Rice's nonsense on torture

Oh wow, I only got around to watching this video now, and from some of the comments I thought she must have been making some half-convincing arguments... nope!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ijEED_iviTA&feature=channel_page


Well, first we upgrade al Qaeda to tyrants, okay. Then one gets the impression that the US homeland was not attacked in WWII. Those little incidents at Pearl Harbor and on the Aleutian islands are called bombing and occupation, to most people.

Then we are informed that 500,000 deaths in WWII is "no!" Why? Perhaps we should have got the figure correct to the precise soldier?



The problem with the internet is that you can actually find obscure references instantaneously. In this case, the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE) report on Guantanamo. Turns out, with ten seconds of google:

* the OSCE people were only allowed in on the condition of not actually interviewing any detainees! These same conditions were rejected by other human rights organisations, like Amnesty.

* and, the guy who led the OSCE team, Alain Grignard, with the Belgian federal police, thought detaining prisoners for years with trial was a form of "psychological torture".

http://intelligence-summit.blogspot.com/2006/03/osce-guantanamo-better-than-belgian.html

"Did you know that? Alright, no, well wait a second, if you didn't know that, maybe before you make allegations about Guantanamo, you should read."




But it gets better!

CR: "The ICRC also had access to Guantanamo, and they made no allegations about inerrogations about Guantanamo. What they did say is that they beleived indefinite detention..."

What sort of access did the ICRC have? Does anybody remember? Like, there were some prisoners that were deliberately kept away from the ICRC? And, like, this was such an official policy that it was actually written into the operating manual for the prison, there was an official level given to each prisoner, and the top level were kept away from the ICRC?

In fact, you can read various versions of the manual online.

http://wikileaks.org/wiki/Chaplain,_Red_Cross_Muzzled_at_Gitmo_in_2004

In any case, with its access, the ICRC did write a detailed report, which was leaked recently. Perhaps you might actually like to read what the ICRC *did* have to say.

http://www.nybooks.com/icrc-report.pdf

From the introduction, the very first paragraph:

"The International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) has consistently expressed its grave concern over the humanitarian consequences and legal implications of the practice by the United States (US) authorities of holding persons in undisclosed detention in the context of the fight against terrorism. In particular, the ICRC has underscored the risk of ill-treatment, the lack of contact with the outside world as a result of being held incommunicado, the lack of a legal framework, and the direct effect of such treatment and conditions on the persons held in undisclosed detention and on their families."

It's clearly a glowing report, with sections entitled "Suffocation by water", "Prolonged stress standing", "Beatings by use of a collar", "Beating and kicking", "Confinement in a box", "Prolonged nudity", and so on. And clearly none of this involves any allegations about interrogations, surely.

And here is an example of non-allegations about interrogations, from the summary, section 1, page 5:

"as outlined in Section 4 below, and as concluded by this report, the ICRC clearly considers that the allegations of the fourteen [detainees interviewed] include descriptions of treatment and interrogation techniques --- singly or in combination --- that amounted to torture and/or cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment."

Can't you see there are no allegations about interrogation?



And this is fantastic:

CR: "By definition, if it was authorised by the President, it did not violate our obligations under the Convention Against Torture."

I didn't know we had monarchists left in this country!

Hmm, I wonder which article of the Convention has the "President said so" defence? Dang, that could have come in handy for Pinochet's lawyers when he was being extradited for torture under the same convention! Pity he didn't notice that provision, having been President of Chile and all, since by definition anything he authorises doesn't violate the convention!

Torture developments

Torture developments:

Ex-Bush admin official: Many at Gitmo are innocent
http://www.google.com/hostednews/ap/article/ALeqM5ie2Gewi7L3__bSzBds095stmE88QD971FBSO1

Judge: Abu Ghraib detainees can sue Va. contractor
http://www.google.com/hostednews/ap/article/ALeqM5hXZlMqKrNDLSyKZOEj87zhuphgggD971AOG83

And also, new developments in the historical record regarding Guatemala in the 1980s.

Recall that the Reagan administration engaged in multiple terrorist wars in central America in the 1980s. The program was to support --- often with active US participation and involvement --- murderous and repressive right-wing governments across the region. Perhaps the most notorious is Nicaragua, where the US fought against the democratically elected Sandinista government, both directly, and through the "Contras", using terrorist methods; for this, the US government was condemned by the International Court of Justice. Similar stories in Uruguay, Bolivia, Costa Rica, Grenada, Panama, El Salvador, and more.

But also in Guatemala. In 1954, Guatemala was the CIA's second great success (the first was overthrowing democracy in Iran) in the overthrow of the democratically-elected reformist Arbenz government. Policies of supporting brutal repressive governments continued into the 1990s. The Reagan administration, in its first two years, sent $13 million in military aid --- and these were the overt shipments. Covertly, the CIA used Cuban exiles to train security forces in Guatemala, including training in assassination techniques. Green Berets trained the Guatemalan Army. Guatemalan officers were trained at the School of the Americas in Panama. In March 1982, General Rios Montt took power in a coup, and Reagan responded by increasing military aid. In Montt's first 6 months in power, 2600 peasants were massacred; in his 17-month reign, 400 villages were wiped off the map. Reagan visited Montt in December 1982 and declared Montt was getting "a bad deal". In 1988, the Council on Hemispheric Affairs reported Guatemala still has the worst human rights record in Latin America.

The recent revelation regards abductions of students and labor leaders in the mid-1980s. Newly declassified documents show the US embassy was well aware that the Guatemalan government was behind them. Note these appear to be official diplomatic cables. The CIA station would presumably have been much more actively involved: it was standard CIA practice to have at least liaisons, if not paid agents, within all national security forces.

Historical Archives Lead to Arrest of Police Officers in Guatemalan Disappearance
Declassified documents show U.S. Embassy knew that Guatemalan security forces were behind wave of abductions of students and labor leaders
http://www.gwu.edu/~nsarchiv/NSAEBB/NSAEBB273/index.htm