HRW: The Bush Administration is Getting Away with Torture
Democracy is not about force or control. It is about sharing power and liberty. Real freedom is not just doing what you want to at the expense of others it is truly feeling the peace of freedom where you are free to live to your highest potential. There is nothing free in the terminology ‘free market’ it simply means no government restrictions, that business can pursue its agenda under the banner of jobs and economic growth. People believe these are good things, that they benefit. However, if human rights are violated, if cruelty is applied, if murder is committed in the name of freedom, then a great darkness has indeed descended over the minds of people. What of our shared humanity? What of empathy for the suffering of another? What of justice? Why is it okay in order to win a war?
The apathy and busyness of our times has rendered democracy an unrealised potential. The aspiration to be rich and famous to have the big house, car and status are dreams of the industrial revolution that are no longer sustainable today. We are living in a world imploding under its own weight in materialism. I see the twin towers collapsing in this moment as a metaphor. This materialism is driven by the media, social norms and values cultivating our demand which drives the injustice we are witnessing around the world. I always remember Gandhi encouraging his people to make their own clothes, to spin khardi (home spun) and to stop buying the clothes from Britain which was the terroriser of the Indian people. It was trade that was seeking out the cheap resources and labour to maximise their profits and lust for power. We have to understand that the world is in the shape it is in because of all us consumers. We can stop the human rights violations, the war crimes by researching a way of life that is peaceful. To live in a way that leads by example and reveals what a Culture of Peace is about and what genuine liberty and happiness means. You truly have the power. The people in Human Rights Watch are just people who are speaking up. The activist are often just people who decide to get together and live the democracy they are told they have and voice their concerns. So those sitting on the sidelines cheering or booing are not in the game. There is a lot sitting in the colesium of TV, many are choosing to not get involved in a world paradigm that will affect themselves and their children. It is all our responsibility to ensure justice and human rights are top of the agenda. Why – Imagine if it was me in the other’s shoes (situation), what would I want people to do? I would want them to care about me.
The article by Human Rights Watch is speaking of the human rights violations conducted during the wars of Iraq and Afghanistan. I reflect on Clinton decoupling human rights from trade as one of the major errors of US Government policy. It revealed the power given to business over the justice to people. Why would decoupling of trade and human rights be necessary in a just world where business is conducted ethically. These are basic standards. It suggests business know they are going to violate human rights and want to just go ahead for the sake of profit. As Noam Chomsky entitled his book Power over People. That is the core issue here. As a result of decoupling trade from human rights it gave the green light for multinational companies to go on despoiling the environment ignoring the people who were affected by their activities, it gave the green light for business to buddy up with government and work together to make money, ignoring the outcries of people affected and seeing the opportunity cost in law suits (worth paying out parties and continuing on). There are numerous examples. The situation at Guantanamo revealed human rights divorced from humane conduct under the rules of war. This was circumvented and beyond this were business priorities that took precedence over the right to life for many people. It revealed how we treat each other when money or advantage is involved. The Geneva Conventions were set up in international law to ensure humanitarian treatment of prisoners. What we saw was the US undertake side stepping this law and commit violations themselves. We see this in Australia with refugees (many fleeing these countries) where they are kept at Christmas Island excised from the mainland, again side stepping international obligations. So the US are not alone here. This is not democracy or the rule of law, so what do Americans believe in? What do Australians believe in? (our leaders joined in the war) who are we in relationship to this? What sort of world order will all of us co-create together for the children? A world of tooth and claw (Thomas Hobbes) where might is right, where the most violent or the wealthiest elite win (survival of the most aggressive) or a libertarian world (John Locke) where we value international law, democracy, sharing power and human rights. When I look at the movies on television, I see violence still sells yet the reality is seldom reported. Instead it is glorified, the violent games just repeat behaviours where might is right and winning is grinning and they are just harmless games. Are they?. If we valued peace we would have problem solving games where kids use their minds to actually work out solutions and this wins points but only if there is a win/win rather than a win/lose. You can see how all of us have it programmed and so many would defend this believing it is fun. Yet in the international arena these sponsoring thoughts based in fear is what drives conflict. Perhaps experience becomes the real teacher here, when it comes to your door it will no longer seem appealing. You may decide that boys are not being boys and there is nothing you can do. You will take action for a peaceful world that respect all. You will see it is not a game but a choice. That is empowerment. We all have choices. Even when you think you don’t you have just made a choice.
Why not choose truth over lies, love over hate and goodness over negativity. This is the beginning of peace. We have to stand up for it and not allow fear to keep us all silent, that is the greatest terrorism in my view. To stand up is what Human Rights Watch is asking for. Why not recouple trade to human rights as a step in the most loving direction…
http://www.hrw.org/news/2011/07/11/united-states-investigate-bush-other-top-officials-torture
Inquiry Into 2 Deaths in CIA Custody Insufficient
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The Bush Administration and Mistreatment of DetaineesJuly 12, 2011
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There’s overwhelming evidence of torture by the Bush administration. The Obama administration has a legal obligation to investigate. Jessie Graham reports.
(Washington, DC) – Overwhelming evidence of torture by the Bush administration obliges President Barack Obama to order a criminal investigation into allegations of detainee abuse authorized by former President George W. Bush and other senior officials, Human Rights Watch said in a report released today. The Obama administration has failed to meet US obligations under the Convention against Torture to investigate acts of torture and other ill-treatment of detainees, Human Rights Watch said.
The 107-page report, “Getting Away with Torture: The Bush Administration and Mistreatment of Detainees,” presents substantial information warranting criminal investigations of Bush and senior administration officials, including former Vice President Dick Cheney, Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld, and CIA Director George Tenet, for ordering practices such as “waterboarding,” the use of secret CIA prisons, and the transfer of detainees to countries where they were tortured.
“There are solid grounds to investigate Bush, Cheney, Rumsfeld, and Tenet for authorizing torture and war crimes,” said Kenneth Roth, executive director of Human Rights Watch. “President Obama has treated torture as an unfortunate policy choice rather than a crime. His decision to end abusive interrogation practices will remain easily reversible unless the legal prohibition against torture is clearly reestablished.”
If the US government does not pursue credible criminal investigations, other countries should prosecute US officials involved in crimes against detainees in accordance with international law, Human Rights Watch said.
“The US has a legal obligation to investigate these crimes,” Roth said. “If the US doesn’t act on them, other countries should.”
In August 2009, US Attorney General Eric Holder appointed Assistant US Attorney John Durham to investigate detainee abuse but limited the probe to “unauthorized” acts. That meant the investigation could not cover acts of torture, such as waterboarding, and other ill-treatment authorized by Bush administration lawyers, even if the acts violated domestic and international law. On June 30, Holder accepted Durham’s recommendation to carry out full investigations of two deaths in CIA custody, reportedly from Iraq and Afghanistan. Human Rights Watch said that the narrow scope of Durham’s inquiry failed to address the systemic nature of the abuses.
“The US government’s pattern of abuse across several countries did not result from the acts of individuals who broke the rules,” Roth said. “It resulted from decisions made by senior US officials to bend, ignore, or cast the rules aside.”
In citing the four top-level Bush administration officials, Human Rights Watch said that:
- President Bush publicly admitted that in two cases he approved the use of waterboarding, a form of mock execution involving near-drowning that the United States has long prosecuted as a type of torture. Bush also authorized the illegal CIA secret detention and renditions programs, under which detainees were held incommunicado and frequently transferred to countries such as Egypt and Syria where they were likely to be tortured;
- Vice President Cheney was the driving force behind the establishment of illegal detention and interrogation policies, chairing key meetings at which specific CIA operations were discussed, including the waterboarding of one detainee, Abu Zubaydah, in 2002;
- Defense Secretary Rumsfeld approved illegal interrogation methods and closely followed the interrogation of Mohamed al-Qahtani, who was subjected to a six-week regime of coercive interrogation at Guantanamo that cumulatively appears to have amounted to torture;
- CIA Director Tenet authorized and oversaw the CIA’s use of waterboarding, stress positions, light and noise bombardment, sleep deprivation, and other abusive interrogation methods, as well as the CIA rendition program.
In media interviews, Bush has sought to justify his authorization of waterboarding on the ground that Justice Department lawyers said it was legal. While Bush should have recognized that waterboarding constituted torture without consulting a lawyer, there is also substantial information that senior administration officials, including Cheney, sought to influence the lawyers’ judgment, Human Rights Watch said.
“Senior Bush officials shouldn’t be able to shape and hand-pick legal advice and then hide behind it as if it were autonomously delivered,” Roth said.
Human Rights Watch said the criminal investigation should include an examination of the preparation of the Justice Department memos that were used to justify the unlawful treatment of detainees.
Human Rights Watch also said that victims of torture should receive fair and adequate compensation as required by the Convention against Torture. Both the Bush and Obama administrations have successfully kept courts from considering the merits of torture allegations in civil lawsuits by making broad use of legal doctrines such as state secrets and official immunity.
An independent, nonpartisan commission, along the lines of the 9-11 Commission, should be established to examine the actions of the executive branch, the CIA, the military, and Congress, with regard to Bush administration policies and practices that led to detainee abuse, Human Rights Watch said. Such a commission should make recommendations to ensure that the systematic abuses of the Bush administration are not repeated.
In February 2011, Bush cancelled a trip to Switzerland, where alleged victims of torture had intended to file a criminal complaint against him. An investigation implicating US officials in torture is under way in Spain. Documents made public by Wikileaks revealed that US pressure on Spanish authorities to drop the case has continued under the Obama administration.
Human Rights Watch said that the US government’s failure to investigate US officials for the torture and ill-treatment of detainees undermines US efforts to press for accountability for human rights violations abroad.
“The US is right to call for justice when serious international crimes are committed in places like Darfur, Libya, and Sri Lanka, but there should be no double standards,” Roth said. “When the US government shields its own officials from investigation and prosecution, it makes it easier for others to dismiss global efforts to bring violators of serious crimes to justice.”