Bet this doesn't make the NY Times

[bj229r]

 Tortured screams ring out as Iraqis take over Abu Ghraib
By Ali Saber in Baghdad and Gethin Chamberlain
(Filed: 10/09/2006)

The notorious Abu Ghraib prison in Baghdad is at the centre of fresh abuse allegations just a week after it was handed over to Iraqi authorities, with claims that inmates are being tortured by their new captors.
    
Staff at the jail say the Iraqi authorities have moved dozens of terrorist suspects into Abu Ghraib from the controversial Interior Ministry detention centre in Jadriyah, where United States troops last year discovered 169 prisoners who had been tortured and starved.

An independent witness who went into Abu Ghraib this week told The Sunday Telegraph that screams were coming from the cell blocks housing the terrorist suspects. Prisoners released from the jail this week spoke of routine torture of terrorism suspects and on Wednesday, 27 prisoners were hanged in the first mass execution since the overthrow of Saddam Hussein's regime.

Conditions in the rest of the jail were grim, with an overwhelming stench of excrement, prisoners crammed into cells for all but 20 minutes a day, food rations cut to just rice and water and no air conditioning.

Some of the small number of prisoners who remained in the jail after the Americans left said they had pleaded to go with their departing captors, rather than be left in the hands of Iraqi guards.

"The Americans were better than the Iraqis. They treated us better," said Khalid Alaani, who was held on suspicion of involvement in Sunni terrorism.

Abu Ghraib became synonymous with abuse after shocking pictures were published in 2004 showing prisoners being tortured and humiliated, galvanising opposition to the US presence in Iraq.

The witness gained access to the prison just days after the Americans formally handed over control to the Iraqi authorities on Sept 1.

Inside the 100-yard long cell block the smell of excrement was overpowering. Four to six prisoners shared each of the 12ft by 15ft cells along either side and the walls were smeared with filth. The cell block was patrolled by guards who carried long batons and shouted angrily at the prisoners to stand up.

Access to the part of the prison containing terrorism suspects was denied, but from that block came the sound of screaming. The screaming continued for a long time.

"I am sure someone was being beaten, they were screaming like they were being hit," the witness reported. "I felt scared, I was asking what was happening in the terrorist section.

"I heard shouting, like someone had a hot iron on their body, screams. The officer said they were just screaming by themselves. I was hearing the screams throughout the visit."

The witness said that even in the thieves' section prisoners were being treated badly. "Someone was shouting 'Please help us, we want the human rights officers, we want the Americans to come back'," he said.

Prisoners interviewed in the presence of their jailers said they were frightened for their safety. They complained that chicken and milk had been cut from their rations, leaving them on rice and water. They also complained about the oppressive heat.

Outside the prison, relatives of some of the inmates said they were being tortured by their captors. One woman, who gave her name as Omsaad, said: "My son Saad [who was arrested in Fallujah as a suspected insurgent] said he is being tortured by the Iraqis to confess the name of his leader. I met my son and he told me they were being treated badly by the Iraqis."

Haleem Aleulami, who was released from the jail last week, three weeks after being arrested in Ramadi for carrying a pistol in his car, said the Americans had treated him better when they ran the jail. He claimed that visits from the International Red Cross staff had dried up and accused local human rights workers of being members of Shia groups who turned a blind eye to problems in the jail.

"The people are Iraqis and they are members of the Sciri and al Dawa parties. They have a good relationship with the leaders of the jail and they keep quiet," he said. The guards swore at the ordinary prisoners, he said, but those in the terrorist section were treated more brutally.

"The guards were swearing at us, but in the terrorist section they were beating them. I heard it all the time. Everyone knows what is happening."

And Khalid Alaani, who was also picked up in Ramadi suspected of involvement in Sunni terrorism, said: "We preferred the Americans. We asked to move with them to Baghdad airport because we knew the treatment would be changed because we know what the Iraqis are. When the Americans left everything changed."

Staff at the jail said that the prisoners were allowed out from their cells for only 15 to 20 minutes a day because of the danger from the regular mortar attacks. They are no longer allowed access to the main hall where the Americans had allowed them to watch television and the room is now reserved for the use of officers and guards. Staff explained that the air conditioning in the cell blocks had broken, although it was working in their quarters.

One officer, Capt Ali Abdelzaher, said: "We have a problem with the financing for the food, not like the Americans, and there is a technical problem with the air conditioning."

Capt Abdelzaher also confirmed that a number of inmates had been transferred from the Jadriyah detention centre, along with their guards and interrogators.

Graphic stories of abuse at that previously secret facility emerged after US soldiers found 169 prisoners showing signs of torture last November.

Most of the prisoners held by the Americans at Abu Ghraib were either released in recent months or transferred to a new �32 million detention centre at Camp Cropper near Baghdad International Airport.

Yesterday, the International Red Cross confirmed that its visits to the prison had been suspended since January 2005 on security grounds.

Underwear on your head doesn't seem so bad now does it?

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/main.jhtml?xml=/news/2006/09/10/wirq10.xml

[john9001]

nonsense, only the evil american imperial troops torture people.

and they also steal all the oil.

[lasersailor184]

What do you expect?  It's exactly like the Russians in WW2 doing horrible things to captured German Soldiers because of bad things the german soldiers did.


These terrorist suspects are suspected of killing their families, friends, countrymen and church pals.  Who wouldn't go ape****?

[red26]

Most of our state correction units here in Texas dont have AC Huntsville to name one it's also called the Walls Unit. So no pitty there.

And what they do in that country is there doings.

[AquaShrimp]

Sounds alot like South Vietnam.  Torture and executions, that will increase as Iraq collapses.

[Elfie]

This wont make the NYT, it doesnt show American's or Bush in a bad light.

[-dead-]

Originally posted by Elfie
This wont make the NYT, it doesnt show American's or Bush in a bad light.

Don't be so sure: after all these dreadful Iraqi torturers are presumably the newly US-trained, US-equipped, US-installed and US-approved dreadful Iraqi torturers.

"Your tax dollars at work" as the phrase has it.

Removing the old regime of torturers and installing exactly the same thing in its stead has so far cost the US $1,255 per person as well as 2,666 dead troops and 20,000 wounded. It has cost the Iraqis far more - probably in the hundreds of thousands.

Patting yourself on the back because the regime you have just installed makes your own tarnished human rights records look a bit less awful by virtue of the new regime's being even worse (and indeed on a par with Saddam's) seems a bit of a pyrrhic victory.

[Habu]

And I am sure if all those US trained (ect cough bull****) people were not in charge then the place would be clean and daisy fresh and staffed by friendly helpful Iraqi left wing types who only want to help the poor inmates rehad themselves.

Right?

[Shuckins]

What?  Captured terrorists are begging that American soldiers, servants of the Great Satan, take said prisoners with them when they turn over the prisons to the Iraqi government?!

Say it aint so, Joe.

These same terrorists didn't seem to be worried about the consequences of their actions when they were blowing up police trainees and judges and civilian relatives of the new government.  Now that they've been caught, their chickens have come home to roost.  Members of the Iraqi security forces who have seen their relatives and friends blown to bits by suicide bombers or assassinated by thugs masquerading as religious warriors aren't going to play around with them in prison.

Too many lives are at stake.

Torture is reprehensible in the eyes of the people of the west.  I don't condone it...but it must be evident to even those who have only a cursory knowledge of the history of the Middle East, that it has been so long a part of that region's culture that it hardly raises an eyebrow.  

They don't coddle scum over there...and never have.

[lazs2]

dead... I would say that our human rights record is far better than any country you can name in wartime.  Are you comparing us to your country... china?

lazs

[Eagler]

no I think dead-head is staying that the US and Saddam are the same as far as human rights goes ... LOL LOL LOL

[Lye-El]

I would guess their religious leaders are OK with it as long as the Great Satan isn't involved or they be doing a fatwa or something. Seems the only ones complaining are the prisoners.

[Elfie]

Originally posted by -dead-
Don't be so sure: after all these dreadful Iraqi torturers are presumably the newly US-trained, US-equipped, US-installed and US-approved dreadful Iraqi torturers.

"Your tax dollars at work" as the phrase has it.

Removing the old regime of torturers and installing exactly the same thing in its stead has so far cost the US $1,255 per person as well as 2,666 dead troops and 20,000 wounded. It has cost the Iraqis far more - probably in the hundreds of thousands.

Patting yourself on the back because the regime you have just installed makes your own tarnished human rights records look a bit less awful by virtue of the new regime's being even worse (and indeed on a par with Saddam's) seems a bit of a pyrrhic victory.

1) Torture isnt viewed in the same way in every part of the world. In the West we believe torture is inherently evil. In other parts of the world it is viewed as a legitimate interrogation tactic.

2)This coming from someone that lives in China, with China's human rights record is just rich. Tianamen (sp) square anyone?

[-dead-]

Originally posted by Elfie
1) Torture isnt viewed in the same way in every part of the world. In the West we believe torture is inherently evil. In other parts of the world it is viewed as a legitimate interrogation tactic.

Oh well that makes it perfectly acceptable then.
So you condone the torture, because it's "viewed as a legitimate interrogation tactic"? And why is it a legitimate interrogation tactic under the US-draughted and approved Iraqi constitution?

Especially as it's expressly forbidden in two Articles:

Article 9 D. The Iraqi National Intelligence Service shall collect information, assess threats to national security, and advise the Iraqi government. This service shall be under civilian control and shall be subject to legislative oversight and shall operate in accordance with the law and pursuant to the recognized principles of human rights.

Article 35:
B. No person may be kept in custody or interrogated except in the context of a judicial decision.
C. All forms of psychological and physical torture and inhumane treatment shall be prohibited. Any confession coerced by force, threat, or torture shall not be relied on. The victim shall have the right to compensation in accordance with the law for material and moral damages incurred.

2)This coming from someone that lives in China, with China's human rights record is just rich. Tianamen (sp) square anyone?

I know this may come as a bit of a shock but not everyone slavishly justifies and agrees with everything their government does as being right and good.

And aren't you just a little bit ashamed that you're defending and justifying the use of torture whilst "someone that lives in China, with China's human rights record" is telling you that its use by the newly US-installed Iraqi government does indeed "show Americans or Bush in a bad light"?

Besides which, it's somewhat of an ad straw hominen: torture is illegal in my little special administrative region corner of China -- Guantanamo SOP and "extraordinary rendition" (out-sourced torture) included.

[john9001]

Originally posted by -dead-

I know this may come as a bit of a shock but not everyone slavishly justifies and agrees with everything their government does as being right and good.
 

this may come as a shock you but i do not agree with what Al Qeida does.