List all torture incidents | List deaths | List by technique | List by location
Public support | Government policy | Accountability & cover-ups | Rendition | FoIA docs | NGO reports & legal actn
Consequences & blowback | The New Iraq & other broken promises | The media | The noble few

Friday, August 31, 2001

Index: Public support

A few articles regarding the level of public support for torture:
A nation and its people who refuse to acknowledge its crimes and the suffering of its victims is an evil to the world and should expect only evil as its reward.
-- Tom Feeley, Information Clearing House

posted by elendil at 10:06 pm 0 comments

Thursday, August 30, 2001

Index: Govt policy

Information regarding government policies for torture. Included in this list are the secret memos by Administration lawyers finding ways around international protections against prisoner abuse and torture:

posted by elendil at 10:08 pm 0 comments

Wednesday, August 29, 2001

Index: Internal "investigations", cover-ups and accountability issues

A consistent pattern of cover-up emerges from careful reading of some cases, undercutting the naive claim that the military and government can be trusted to its own self-regulation. It is often found that a sincere investigation is not undertaken until someone leaks the details to the media, and even then accountability stops at the lower levels and sentences are light.

posted by elendil at 10:09 pm 1 comments

Tuesday, August 28, 2001

Index: Torture - all

All torture and abuse incidents with descriptions, ordered by date, with locations listed. Considering that the coalition aren't exactly eager to have their practices scrutinised, the incidents here represent only the tip of the iceberg:
  1. 12-2005: Marine tells of US torturing Afghans, commits murder-suicide, Kandahar Airport, Afghanistan
  2. 11-2005: 173 prisoners found tortured by Iraqi Interior Ministry, Iraq
  3. 11-2005: Photos from Haj Ali, Iraq
  4. 10-2005: Dossari suicide attempts, Guantanamo
  5. 08-2005: Video of 20 men tortured by Iraqi Interior Ministry, Iraq
  6. 07-2005: New Iraqi govt using torture, Iraq
  7. 06-2005: Incident: American contractor abused by Marines in Iraq, Fallujah, Iraq
  8. 06-2005: Italy arrests CIA agents for extraordinary renditions, Egypt
  9. 05-2005: Incident: Ministry of Interior tortures Ali with electricity, collective punishment, Iraq
  10. 05-2005: US captain stands by and watches Iraqi commandos beat a detainee, Iraq
  11. 06-2003: Incident: death, Wali, Afghanistan
  12. 02-2005: Media: Mamdouh Habib interviewed by Australia's 60 Minutes, Pakistan; Afghanistan; Guantanamo
  13. 12-2004: Incident: Adrey tortured in Kuwait by Australians, Kuwait
  14. 09-2004: Evidence against prisoners at GTMO obtained by torturing other prisoners, Guantanamo Bay
  15. 08-2004: Incident: Group of 4 Iraqi men arrested, beaten, tortured, Emergency Response Units HQ, Iraq
  16. 08-2004: Incident: Shahid detained by police at al-Najaf, interrogated, beaten, al-Najaf Police Directorate, Iraq
  17. 07-2004: Mercenaries, Kabul, Afghanistan
  18. 05-2004: Investigations into Afghan detention facilities reveal one murder, four deaths, and eight beaten, Afghanistan
  19. 05-2004: Media: Abu Ghraib prisoner tells story, joins militants, Abu Ghraib, Iraq
  20. 05-2004: Incident: Saleh detained at Abu Ghraib, Abu Ghraib, Iraq
  21. 04-2004: Incident: Electric shock, Al Mahmudiya, Al Mahmudiya, Iraq
  22. 03-2004: Incident: Iraqi blogger tells of abuse at Abu Ghraib, Abu Ghraib, Iraq
  23. 03-2004: Afghan village abuses, Afghanistan
  24. 02-2004: Incident: Mithal al Hassan detained, Abu Ghraib, Iraq
  25. 01-2004: Incident: Reuters staff detained, abused, Fallujah Iraq
  26. 12-2003: Incident: el-Masri kidnapped in Macedonia, detained in Afghanistan, Afghanistan
  27. 12-2003: Incident: Alazawi detained, Abu Ghraib, Iraq
  28. 12-2003: Asamiya Palace, Asamiya Palace, Iraq
  29. 12-2003: Incident: Abdul Kareem, Mosul Iraq
  30. 12-2003: Incident: Haji Abdul Rahman detained, Bagram, Afghanistan; Gardez, Afghanistan
  31. 12-2003: Incident: Mohammed Karim Shirullah detained, Bagram, Afghanistan
  32. 12-2003: Incident: Saddam Selah detained at Abu Ghraib, Abu Ghraib, Iraq
  33. 11-2003: Incident: Death in custody, Mowhoush, Qaim, Iraq
  34. 10-2003: Incident: Bashmilah rendition, Jordan; Yemen
  35. 10-2003: Incident: alleged sexual assault, Abu Ghraib, Iraq
  36. 09-2003: Incident: "Selwa" detained, raped, Abu Ghraib, Iraq
  37. 09-2003: Incident: Mousa dies in British custody, Basra, Iraq
  38. 08-2003: Incident: Salim 'Ali, Indonesia; Jordan
  39. 08-2003: Incident: Yassen detained, Abu Ghraib, Iraq; Various, Iraq
  40. 08-2003: Incident: Burns, Al Mamudiyah, Al Mamudiyah, Iraq
  41. 08-2003: Incident: Ali H. detained, Abu Ghraib, Iraq
  42. 07-2003: Incident: Said Nabi Siddiqi detained, Kandahar, Pakistan; Bagram Afghanistan
  43. 07-2003: Incident: Sherzad Kamal Khalid detained, Various, Iraq
  44. 07-2003: Incident: Thahe Mohammed Sabbar detained, Camp Bucca Iraq; Abu Ghraib, Iraq
  45. 07-2003: Incident: Arkan Mohammed Ali detained, Abu Ghraib, Iraq; Various Iraq
  46. 06-2003: Incident: Mehboob Ahmad detained, Gardez and Bagram, Afghanistan
  47. 05-2003: Incident: Operation Ali Baba, Camp Breadbasket, Iraq
  48. 05-2003: Incident: Mohammed Surur abducted, tortured, Kenya
  49. 03-2003: The Dark Place, Pakistan, "Dark Place", Pakistan
  50. 01-2003: Incident: Baker poses as detainee, gets brain injuries, Guantanamo
  51. 12-2002: Incident: Abu Kenami dies in detention, Mosul, Iraq
  52. 11-2002: Habibullah Habibullah tortured to death, Bagram, Afghanistan
  53. 12-2002: Dilawar tortured to death, Bagram, Afghanistan
  54. 09-2002: Incident: Arar is detained at New York's JFK airport, sent to Syria, tortured, Syria
  55. 09-2002: Abuse at Kandahar Detainee Facility, Afghanistan
  56. 09-2002: GTMO detainee: Fabricates evidence to avoid torture, Afghanistan; Pakistan
  57. 08-2002: GTMO detainee: Broken shoulder, Bagram Afghanistan; Kandahar Pakistan
  58. 06-2002: GTMO detainee: Beaten unconscious, Guantanamo
  59. 05-2002: Incident: Almaki arrested in Damascus, tortured in Syria, Syria
  60. 05-2002: Incident: Hussain Adbulkadr Youssouf Mustafa arrested in Pakistan, Pakistan; Bagram Afghanistan
  61. 04-2002: Incident: Benyam Mohammed renditioned, tortured, Pakistan; Morocco; Afghanistan; Guantanamo
  62. 03-2002: Incident: Kiyemba Pakistan; Bagram, Afganistan; Guantanamo Bay
  63. 01-2002: Incident: Idir, Guantanamo
  64. 12-2001: Incident: Ahmed Agiza renditioned to Egypt, Egypt
  65. 12-2001: Incident: Muhammad al-Zery renditioned to Egypt, Egypt
  66. 12-2001: Incident: al-Hajj detained, threatened, Guantanamo
  67. 11-2001: Incident: "Tipton three" detained, Afghanistan
  68. 11-2001: Incident: Kurnaz beaten, electric shocks, Kandahar, Pakistan; Guantanamo
  69. 11-2001: Incident: Murbati abused, Kandahar, Pakistan; Guantanamo
  70. 10-2001: Incident: Zamar travels to Morocco, detained by US authorities, Morocco; Syria
  71. 10-2001: Incident: Habib detained by US authorities in Pakistan, Pakistan; Egypt; Guantanamo

posted by elendil at 10:11 pm 3 comments

Monday, August 27, 2001

Index: Torture - deaths

Many incidents have ended in the death of the torture victim. For most of them, we will never learn their names and what happened to them. Here are the few that leaked through:

posted by elendil at 10:14 pm 8 comments

Sunday, August 26, 2001

Index: Torture - by technique

The following torture accounts are organised by technique. Please note that only 'interesting' interrogation are listed here. The reason for this is pragmatic -- if I were to list every detainee who was severely beaten, for example, I would end up merely reproduce all torture incidents.

Torture involving electricity:

Palestinian hanging:

Rape and forced sodomy

posted by elendil at 10:15 pm 4 comments

Saturday, August 25, 2001

Index: Torture - by location

The following torture and prisoner abuse accounts are organised by the location in which they occurred. Please note that the location is not the same as the responsible governments, which were all Coalition partners, mostly the US.

Guantanamo:

Egypt:

Afghanistan:

Pakistan:

Syria:

Iraq:

Other:

posted by elendil at 10:15 pm 1 comments

Friday, August 24, 2001

Index: Rendition

The following is a list of incidents involving an extraordinary rendition, which is the practice of sending detainees to countries in which torture is routinely used in interrogation. Critics have suggested this amounts to torture by proxy. The US government continues to deny that the purpose of sending detainees to countries where they can be tortured is to torture them.

posted by elendil at 10:24 pm 1 comments

Wednesday, August 22, 2001

Index: FoIA

Information from documents obtained by NGOs under the Freedom of Information Act. None of this information would have come to light without their work. The tireless action by these NGOs, especially the ACLU, should be accepted with humble gratitude by anyone who believes in the patriotic ideals of freedom and liberty:

posted by elendil at 10:25 pm 0 comments

Tuesday, August 21, 2001

Index: NGO reports, legal actns

posted by elendil at 10:26 pm 1 comments

Monday, August 20, 2001

Index: "New" Iraq

Saddam Hussein now sits in a prison cell, and Iraqi men and women are no longer carried to torture chambers and rape rooms ...

-- Bush, 2004

The promise of a new Iraq free from human rights abuse was hard to argue with, even for those of us who opposed the invasion. Unfortunately, this promise to the Iraqi people has been broken. Now the Ministry of Interior and its paramilitary police commandos like the Wolf Brigade regularly abduct, torture, and murder Iraqis. The old patterns are reestablishing themselves.

The American public were given an opporunity to avert this crisis during the Abu Ghraib scandal. But instead of taking a firm stand against torture, they chose to disregard it as "a few bad apples" and "hazing". Because of their negligence, the problem has spread. Initially the Ministry under Allawi worked in concert with the US military, or while US forces looked on in approval. Now the structure has grown its own connections with militias, feeding and feeding off the sectarian violence, increasing the threat of full-blown civil war.

posted by elendil at 10:28 pm 0 comments

Sunday, August 19, 2001

Index: Consequences

The laws of nature operate with indifference to our opinions and preferences. Like billiard-balls on a table, all actions have consequences, whether we think they are fair or not, whether we want to believe in them or not. So when we choose a course of action, we must do so with our eyes wide open. Ignorance might protect us from moral accountability, but nature always collects its debts.

These are the consequences of torture.

Receiving false confessions and poor intelligence:

Providing justification for violent retaliation against one's self: Brutalising one's own soldiers and one's self: Undermining one's own professed objectives, proving one's own hypocrisy, and humiliating one's self:

posted by elendil at 10:29 pm 0 comments

Saturday, August 18, 2001

Index: Media

Information relating to the media and coverage of the abuse:

posted by elendil at 10:30 pm 0 comments

Friday, August 17, 2001

Index: Noble few

The rare few public servants who have spoken out against abuse, and sufferred as a consequence. They have truly learnt the meaning and duty of being a public servant.

posted by elendil at 10:31 pm 1 comments

Wednesday, August 01, 2001

About me

I am an Australian woman who has become alarmed by the use of torture by the US and its allies in the Global War on Terror.

When not reading up on the latest atrocities, I work as a research scientist.

I am multi-ethnic, an atheist, a beginner Esperantist, and I put in practise Peter Singer's argument from Famine, affluence, and morality.

I am intrigued by the political philosophy Prof Brian Ellis calls Social Humanism, and I number all the boxes when I vote, even for the Senate.

I also like early American horror writers, Scandinavian death metal, social documentaries, Linux, worm farms, and durians.

posted by elendil at 10:43 pm 0 comments