in padded restraint chairs and flexible yellow tubes are inserted through their noses and throats. Milky nutritional supplements, mixed with water and olive oil to add calories and ease constipation, pour into their stomachs.

Shalabi, 32, an accused al-Qaida militant who was among the first prisoners taken to Guantanamo, and Ahmed, about 34, have refused to eat for almost two years to protest their conditions and open-ended confinement. In recent months, the number of hunger strikers has grown to two dozen, and the military is using force-feeding to keep them from starving.

An Associated Press investigation reveals the most complete picture yet of a test of wills that's taking place out of public view and shows no sign of ending, despite international outrage.

The restraint chair was a practice borrowed from U.S. civilian prisons in January 2006. Prisoners are strapped down and monitored to prevent vomiting until the supplements are digested.

( just like the French use gavage to force feed geese to cause their livers to go diseased in make foie gras )

The British human rights group Reprieve labeled the process "intentionally brutal" and Shalabi, according to his lawyer's notes, said it is painful, "something you can't imagine. For two years, me and Ahmed have been treated like animals."

The government says force-feeding detainees in the restraint chair was not meant to break the hunger strikes, but it had that effect. A mass protest that began in August 2005 and reached a peak of 131 detainees dwindled at one point to just two - Shalabi and Ahmed. In recent months, though, the number has grown again.

The military won't identify strikers, citing privacy rules and a desire to keep detainees from becoming martyrs.

But the AP was able to identify Shalabi and Ahmed, both Saudi Arabians, through interviews with several detainee lawyers and detailed military charts, obtained through the Freedom of Information Act, tracking the weights of each detainee.

Shalabi told his lawyer that other strikers include Sami al-Hajj, a Sudanese cameraman for Al-Jazeera, the Qatar-based Arabic-language TV station; Shaker Aamer, a Saudi who has acted as a camp leader; and Ghassan Abdullah al-Sharbi, a U.S.-educated Saudi engineer who told his captors he was proud to fight the U.S. and would consider it an honor to be given a life sentence.

"I don't quite see what they have gained from it," detention center commander Navy Rear Adm. Mark Buzby told the AP. "They are alive and healthy and we are going to keep them that way as long as they are here."

The military counted 24 men on hunger strike this week, including 23 receiving "enteral feeding" through tubes. It begins daily monitoring and considers force-feeding any detainee who misses nine consecutive meals. All are now at 100 percent of their ideal body weight because of the tube feedings, the military says.

"We never allow them to become seriously, medically compromised," said Navy Capt. Ronald Sollock, a doctor who commanded the detention center hospital from January 2006 until this month.

Guantanamo officials who deal directly with the strikers - and cannot be identified under military rules - cast doubt on their commitment. They say some were coerced by other detainees to stop eating and others eat McDonald's Happy Meals or Subway sandwiches provided by interrogators when they think other detainees won't find out.

And while detainees have complained of wounds from the repeated insertion and removal of the tubes, the military says it uses lubricants and local anesthetics to ease the pain.

Health experts unaffiliated with the military say there are no nutritional consequences from long-term tube feeding, that with proper care it can be done safely. Psychological and physical harm, however, are a real possibility.

Dr. Ronald Kleinman, chief of pediatric gastroenterology and nutrition at MassGeneral Hospital for Children, says there is a potential for "psychological consequences when this is done coercively," as well as "physical harm from repeatedly inserting a tube through the nose or leaving it in place inappropriately."

The previous Guantanamo commander, Navy Rear Adm. Harry Harris, underwent the process "just so he could say it was no big deal," Buzby said. He also says long-term strikers have complained at times when their feeding is delayed.

Prisoners have sporadically refused to eat at Guantanamo since shortly after they began arriving in January 2002. Detainees also show defiance by banging on their cell doors in concert for extended periods or hurling their bodily excretions at guards.

The mass hunger strike that began in August 2005, however, was something different. The prisoners compared themselves to the 10 Irish Republican Army hunger strikers who starved themselves to death in Britain's Maze prison in 1981 in hopes of winning status as political prisoners.

"Nobody should believe for one moment that my brothers here have less courage," Ethiopian detainee Binyam Mohammed warned in a statement released through his lawyer.

The Guantanamo hunger strikers were tube-fed, but many intentionally vomited the nutritional supplements and steadily lost weight.

By that December, at least 19 of 29 remaining strikers were significantly malnourished and at "great risk" of complications such as infection, permanent organ damage and injuries from weakened bones and muscles, according to an affidavit filed by a former hospital commander, Navy Capt. Stephen Hooker, in support of the military's response.

In early 2006, the military started using the restraint chairs, which strap down their arms and legs, to prevent detainees from resisting feeding efforts or making themselves vomit.

Among opponents were the International Committee of the Red Cross and Physicians for Human Rights. "We believe the will of the detainee must be respected," Red Cross spokesman Simon Schorno said.

The number of strikers has increased again recently, lawyers say, in protest of their increased isolation in Camp 6, the newest section of Guantanamo, where detainees spend most of the day alone in solid-wall cells. About 360 men are still being held at Guantanamo on suspicion of terrorism or links to al-Qaida or the Taliban.

The U.S. considers refusing to eat to be a disciplinary infraction and confiscates so-called comfort items such as mattresses and long underwear from their air-conditioned cells. Detainees must sleep on thin mats, can't get books or magazines other than the Quran and can have paper and pens to write letters for only an hour or so a day.

Shalabi and Ahmed have regained their weight since their captors began strapping them down. The records show Shalabi's weight dropped from 124 pounds to 106 pounds in January 2006, when the use of the restraint chair began. His lawyer says he now weighs about 155. Ahmed dropped from 149 pounds to 108 in December 2005 and was 143 pounds at the end of last year. His current weight is unknown.

The military doesn't allow detainee interviews, and Ahmed has no known lawyer. But Shalabi told New York attorney Julia Tarver Mason that after more than five years in detention without being charged, the strikers see their protest as a grueling but necessary struggle against indefinite confinement.

"I think he just feels hopeless that the law doesn't apply to him," Mason said.

A slight man with a short beard, Shalabi appeared in better health in June than when they previously met in October 2005, when he was "gaunt and emaciated," Mason said. But the strike has taken its toll. "He looks very old for someone his age. ... If I saw him anywhere else," the lawyer said, "I would think he's a man in his 50s."

The Bush administration maintains the detainees have no right to challenge their confinement in U.S. courts. They may, however, have some reason to feel less hopeless now: Reversing an earlier decision, the U.S. Supreme Court has agreed to review the question, and a decision is expected next year.

==================

5 years of confinement, no trials, no evidence, just unending confinement, brutalization, and dehumanization.

dubya and dickhead and gonzo and their sadistic accomplices in the US military have America standing tall and proud, a shining beacon on the hill, showing humanity the way forward.

[boutons_]

Of course, sensory deprivation, long-term isolation, forced feeding, waterboarding, and who knows what else aren't "torture" for the Repug sadits and criminals in the WH and that puto gonzo.

[sabar]

Bush has betrayed his conservative ideals!

[Wild Cobra]

I don't see how the policy placed in words is any didfferent than what we already were doing. There was a loophole in it!

[Wild Cobra]

Maybe there wasn't a loophole, I heard that the privisions could be overridden on a case by case basis. Maybe it's in a code refered to?

Link:

Executive Order: Interpretation of the Geneva Conventions Common Article 3 as Applied to a Program of Detention and Interrogation Operated by the Central Intelligence Agency (http://www.whitehouse.gov/news/releases/2007/07/20070720-4.html):


By the authority vested in me as President and Commander in Chief of the Armed Forces by the Constitution and the laws of the United States of America, including the Authorization for Use of Military Force (Public Law 107 40), the Military Commissions Act of 2006 (Public Law 109 366), and section 301 of title 3, United States Code, it is hereby ordered as follows:

Section 1. General Determinations. (a) The United States is engaged in an armed conflict with al Qaeda, the Taliban, and associated forces. Members of al Qaeda were responsible for the attacks on the United States of September 11, 2001, and for many other terrorist attacks, including against the United States, its personnel, and its allies throughout the world. These forces continue to fight the United States and its allies in Afghanistan, Iraq, and elsewhere, and they continue to plan additional acts of terror throughout the world. On February 7, 2002, I determined for the United States that members of al Qaeda, the Taliban, and associated forces are unlawful enemy combatants who are not entitled to the protections that the Third Geneva Convention provides to prisoners of war. I hereby reaffirm that determination.

(b) The Military Commissions Act defines certain prohibitions of Common Article 3 for United States law, and it reaffirms and reinforces the authority of the President to interpret the meaning and application of the Geneva Conventions.

Sec. 2. Definitions. As used in this order:

(a) "Common Article 3" means Article 3 of the Geneva Conventions.

(b) "Geneva Conventions" means:

(i) the Convention for the Amelioration of the Condition of the Wounded and Sick in Armed Forces in the Field, done at Geneva August 12, 1949 (6 UST 3114);

(ii) the Convention for the Amelioration of the Condition of Wounded, Sick and Shipwrecked Members of Armed Forces at Sea, done at Geneva August 12, 1949 (6 UST 3217);

(iii) the Convention Relative to the Treatment of Prisoners of War, done at Geneva August 12, 1949 (6 UST 3316); and

(iv) the Convention Relative to the Protection of Civilian Persons in Time of War, done at Geneva August 12, 1949 (6 UST 3516).

(c) "Cruel, inhuman, or degrading treatment or punishment" means the cruel, unusual, and inhumane treatment or punishment prohibited by the Fifth, Eighth, and Fourteenth Amendments to the Constitution of the United States.

Sec. 3. Compliance of a Central Intelligence Agency Detention and Interrogation Program with Common Article 3. (a) Pursuant to the authority of the President under the Constitution and the laws of the United States, including the Military Commissions Act of 2006, this order interprets the meaning and application of the text of Common Article 3 with respect to certain detentions and interrogations, and shall be treated as authoritative for all purposes as a matter of United States law, including satisfaction of the international obligations of the United States. I hereby determine that Common Article 3 shall apply to a program of detention and interrogation operated by the Central Intelligence Agency as set forth in this section. The requirements set forth in this section shall be applied with respect to detainees in such program without adverse distinction as to their race, color, religion or faith, sex, birth, or wealth.

(b) I hereby determine that a program of detention and interrogation approved by the Director of the Central Intelligence Agency fully complies with the obligations of the United States under Common Article 3, provided that:

(i) the conditions of confinement and interrogation practices of the program do not include:

(A) torture, as defined in section 2340 of title 18, United States Code;

(B) any of the acts prohibited by section 2441(d) of title 18, United States Code, including murder, torture, cruel or inhuman treatment, mutilation or maiming, intentionally causing serious bodily injury, rape, sexual assault or abuse, taking of hostages, or performing of biological experiments;

(C) other acts of violence serious enough to be considered comparable to murder, torture, mutilation, and cruel or inhuman treatment, as defined in section 2441(d) of title 18, United States Code;

(D) any other acts of cruel, inhuman, or degrading treatment or punishment prohibited by the Military Commissions Act (subsection 6(c) of Public Law 109 366) and the Detainee Treatment Act of 2005 (section 1003 of Public Law 109 148 and section 1403 of Public Law 109 163);

(E) willful and outrageous acts of personal abuse done for the purpose of humiliating or degrading the individual in a manner so serious that any reasonable person, considering the circumstances, would deem the acts to be beyond the bounds of human decency, such as sexual or sexually indecent acts undertaken for the purpose of humiliation, forcing the individual to perform sexual acts or to pose sexually, threatening the individual with sexual mutilation, or using the individual as a human shield; or

(F) acts intended to denigrate the religion, religious practices, or religious objects of the individual;

(ii) the conditions of confinement and interrogation practices are to be used with an alien detainee who is determined by the Director of the Central Intelligence Agency:

(A) to be a member or part of or supporting al Qaeda, the Taliban, or associated organizations; and

(B) likely to be in possession of information that:

(1) could assist in detecting, mitigating, or preventing terrorist attacks, such as attacks within the United States or against its Armed Forces or other personnel, citizens, or facilities, or against allies or other countries cooperating in the war on terror with the United States, or their armed forces or other personnel, citizens, or facilities; or

(2) could assist in locating the senior leadership of al Qaeda, the Taliban, or associated forces;

(iii) the interrogation practices are determined by the Director of the Central Intelligence Agency, based upon professional advice, to be safe for use with each detainee with whom they are used; and

(iv) detainees in the program receive the basic necessities of life, including adequate food and water, shelter from the elements, necessary clothing, protection from extremes of heat and cold, and essential medical care.

(c) The Director of the Central Intelligence Agency shall issue written policies to govern the program, including guidelines for Central Intelligence Agency personnel that implement paragraphs (i)(C), (E), and (F) of subsection 3(b) of this order, and including requirements to ensure:

(i) safe and professional operation of the program;

(ii) the development of an approved plan of interrogation tailored for each detainee in the program to be interrogated, consistent with subsection 3(b)(iv) of this order;

(iii) appropriate training for interrogators and all personnel operating the program;

(iv) effective monitoring of the program, including with respect to medical matters, to ensure the safety of those in the program; and

(v) compliance with applicable law and this order.

Sec. 4. Assignment of Function. With respect to the program addressed in this order, the function of the President under section 6(c)(3) of the Military Commissions Act of 2006 is assigned to the Director of National Intelligence.

Sec. 5. General Provisions. (a) Subject to subsection (b) of this section, this order is not intended to, and does not, create any right or benefit, substantive or procedural, enforceable at law or in equity, against the United States, its departments, agencies, or other entities, its officers or employees, or any other person.

(b) Nothing in this order shall be construed to prevent or limit reliance upon this order in a civil, criminal, or administrative proceeding, or otherwise, by the Central Intelligence Agency or by any individual acting on behalf of the Central Intelligence Agency in connection with the program addressed in this order.

GEORGE W. BUSH

THE WHITE HOUSE,

July 20, 2007.

[DarkReign]

Good, Im glad to see him at least pay lip service to the issue.

Torture has been going on for years, this was just the first time it was bandied about as common practice. Dont worry, when the feds think they got someone with intel, theyll get it out of them, and it wont be sensory deprivation.

[Ya Vez]

Al and Billary like to grab ass....

"'extraordinary renditions', were operations to apprehend terrorists abroad, usually without the knowledge of and almost always without public acknowledgment of the host government...The first time I proposed a snatch, in 1993, the White House Counsel, Lloyd Cutler, demanded a meeting with the President to explain how it violated international law. Clinton had seemed to be siding with Cutler until Al Gore belatedly joined the meeting, having just flown overnight from South Africa. Clinton recapped the arguments on both sides for Gore: Lloyd says this. Dick says that. Gore laughed and said, 'That's a no-brainer. Of course it's a violation of international law, that's why it's a covert action. The guy is a terrorist. Go grab his ass.'"[11]

In a New Yorker magazine interview with CIA veteran Michael Scheuer, an author of the rendition program under the Clinton Administration, writer Jane Mayer noted, "In 1995, American agents proposed the rendition program to Egypt, making clear that it had the resources to track, capture, and transport terrorist suspects globally—including access to a small fleet of aircraft. Egypt embraced the idea. "What was clever was that some of the senior people in Al Qaeda were Egyptian," Scheuer said. "It served American purposes to get these people arrested, and Egyptian purposes to get these people back, where they could be interrogated." Technically, U.S. law requires the CIA to seek "assurances" from foreign governments that rendered suspects won’t be tortured. Scheuer told me that this was done, but he was "not sure" if any documents confirming the arrangement were signed."[12]

Thereafter, with the approval of President Clinton and a presidential directive (PDD 39), the CIA instead elected to send suspects to Egypt, where they were turned over to the Egyptian mukhabarat.

[Wild Cobra]

Torture has been going on for years, this was just the first time it was bandied about as common practice.
Not true. What the libs are calling torture is not torture!

Have you heard of any events of torture? Distress, humiliation, and the like, yes. Real torture? I challenge you to find a single case!

[sabar]

Torture is torture, it doesn't have to involve a risk of death, just suffering.

[Wild Cobra]

Torture is torture, it doesn't have to involve a risk of death, just suffering.
A key qualifier for torture is "severe" pain or suffering.

How do you define severe? Are you a wimp, and cannot endure a little uncomfort?

I get it now. Liberals are wimps, thats why any thing distressing is torture! It finally dawned on me. Damn I feel stupid.

Torture (http://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/torture), Wiktionary definition:


torture (plural tortures)

1. Certain, clearly defined acts perpetrated against helpless prisoners, to force them to suffer excruciating pain and discomfort.
2. Cruel and outrageous acts that terrorize helpless prisoners to force or coerce them to react in a way that satisfies the torturer.

Allowing large dogs to attack bound, hand-cuffed prisoners is clearly torture.

3. Any act committed by an official of a government against a prisoner of war which could cause undue pain, as clearly defined by many international agreements.

In every war there are acts of torture that cause the world to shudder.

4. (mainly literary) The "suffering of the heart" imposed by one on another, as in personal relationships.

Every time she says 'goodbye' it is torture!

First part of Wikipedia on torture (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Torture):


Torture defined by all historic dictionaries is "any act by which severe pain or suffering, whether physical or mental"[1] [2]. Individuals or groups may inflict torture on others for the sadistic gratification of the torturer, as was the case in the Moors Murders.

How about this;

as cited by the 2006 Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy (Torture) from Stanford University:


Torture includes such practices as searing with hot irons, burning at the stake, electric shock treatment to the genitals, cutting out parts of the body, e.g. tongue, entrails or genitals, severe beatings, suspending by the legs with arms tied behind back, applying thumbscrews, inserting a needle under the fingernails, drilling through an unanesthetized tooth, making a person crouch for hours in the ‘Z’ position, waterboarding (continuously immersing the head in water until close to point of drowning), and denying food, water or sleep for days or weeks on end.

I haven't read all this yet, but it should be interesting:

Final Report of the Independent Panel to Review DOD Detention Operations (http://www.npr.org/documents/2004/abuse/schlesinger_report.pdf)

From what little I have read, I saw 66 improper incidents, but found nothing classed as torture.

[Wild Cobra]

Another interesting document:

AR 15-6 Investigation of the Abu Ghraib Prison and 205th Military Intelligence Brigade (http://news.findlaw.com/hdocs/docs/dod/fay82504rpt.pdf). Part of the executive summary:


Abuse

Clearly abuses occurred at the prison at Abu Ghraib. There is no single, simple explanation for why this abuse at Abu Ghraib happened. The primary causes are misconduct (ranging from inhumane to sadistic) by a small group of morally corrupt soldiers and civilians, a lack of discipline on the part of the leaders and Soldiers of the 205th MI BDE and a failure or lack of leadership by multiple echelons within CJTF-7. Contributing factors can be traced to issues affecting Command and Control, Doctrine, Training, and the experience of the Soldiers we asked to perform this vital mission.

[boutons_]

"The primary causes are misconduct (ranging from inhumane to sadistic) by a small group of morally corrupt soldiers and civilians"

bullshit, the climate of Abu Ghraib was defined by Rummy and by the intentional lack of direction and command at Abu Ghraib.

[PixelPusher]

"The primary causes are misconduct (ranging from inhumane to sadistic) by a small group of morally corrupt soldiers and civilians"

bullshit, the climate of Abu Ghraib was defined by Rummy and by the intentional lack of direction and command at Abu Ghraib.

Actually, while the authors of the document are careful not to directly blame DOF or the Army (a real shocker, I know), it does suggest something like "lack of direction".


Neither Department of Defense nor Army doctrine caused any abuses. Abuses
would not have occurred had doctrine been followed and mission training conducted.
Nonetheless, certain facets of interrogation and detention operations doctrine need to be updated, refined or expanded, including, the concept, organization, and operations of a Joint Interrogation and Debriefing Center (JIDC); guidance for interrogation techniques at both tactical and strategic levels; the roles, responsibilities and relationships between Military Police and Military Intelligence personnel at detention facilities; and, the establishment and organization of a Joint Task Force structure and, in particular, its intelligence architecture.