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| Iraq |
| Human Rights Watch accuse U.S. of not being nice (again) |
| 2003-07-21 |
| Amnesty International accused U.S. troops on Sunday of "very severe" human rights abuses in Iraq and complained that it had been denied access to thousands of prisoners held without charge in "appalling" conditions." (No curtains, TV, or Phone OMG!) Amnesty spokeswoman Judit Arenas Licea said some Iraqis had been forced to stand under the blistering sun for up to 48 hours in U.S.-run detention centers that lack proper sanitation and that relatives had no information on their plight. One detainee was shot dead by U.S. troops during a prison riot last month, she told Reuters in an interview in Baghdad. (Shot during a riot? Hmmm I will call this a clean one) "We are disappointed that human rights were used as an excuse to go to war in Iraq and now the human rights of Iraqis are being violated," she said, condemning conditions at among other sites Saddam Hussein’s once notorious Abu Ghraib prison. (And during Saddam’s rein, where were these accusations?) A (I’m sure these fellows were treated badly..THEY'RE ALIVE!) It is also investigating abuses under Saddam, although most of those imprisoned by him are now free (to join the anti-U.S. crowd). While some Iraqis detained by invading troops have been released, many remain in prisons with no access to a lawyer or families, Licea said. (Um there stil is NOT a legal system in Iraq. What law would a lawyer practice?) The U.S. military authorities have repeatedly turned down Amnesty’s requests for access to those jails, Licea said. Some Iraqis are being held by the Americans at the Abu Ghraib complex near Baghdad, one of the most feared prisons under Saddam. Today it is heavily guarded by U.S. troops. Licea alleged that American soldiers shot and killed detainee Alaa Jassem there on June 13 while trying to contain prisoners rioting against poor conditions. (One person? Isn’t that genocide in Arab press?) U.S. Deputy Defense Secretary Paul Wolfowitz visited Abu Ghraib prison on Sunday as part of a five-day tour of Iraq. Saddam and his associates had "murdered" 30,000 people in Abu Ghraib, Wolfowitz told reporters, adding that he believed that most Iraqis were now behind the United States. When Amnesty tried to investigate prison conditions it got similar answers from U.S. soldiers every time, Licea said: "They just cite security reasons for not giving information. But we know from ex-prisoners that many have not bathed properly for months and there is no sanitation." (I doubt this, We DO NOT like stinky prisoners) Amnesty has also been denied access to a temporary American prison set up at Baghdad’s main airport where it believes some of Saddam’s top officials are held. U.S. troops, who have lost 37 of their comrades to attacks since major combat was declared over on May 1, have struggled to impose order since they toppled Saddam. Many fear for their lives and so prefer to trust no one on the streets. But Licea said this was prolonging a vicious circle of mistrust as soldiers were heavy handed in arrests and searches. "People are handcuffed and put on their knees and humiliated. There was one case where a 12-year-old child was handcuffed behind his back with a group of adults. The Americans treat the children like adults," she said. (Honey if he had a gun he IS an adult) This story is SOOO slanted it’s almost comical. You notice the most (of not all) the ’charges’ sound an awful lot like Saddam’s treatment of prisoners. I know it’s not a country club, but are ours guys supposed to entertain these yahoos? Where was this ’human rights’ group when Saddam and family were in power? Practicing the CNN reporting method I bet. |
| Posted by:Cyber Sarge |
| #11 Anyone see the story about the latest "investigation" of the Justice Department and the Patriot Act? Seems there have been 32 whole cases of alleged "mistreatment" of people acknowledged to be illegal aliens who were rounded up after 9/11. You know what the big disclosure was (the full "report" comes out next week). That a guard with the federal Bureau of Prisons made a detainee take off his shirt and wipe the guard's shoes clean. Talk about brutality! No context, no sense of history, and a complete unwillingness to cut the Bush Administration a break. That's the left, that's the pacificists. |
| Posted by: R. McLeod 2003-7-22 3:22:19 AM |
| #10 Nothing to get excited about, folks. Just plain old jealous hypocrisy. |
| Posted by: Old Tom 2003-7-21 11:16:46 PM |
| #9 SOG475 - ever notice that they only bitch about countries that have lots of 5-star hotels - just like reporters? You won't see them in Basra or Baghdad - they'll file from Kuwait City or Dubai or London (I like the Savoy, myself) or NY. ;-> |
| Posted by: PD 2003-7-21 8:43:05 PM |
| #8 Okay so what, Amnesty International comes out from under their rock in Hyde Park and writes another diatribe as fodder for the "America Last" crowd on the left. These idiots are tiresome, they waste my time, they irritate rational people and they waste newsprint. When these knaves and fools actually come out and make a politically incorrect pronouncement about something profound like the millions of people killed in central Africa, I might take them seriously. They step over the bodies of thousands of poor murdered souls in Iraq and bellyache when we marginally mistreat or bruise some Baath party thug with an RPG in his garage. They whine about how we treat the Taliban when they killed and brutalized an entire country. They are so predictable. They could have written this from under the safety of their warren in Hyde Park or on the train going to their mummies for tea, ala Jason Blair. Do we have proof they even went to Iraq. I notice there is a complete absence of any remorse or outrage over the 30,000 bodies we have found in mass graves in the Shi'ite south and the Kurdish north of Iraq. AND I do not have any recollection of them making any pronouncements on Saddam's little auto de fey that he held for the Shi'ites in 1991. These dimwits disgust me. There is nothing worse than selective morality that an act is only bad when a certain group committs them but if you are part of the politically correct and on the left's holy and blest list you can exterminate whole populations, like in Africa, heaven forbid anyone criticize those darling little marxists in Africa. After all, colonialism was so BAD...and dull too, there were no mass murders to write about. I am also irritated that we even bother to post this stuff. I am also irritated that I even post my objections. |
| Posted by: SOG475 2003-7-21 7:59:39 PM |
| #7 yea we sure are mistreating them iraqi's what no bath -- seems to me that it would be the troops who are being mistreated - forced to smell those rats! |
| Posted by: Dan 2003-7-21 7:20:12 PM |
| #6 "How do they "stand under the blistering sun for up to 48 hours" when there is only 14 hours of sunlight in Baghdad?" This is America, don't you know, and we obviously spare no expense to harm others. Could be we reflect sunlight off the International Space Station. I don't know how we do it, but if "human rights" activists say we are doing something wrong, who are we to argue? |
| Posted by: BJD (The Dignified Rant) 2003-7-21 4:18:01 PM |
| #5 How do they "stand under the blistering sun for up to 48 hours" when there is only 14 hours of sunlight in Baghdad? |
| Posted by: Bob 2003-7-21 4:11:57 PM |
| #4 Searching under the streetlight again, are we?... |
| Posted by: mojo 2003-7-21 3:12:26 PM |
| #3 Amazing. We run the world's only "concentration camps" in Gitmo (to go by Amnesty International's claims) where the prisoners leave a good dozen pounds heavier than when they went in. Hmm, I can see where the McDonalds lawsuit teams will go next. |
| Posted by: BJD (The Dignified Rant) 2003-7-21 1:47:13 PM |
| #2 This story is SOOO slanted it’s almost comical. The leaning tower of Pisa used to be slanted. This story just plain topples over. Of course, they would ignore your question tu. But by refusing to answer it, they would be telling all. |
| Posted by: Rafael 2003-7-21 1:28:25 PM |
| #1 When you walk up behind a troopie waiting to buy a soda and shoot him in the back of the head or kindap and murder 2 American soldiers, would Amnesia International consider that a human rights violation or the act of resistance by "freedom fighters"? I'd be real interested in their answer to that one. |
| Posted by: tu3031 2003-7-21 11:43:55 AM |