Secret US jails hold 10,000

[Jonty]

http://www.nzherald.co.nz/storydisplay.cfm?storyID=3566058&thesection=news&thesubsection=world&thesecondsubsection=&reportID=61564


Secret US jails hold 10,000

13.05.2004
By ANDREW BUNCOMBE and KIM SENGUPTA
WASHINGTON - Almost 10,000 prisoners from President George W. Bush's so-called war on terror are being held around the world in secretive American-run jails and interrogation centres similar to the notorious Abu Ghraib Prison.

Some of these detention centres are so sensitive that even the most senior members of the United States Congress have no idea where they are.

From Iraq to Afghanistan to Cuba, this American gulag is driven by the pressure to obtain "actionable" intelligence from prisoners captured by US forces.

The systematic practice of holding prisoners without access to lawyers or their families, together with a willingness to use "coercive interrogation" techniques, suggests the abuse of prisoners at Abu Ghraib now shocking the world could be widespread.

Iraq has become a holding pen for America's prisoners from 21 countries, according to a report from the international campaign group Human Rights Watch.

The US military is keeping prisoners at 10 centres, most of which were used by Saddam Hussein's regime. The total in January was 8968, and is thought to have increased.

Prisoners are being held from, among other countries, Algeria, Egypt, India, Iran, Iraq, the Palestinian territories, Jordan, Lebanon, Libya, Malaysia, Oman, Saudi Arabia, Somalia, Sudan, Syria, Sweden, Tunisia, Turkey, Ukraine, the United Kingdom and Yemen.

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[sullster]

I don't believe it. Who exactly are the sources for this claim. It is not clear in the article. The use of the prejorative term "gulag" discredits the article.

New Zealand is a very left wing country and we cannot expect its press to be objective. It must have pained them to use the word "gulag" rather than "concentration camps". The modern left can criticise Stalin now.

[pistonhips]

New Zealand is a very left wing country and we cannot expect its press to be objective.

Well..that takes care of that then...a blanket dismissal of any further stories from the New Zealand media...
:banghead:

[Tom Sawyer]

I don't believe it. Who exactly are the sources for this claim. It is not clear in the article.

The article said that the info comes from the Human Rights Watch and the International Red Cross, so the sources are clearly stated in the article.

The use of the prejorative term "gulag" discredits the article.

So, I take it that you also think that any commentary that uses the word "liberal" in a prejorative sense (or better yet a pejorative sense) should be immediately discredited?

New Zealand is a very left wing country and we cannot expect its press to be objective. It must have pained them to use the word "gulag" rather than "concentration camps". The modern left can criticise Stalin now.

Ya, those damn commies in New Zealand. You'd think they'd thank us for kicking Hitler out of there.

[Nick the Dick]

I don't believe it. Who exactly are the sources for this claim. It is not clear in the article. The use of the prejorative term "gulag" discredits the article.

New Zealand is a very left wing country and we cannot expect its press to be objective. It must have pained them to use the word "gulag" rather than "concentration camps". The modern left can criticise Stalin now.

That's funny sullster, cause I don't believe anything out of the US of A simply because it’s a very right wing country. With press like FOX news and personalities like Rush Limbaugh, its hard to find any sort of honest or objective reporting in the US.

[Farren]

Heh. I'm inclined to believe the NZ press more because by all accounts New Zealand is so godless. A friend who went to school there said all his classmates were athiests, including the son of a minister (my friend was a Christian at the time, a fact his classmates found surprising).

I should clarify that this is not simply a kneejerk reaction against religion. Many people who I love and respect are religious. But the Abrahamic religions require a mindset willing to project values and meanings into the world that simply aren't evidently there. This set of mental habits acts as a distorting lens on reality.

In my view the more Abrahamic religionists there are in a nation, the more distorted the perceptions within the society, including the press. A surplus of fundamentalists produces even more distortion. That's why I find much of what I hear from the NZ press and New Zealanders themselves sensible and rational, even if I disagree. They're not looking at the world through funfair glasses.

[reprise]

New Statesman (http://www.newstatesman.com/nscoverstory.htm) story discussing similar issues.

[sullster]

[QUOTE=Tom Sawyer]The article said that the info comes from the Human Rights Watch and the International Red Cross, so the sources are clearly stated in the article.
So, I take it that you also think that any commentary that uses the word "liberal" in a prejorative sense (or better yet a pejorative sense) should be immediately discredited?
Ya, those damn commies in New Zealand. You'd think they'd thank us for kicking Hitler out of there.[/QUOTE



I stand corrected and those sources must be accurate.

I have no problem with "liberal", you incorrectly assume I am right wing neo-con. I am dead centrist and I cannot stand the rhetoric of either wing. The use of the word "gulag" is becoming more common and it is used only as a provocation. Comparisons of US military prisons with Stalin's system is absurd. The left used to cry "nazi" or "fascist" at its enemies, now there is "gulag".

Nice try at assuming I don't know any history and thus make you look superior. In point of fact, New Zealand troops fought in Italy during WW2 as well as in the Pacific with the Aussies. I will thank them for helping defeat both Hitler and the Japanese.

I salute NZ atheism. You call them "damn commies" not me.

[Tom Sawyer]

Nice try at assuming I don't know any history and thus make you look superior. In point of fact, New Zealand troops fought in Italy during WW2 as well as in the Pacific with the Aussies. I will thank them for helping defeat both Hitler and the Japanese.

I salute NZ atheism. You call them damn commie not me.

My comment was meant facetiously. :banghead:

By the way, nice job dismissing the entire NZ press and then saluting the country :)

[reprise]

Nice try at assuming I don't know any history and thus make you look superior. In point of fact, New Zealand troops fought in Italy during WW2 as well as in the Pacific with the Aussies. I will thank them for helping defeat both Hitler and the Japanese.

I salute NZ atheism. You call them damn commie not me.

See, you refuse entry to US navy ships and pull out of one little treaty and next thing you know people are calling you commies. :D

Large sections of the Australian and New Zealand media probably do seem extremely left-wing to people living in the US, just as even the more "moderate" media in the US often seems quite right-wing to us. And yet we have our columnists and radio personalities who are every bit as froth at the mouth right wing as Rush and who believe that neo-con policies are the only hope for the world and GBW is the messiah. You probably don't hear about them because you have your own who are saying such things.

[Jonty]

Large sections of the Australian and New Zealand media probably do seem extremely left-wing to people living in the US, just as even the more "moderate" media in the US often seems quite right-wing to US.

There really is no "moderate" media in the USA, virtually all of it is strongly slanted to the right. I've proven the right wing media bias in this forum at least twice now and had no dissenting opinions.

Here is the link to one of the threads wherein I prove the right wing media bias.

http://www.iidb.org/vbb/showthread.php?t=72093&highlight=tyler+texas

[sullster]

There really is no "moderate" media in the USA, virtually all of it is strongly slanted to the right. I've proven the right wing media bias in this forum at least twice now and had no dissenting opinions.

Here is the link to one of the threads wherein I prove the right wing media bias.

http://www.iidb.org/vbb/showthread.php?t=72093&highlight=tyler+texas


I do not want to get into that and you have had threads proving your point as you say.

All I have to say is that all I ever hear is that the US media is left slanted and people like you say it is right slanted.

I give up.

[Farren]

Well "proof' is a word laden with strong value judgements and probably false in this case, but I can say, as a South African, that the SA news is far to the left of US news. Even the media that's considered "right" in SA is often "left" by US standards.

The US media seems to have hit a turning point around the inception of the Iraq war. Up until that point we were getting CNN and some snippets of FOX. The SABC abruptly terminated transmission of both, apparently because they were so propagandized.

Since we had SKY and BBC on other channels as well as local news, I remember thinking "Christ the US media seems to be in patriot (tm) mode" before they terminated it. There seemed to be a massive disjunct between US media (not just TV, but print) and all the other stuff I was getting.

Curiously, I recall news reports of Israel where Christina Amampour was asked "We're recieving reports that the Israeli's are using Palestinians as human shields while advancing on the PLO compound. Is this true?" She said "I can't verify that at this time"

Later, several news sources revealed that both a UN observer and a reporter from Le Monde, standing on either side of her, revealed that it was undoubtedly true and evident from where they were standing.

Why it's curious, if not necessarily relevant to Iraq (but probably) is that it was Amampour who later publically revealed "We were under tremendous pressure to show a viewpoint favourable to the US in Iraq. The media was cowed. Yes, perhaps even my own station"...

[Jonty]

Well "proof' is a word laden with strong value judgements and probably false in this case, but I can say, as a South African, that the SA news is far to the left of US news. Even the media that's considered "right" in SA is often "left" by US standards.



No value judgements involved, go and look at the thread I linked to and if you find any flaw in my logic please let me know.

[Jonty]

I do not want to get into that and you have had threads proving your point as you say.

All I have to say is that all I ever hear is that the US media is left slanted and people like you say it is right slanted.

I give up.

Go and read the thread I linked to, if you can find any flaw in my logic please let me know..

The "left wing media" meme is simply "poisoning the well" on the part of the right.

[mrmoderate]

Is there any reason the Red Cross is not publicly announcing this secret?

[Farren]

Is there any reason the Red Cross is not publicly announcing this secret?

A pretty good reason would be they don't have access to all sites. The RC only gains automatic access to sites in occupied countries or countries at war, if I understand the GC correctly. Amnesty International, on the other hand, is a little more inquisitive in it's approach - and has been sharply critical of the US of late.

[reprise]

Is there any reason the Red Cross is not publicly announcing this secret?


IIRC, the International Red Cross keeps the specific details of its findings secret in order to ensure that it has continued access to facilities in which people are detained during times of international conflict.

[Sauron]

I don't believe it. Who exactly are the sources for this claim. It is not clear in the article. The use of the prejorative term "gulag" discredits the article.

New Zealand is a very left wing country and we cannot expect its press to be objective. It must have pained them to use the word "gulag" rather than "concentration camps". The modern left can criticise Stalin now.

Then you're really gonna hate this piece coming out of Australia, that bastion of whiny liberalism: :rolleyes:

http://www.smh.com.au/articles/2004/05/14/1084289883713.html


Regime change in America its last hope?
By Margo Kingston
May 14, 2004

So, the bloke who designed America’s debacle in Iraq and sent kids without training to Abu Ghraib goes to the scene of the crime to tell his troops that while the small fry will fry, “I’m a survivor�.

I don’t think so. Incredible stuff is going down in America as the nation comes to terms with the fact that its rulers have destroyed the myth Americans live by and are in the process of destroying American power as well. Many Americans will mourn the fact that they didn’t listen to the stream of whistleblowers before the war – the sacked generals and the diplomats who resigned.
[...]
To begin, prominent pro-war commentator Thomas Friedman of the New York Times writes an extraordinary mea culpa under the headline Dancing Alone:

Do we have any chance of succeeding at regime change in Iraq without regime change here at home? "Hey, Friedman, why are you bringing politics into this all of a sudden? You're the guy who always said that producing a decent outcome in Iraq was of such overriding importance to the country that it had to be kept above politics."

Yes, that's true. I still believe that. My mistake was thinking that the Bush team believed it, too. I thought the administration would have to do the right things in Iraq — from prewar planning and putting in enough troops to dismissing the secretary of defense for incompetence — because surely this was the most important thing for the president and the country. But I was wrong. There is something even more important to the Bush crowd than getting Iraq right, and that's getting re-elected and staying loyal to the conservative base to do so.

I admit, I'm a little slow. Because I tried to think about something as deadly serious as Iraq, and the post- 9/11 world, in a nonpartisan fashion — as Joe Biden, John McCain and Dick Lugar did — I assumed the Bush officials were doing the same. I was wrong. They were always so slow to change course because confronting their mistakes didn't just involve confronting reality, but their own politics.
To begin, prominent pro-war commentator Thomas Friedman of the New York Times writes an extraordinary mea culpa under the headline Dancing Alone:

Do we have any chance of succeeding at regime change in Iraq without regime change here at home? "Hey, Friedman, why are you bringing politics into this all of a sudden? You're the guy who always said that producing a decent outcome in Iraq was of such overriding importance to the country that it had to be kept above politics."

Yes, that's true. I still believe that. My mistake was thinking that the Bush team believed it, too. I thought the administration would have to do the right things in Iraq — from prewar planning and putting in enough troops to dismissing the secretary of defense for incompetence — because surely this was the most important thing for the president and the country. But I was wrong. There is something even more important to the Bush crowd than getting Iraq right, and that's getting re-elected and staying loyal to the conservative base to do so.

I admit, I'm a little slow. Because I tried to think about something as deadly serious as Iraq, and the post- 9/11 world, in a nonpartisan fashion — as Joe Biden, John McCain and Dick Lugar did — I assumed the Bush officials were doing the same. I was wrong. They were always so slow to change course because confronting their mistakes didn't just involve confronting reality, but their own politics.

[reprise]

I nearly linked to the Margo Kingston article earlier. Her pieces of late have been fairly shrill, as have the pieces written by her right wing counterparts like Piers Akerman (http://dailytelegraph.news.com.au/story.jsp?sectionid=1292&storyid=1329729). I wouldn't regard either as writing "balanced" commentaries.

[Underseer]

Thanks for posting the article, Sauron. That was a good read.