Singing The Gitmo Blues

[obeygiant]

Detainee: Cheap deodorant, lack of DVD players equals torture

MAY 15--An accused al-Qaeda member being held at the Guantanamo Bay detention facility claims he is being mentally tortured by guards who provide him with "cheap branded unscented deodorant," deprive him of DVD players and other entertainment, and stock a recreation area with deflated balls that "hardly bounce." The complaints from Majid Khan are contained in a transcript of an April 15 Combatant Status Review Tribunal held at Gitmo. An excerpt from the transcript, which was released today by the Department of Defense, can be found below. Khan is one of 15 suspected enemy combatants who were transported last year to Guanatanamo from overseas CIA jails for military tribunals. According to U.S. officials, Khan pledged to "martyr himself" against Pakistan President Pervez Musharraf by "detonating a vest of explosives inside a building," and referred to al-Qaeda leader Khalid Sheikh Mohammed as his "uncle." During the April tribunal, Khan's representative read a lengthy statement from the accused terrorist, which included a section with "some facts about how they are mentally torturing us." Along with toiletry, exercise, and entertainment beefs, Khan was upset about the weekly "newsletter" he receives: "Most of the stuff is crap; only few pages are worth reading." During the hearing, Khan denied al-Qaeda ties, saying, "I am not an Enemy Combatant. I am not an extremist."

the smoking gun

[OldCorpse]

So, Himmler, is the Red Cross still complaining that Auschwitz shouldn't even exist?

Yes, mein Führer, and the Jews even have the audacity to complain about the excellent shower facilities we have so kindly provided for them!

http://www.commondreams.org/headlines04/1130-01.htm

"Red Cross: Guantanamo Tactics 'Tantamount to Torture'

WASHINGTON - The International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) has accused the U.S. military of using tactics "tantamount to torture" on prisoners at the U.S. Navy base in Guantanamo Bay, The New York Times reported on Tuesday.

A detainee is escorted by guards at Guantanamo Bay. In a confidential report the International Committee of the Red Cross said it found prisoner abuse that amounted to 'a form of torture' at the US military facility, The New York Times reported (AFP/File/Roberto Schmidt)
An ICRC inspection team that spent most of June at Guantanamo Bay reported the use of psychological and sometimes physical coercion on the prisoners, the newspaper said.

It said it had recently obtained a memorandum that quoted the report in detail and listed its major findings.

In Geneva, the ICRC said it would neither confirm nor deny the New York Times report -- in which allegations of treatment tantamount to torture go further than what the neutral intermediary has publicly stated before about inmates held at Guantanamo.

But, in a statement, the Geneva-based ICRC said it remained concerned that "significant problems regarding conditions and treatment at Guantanamo Bay have not yet been adequately addressed," and it was pursuing talks with U.S. authorities.

More than 500 people are being held at the U.S. base in Cuba, detained during the 2001 U.S. war to oust al Qaeda and the ruling Taliban from Afghanistan and in other operations in the U.S. war against terror. The ICRC began visits in early 2002.

The Times said the U.S. government and military officials received the ICRC report in July and rejected its findings.

Asked by the Times about the report, a Pentagon spokesman said in a statement: "The United States operates a safe, humane and professional detention operation at Guantanamo that is providing valuable information in the war on terrorism."

The Times said the Red Cross investigators had found a system devised to break the will of prisoners through "humiliating acts, solitary confinement, temperature extremes, use of forced positions."

"The construction of such a system, whose stated purpose is the production of intelligence, cannot be considered other than an intentional system of cruel, unusual and degrading treatment and a form of torture," the Times quoted the report as saying.

Beatrice Megevand-Roggo, the committee's delegate-general for Europe and the Americas, told the newspaper the ICRC could not comment on the report submitted to the U.S. government.

The ICRC has agreed to keep its findings confidential.

Human rights groups and lawyers have criticized the United States for holding prisoners at the base indefinitely and most without charges or legal representation.

The U.S. government has taken the position that the detainees are "enemy combatants" and not entitled to the protections normally given to prisoners of war.

It has begun a process of holding individual trials, called tribunals, for each prisoner to determine their status.

Additional reporting by Stephanie Nebehay in Geneva"

Red Cross - those commie terrorist-loving dhimmi bastards!

[Ugg]

Are you guaranteeing that this is real? I thought nothing was ever to be leaked about what went on during the trials. Sounds highly dubious at best and most likely simply propaganda to keep the hearts of Americans hardened against "the infidel".

Anyone who believes a government leak from the Guantanamo trials, I have a mansion in Baghdad I'll sell you for a good price.....

[OldCorpse]

Originally Posted by Ugg

Are you guaranteeing that this is real? I thought nothing was ever to be leaked about what went on during the trials. Sounds highly dubious at best and most likely simply propaganda to keep the hearts of Americans hardened against "the infidel".

Anyone who believes a government leak from the Guantanamo trials, I have a mansion in Baghdad I'll sell you for a good price.....

Sure it can be real. Don't you understand how propaganda works? You can always find one or two guys in any large group who are plain crazy, and then all you need is do some fancy editing, and try to smear the rest of the prisoners by pretending that this is representative. And guess what, it works!

You know, how I made the joke in the post above about Nazi concentration camps and the Red Cross? It was based on truth. The Nazis actually managed to fool the Red Cross into believing the concentration camps were A-OK! If the Nazis can be good enough with propaganda to fool the Red Cross about concentration camps, then surely this administration - if not quite competent enough to fool the Red Cross, can at least fool some American people (the right wing nuts, of course, not normal people). Here's the Red Cross fooled by Nazis about concentration camps - link well worth reading:

http://www.scrapbookpages.com/CzechR...rossVisit.html

Among the Nazi concentration camps, Buchenwald is famous for its human lamp shades; Auschwitz is noted for its gas chambers and Bergen-Belsen will be forever remembered as the place where British bulldozers shoved the emaciated corpses of the deliberately starved inmates into mass graves. Theresienstadt's claim to fame is the beautification program (Verschönerung) in which the Nazis cleaned up the ghetto in preparation for a visit on June 23, 1944 by two Swiss delegates of the International Red Cross and two representatives of the government of Denmark.

[solvs]

Isn't it obvious? One guy might be a jerk. So there's no scandal here. We're obviously not torturing anyone, nor holding them against their wills without trials for years even though some are innocent because someone found one douchebag who may want a DVD player and some scented deodorant if he exists.

Well, I know I'm placated.

[OldCorpse]

Below is a bit more balanced article about the same guy. Funny, how the wingnuts jumped on this story to try to score political points, and the more one actually investigates the story, the worse it looks for the wingnut case. Just like everything connected with this massive war crime and gangster administration. It's like trying to find something good about the Nazis, and then, suprise, surprise, all you find is evil. Pathetic.

What's interesting here is not his treatment (he complains about ridiculous things, but also about more serious stuff, that caused him to attempt suicide twice, and an extensive hunger strike).

What is truly amazing, pathetic and plain disgusting, is just how extraordinarly weak the case against him appears. Key witnesses took back their testimony claiming CIA pressure. The guy offers to take polygraphs. There appears pathetically little in the way of hard evidence.

I don't know one way or another about the guilt of this guy. I certainly find the entire phenomemon of Gitmo and the massive abuses combined with the pathetically weak cases - to be something of a low point for our nation. How can we ever hold the moral high ground with this disgrace dogging our every step all over the world?

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn...print/asection

"A suspected terrorist who once lived in Maryland told a military tribunal that he was "mentally tortured" at the U.S. detention facility at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, and was driven to twice attempt suicide by chewing through his own arteries, according to a transcript of a hearing released yesterday by the Pentagon.

Majid Khan, 27, one of 14 "high-value" suspects held for years by the CIA at secret foreign prisons before their transfer to Guantanamo Bay, also said he lost 30 pounds in 27 days during a hunger strike, according to the transcript. In a statement redacted in places by government censors, he complained of mistreatment that ranged from having his beard forcibly shaved and spending weeks without sunlight to the poor quality of the camp's weekly newsletter, it says."

[obeygiant]

Originally Posted by OldCorpse

Sure it can be real. Don't you understand how propaganda works? You can always find one or two guys in any large group who are plain crazy, and then all you need is do some fancy editing, and try to smear the rest of the prisoners by pretending that this is representative. And guess what, it works!

Here is another account from 2005.

More Gitmo torture practices revealed - Report
13/06/2005
The future of the "detention" facility at Guantanomo is once again the issue of debate.

A suspect held in Guantanamo Bay was stripped, forced to bark like a dog, and subjected to music, it emerged as debate intensified in the U.S. capital over the future of the detention camp in Cuba.

The latest disclosures come in a prison log of the treatment of Mohammad al-Kahtani, a Saudi citizen whom many U.S. investigators allege to be the 20th member of the September 11th attacks. The document, extracts of which appear in Time magazine, covers a 50 day spell in 2002-03 - a period when additional interrogation techniques were approved by Donald Rumsfeld, the Defence Secretary.

They included a "sissy slap" with an inflated latex glove, ordering Kahtani to "bark to elevate his social status up to that of a dog," and rejecting a request that he be allowed to pray. On other occasions, water was poured on his head and music by Christina Aguilera was played to keep him awake in midnight sessions.

Other torture tactics Kahtani was subjected to include being questioned in a room decorated with pictures of 11 September victims.

Furthermore, he was made to urinate in his underpants, and at other times to wear pictures of scantily clad women around his neck.

At one point, according to the log, he asked to commit suicide.

A Pentagon official was quoted by the magazine as saying that the log was "the kind of document that was never meant to leave Gitmo."

It is also a document that will only intensify foreign criticism of the prison at the U.S. base, recently described by Amnesty International as a "Gulag of our times".

The former U.S. president Jimmy Carter has added his voice to those calling for its closure, while some senior Democratic lawmakers have called it a "recruiting tool" for "international terrorism".

So sensitive has the issue become that a report in Newsweek magazine last month claiming that a Quran had been flushed down a lavatory at the base led to anti-American riots in Pakistan and Afghanistan in which dozens of people were killed.

The news magazine later retracted the report, but a Pentagon investigation acknowledged other instances in which the Quran was desecrated by guards and interrogators at the camp.

The White House appears split on the issue of the closure of Guantanamo.

Duncan Hunter, the chairman of the House Armed Services Committee, said that some members of the Bush administration favoured closing the camp. "They're divided," Hunter said. "Some members of the White House have come to the conclusion that the legend is different than the fact."

aljazeera.com

[Swarmlord]

Originally Posted by obeygiant

Here is another account from 2005.


aljazeera.com

Real Jack Bauer stuff there. Lol! Oh no! Not the sissy slap!

[leekohler]

Originally Posted by OldCorpse

Below is a bit more balanced article about the same guy. Funny, how the wingnuts jumped on this story to try to score political points, and the more one actually investigates the story, the worse it looks for the wingnut case. Just like everything connected with this massive war crime and gangster administration. It's like trying to find something good about the Nazis, and then, suprise, surprise, all you find is evil. Pathetic.

What's interesting here is not his treatment (he complains about ridiculous things, but also about more serious stuff, that caused him to attempt suicide twice, and an extensive hunger strike).

What is truly amazing, pathetic and plain disgusting, is just how extraordinarly weak the case against him appears. Key witnesses took back their testimony claiming CIA pressure. The guy offers to take polygraphs. There appears pathetically little in the way of hard evidence.

I don't know one way or another about the guilt of this guy. I certainly find the entire phenomemon of Gitmo and the massive abuses combined with the pathetically weak cases - to be something of a low point for our nation. How can we ever hold the moral high ground with this disgrace dogging our every step all over the world?

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn...print/asection

"A suspected terrorist who once lived in Maryland told a military tribunal that he was "mentally tortured" at the U.S. detention facility at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, and was driven to twice attempt suicide by chewing through his own arteries, according to a transcript of a hearing released yesterday by the Pentagon.

Majid Khan, 27, one of 14 "high-value" suspects held for years by the CIA at secret foreign prisons before their transfer to Guantanamo Bay, also said he lost 30 pounds in 27 days during a hunger strike, according to the transcript. In a statement redacted in places by government censors, he complained of mistreatment that ranged from having his beard forcibly shaved and spending weeks without sunlight to the poor quality of the camp's weekly newsletter, it says."

How dare you question the government! You must be for the terr'rists!

[.Andy]

Originally Posted by Swarmlord

Real Jack Bauer stuff there. Lol! Oh no! Not the sissy slap!

Not surprising you see the world through eyes of fiction.

[solvs]

Does anyone really like the idea of Gitmo and Abu Ghraib? You don't have a problem with innocent people being kidnapped, tortured, all in the name of freedom? Are you that desperate to defend the incompetence and corruption of the people you support by picking one kook as representative of the whole picture? Willing to ignore the overwhelming evidence that this is not the case for a majority of those who, even if guilty, are treated ways we decry our enemies for? That our system is set up to protect against because the FF realized such things could lead to abuse, especially against the innocent, to make us no better than those we fight against? Even the guilty get to have rights, because everyone has them or no one does. This is such a basic fundamental principle of our society, I'm continually amazed at those so ill informed as to not understand why such places hurt us all.

The real (warning, graphic) story (here, here, here, here here).

[Swarmlord]

Originally Posted by solvs

Does anyone really like the idea of Gitmo and Abu Ghraib?

Absolutely! We need somewhere to hold foreign nationals.

Originally Posted by solvs

You don't have a problem with innocent people being kidnapped, tortured, all in the name of freedom? <snip>

Innocent? These must be some of those Baby Aspirin factory workers that found themselves holding AK-47s in the wrong place at the wrong time. I hate it when that happens.

[skunk]

Originally Posted by Swarmlord

Absolutely! We need somewhere to hold foreign nationals.

Is this your considered opinion, or is it your attempt at humour? If it is your "considered" opinion, are you supporting the idea of holding people for four or five years without offering a shred of evidence against them? Is this the freedom and justice your heroes are fighting for? A serious answer, please.

[Swarmlord]

Originally Posted by skunk

Is this your considered opinion, or is it your attempt at humour? If it is your "considered" opinion, are you supporting the idea of holding people for four or five years without offering a shred of evidence against them? Is this the freedom and justice your heroes are fighting for? A serious answer, please.

Not without a shred of evidence. If you think these guys were all day care workers, then you'd be sadly mistaken. Do you think that they should be just released back into Afganistan and hope they apply for jobs at the Red Crescent?

[leekohler]

Originally Posted by Swarmlord

Not without a shred of evidence. If you think these guys were all day care workers, then you'd be sadly mistaken. Do you think that they should be just released back into Afganistan and hope they apply for jobs at the Red Crescent?

Uh oh- skunk's gonna get you...

[Swarmlord]

Originally Posted by leekohler

Uh oh- skunk's gonna get you...

He work at Red Crescent?

[zimv20]

Originally Posted by Swarmlord

Not without a shred of evidence. If you think these guys were all day care workers, then you'd be sadly mistaken. Do you think that they should be just released back into Afganistan and hope they apply for jobs at the Red Crescent?

oldcorpse was right about you: you need authority. i'll tell you that it's completely antithetical to the basis on which this country was founded to trust the gov't so much.

especially after this bunch in the WH has proven itself so untrustworthy. the trust you have is tragically misplaced.

[skunk]

Originally Posted by Swarmlord

Not without a shred of evidence.

You seem very sure. More sure, in fact, than some CIA operatives. Your sources must be very well-informed.

AP: Gitmo Detainees Say They Were Sold

They fed them well. The Pakistani tribesmen slaughtered a sheep in honor of their guests, Arabs and Chinese Muslims famished from fleeing U.S. bombing in the Afghan mountains. But their hosts had ulterior motives: to sell them to the Americans, said the men who are now prisoners at Guantanamo Bay.

Bounties ranged from $3,000 to $25,000, the detainees testified during military tribunals, according to transcripts the U.S. government gave The Associated Press to comply with a Freedom of Information lawsuit.

A former CIA intelligence officer who helped lead the search for Osama bin Laden told AP the accounts sounded legitimate because U.S. allies regularly got money to help catch Taliban and al-Qaida fighters. Gary Schroen said he took a suitcase of $3 million in cash into Afghanistan himself to help supply and win over warlords to fight for U.S. Special Forces.

"It wouldn't surprise me if we paid rewards," said Schroen, who retired after 32 years in the CIA soon after the fall of Kabul in late 2001.

http://www.commondreams.org/headlines05/0531-10.htm

And another even more egregious example:

From Times Online
May 4, 2007
Family greet London chef after Guantanamo ordeal

Sean O’Neill
A London chef held for four years in Guantanamo Bay on the basis of false information from an anonymous informant has been reunited with his family, The Times has learnt.

In his first comment since his release, Ahmed Errachidi thanked the hundreds of British people who wrote to him when he was interned. He was freed from the US detention camp last week and flown back to his native Morocco after the British Government refused to intervene on his behalf.

He was taken to a Moroccan prison and appeared in court in Rabat on Wednesday on terrorist charges. But local human-rights lawyers, instructed by the British charity Reprieve, argued successfully for the allegations to be dropped and secured his release.

Mr Errachidi, 40, who was working in the kitchen of a Mayfair hotel at a time when the US authorities claimed he was at an al-Qaeda camp in Afghanistan, was welcomed from jail by his wife and two sons, and returned to the family’s home in Tangiers. Speaking for the first time since his release, he said: “I received 283 letters from people in Britain, 283 beautiful letters that gave me so much hope.

“I am particularly grateful to the mothers and fathers who let their young children write to me and send me the little cards they had drawn, as it was a constant reminder of my own two young boys. I am very sorry not to have written back to each and every person, but I was treated very, very badly in Guantanamo. They held me in isolation for months on end, and I did not even have a pen.”

The chef, who worked in restaurants around London for 16 years, was detained in Pakistan in 2002 and, according to testimony to a US military tribunal, sold for a $5,000 (&#163;2,500) bounty to the CIA. At Guantanamo Bay, the internment camp at a US naval base on Cuba, the American guards nicknamed him “the General” in the mistaken belief that he was an al-Qaeda commander. Information from an unidentified source alleged that he had been at an al-Qaeda training camp in July 2001.

British lawyers were able to produce payslips and witnesses to show that during that month he had been cooking at the Westbury Hotel. Clive Stafford Smith, legal director of Reprieve and Mr Errachidi’s lawyer, said: “Ahmed’s case is an exhibit of everything that is wrong with Guantanamo Bay. The US military relied on false intelligence, saying Ahmed was the ‘General’ of al-Qaeda when he was a London chef.

“The US said Ahmed was training terrorists in Afghanistan at a time when he was cooking in a London hotel. When Ahmed was suffering from a mental breakdown, the US military continued to interrogate him.

http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/new...cle1744613.ece

Do you have any sassy little riposte to this one? For someone to have the gall to call themselves a "libertarian" when they have such scant respect for protecting other people's personal liberty is a bit of a sick joke, don't you think?

[Swarmlord]

Originally Posted by skunk

You seem very sure. More sure, in fact, than some CIA operatives. Your sources must be very well-informed.http://www.commondreams.org/headlines05/0531-10.htm

And another even more egregious example:
http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/new...cle1744613.ece

Do you have any sassy little riposte to this one? For someone to have the gall to call themselves a "libertarian" when they have such scant respect for protecting other people's personal liberty is a bit of a sick joke, don't you think?

If you want to believe that we're holding these guys and pumping them for years worth of cooking recipes and sheep herding techniques then go ahead. And no, I really am not concerned about the freedoms and rights of terrorists.

Perhaps you can write the State Department and get permission to house one of these misunderstood, sold out goat herders to stay at your home for a little cultural exchange.

[zimv20]

Originally Posted by Swarmlord

If you want to believe that we're holding these guys and pumping them for years worth of cooking recipes and sheep herding techniques then go ahead. And no, I really am not concerned about the freedoms and rights of terrorists.

just curious: if the CIA offered you $25k to say that i was a terrorist, would you do it?

[Swarmlord]

Originally Posted by zimv20

oldcorpse was right about you: you need authority. <snip>

Humans need authority. It's the downside to not completely depending on instinct like some species can.

[Swarmlord]

Originally Posted by zimv20

just curious: if the CIA offered you $25k to say that i was a terrorist, would you do it?

Do you think that they would offer it unless I had some evidence to support it? If you think they are that guillable, why stop at you? I'd just turn in the entire audience of the next Superbowl and retire.

[skunk]

Originally Posted by Swarmlord

And no, I really am not concerned about the freedoms and rights of terrorists.

Perhaps you can write the State Department and get permission to house one of these misunderstood, sold out goat herders to stay at your home for a little cultural exchange.

You do not deserve your freedom.

[leekohler]

Originally Posted by Swarmlord

If you want to believe that we're holding these guys and pumping them for years worth of cooking recipes and sheep herding techniques then go ahead. And no, I really am not concerned about the freedoms and rights of terrorists.

And apparently not with the rights and freedoms of the innocent either.

Originally Posted by Swarmlord

Perhaps you can write the State Department and get permission to house one of these misunderstood, sold out goat herders to stay at your home for a little cultural exchange.

Hmm...but maybe we should have them stay with you instead. Maybe you could learn something.

Originally Posted by Swarmlord

Do you think that they would offer it unless I had some evidence to support it? If you think they are that guillable, why stop at you? I'd just turn in the entire audience of the next Superbowl and retire.

You really don't get it, do you?

[Swarmlord]

Originally Posted by skunk

You do not deserve your freedom.

And you once again prove why no one has asked you to be put in charge of this place.