Reply #1: DemocracyNow.org

[reprehensor]

Getting Away with Torture? Human Rights Watch Calls for Accountability Into U.S. Abuse of Detainees

Monday, April 25th, 2005

AMY GOODMAN: We are joined right now by Reed Brody. He is the Special Counsel for Human Rights Watch. Welcome to Democracy Now!

REED BRODY: Happy to be on your show, Amy.

AMY GOODMAN: Well, talk about this report and your demands.

REED BRODY: Well, as you say, Abu Ghraib was just the tip of the iceberg. The mistreatment of Muslim prisoners has been widespread in three countries, at these so-called secret locations where the C.I.A. is holding suspected al Qaeda leaders, as well as in the dungeons of third countries to which the United States has rendered detainees. And yet, there seems to be a wall of immunity that surrounds the top leaders one year out, because next Thursday is the first anniversary of those pictures from Abu Ghraib. And right after the pictures came out, people like Colin Powell and others were quick to say, look, watch how America deals with this. You know, we're going to take -- we're going to deal with this the right way.

But a year out, in fact, the United States is doing what every banana republic does when its atrocities are uncovered. It's covering up and it's trying to shift the blame downwards. And so, we have seen very hesitantly a few prosecutions of the lower level people, people like Lindy England and Charles Graner, whose pictures were taken at Abu Ghraib. But it's obviously -- it’s not them who told the President of the United States that he could commit torture. It's not Lindy England who ripped up the Geneva Conventions. It's not Lindy England who authorized the use of guard dogs to terrorize prisoners. These decisions were made by people like Donald Rumsfeld.

And yet, there seems to be no investigation up to that level. Obviously, we have a situation where the Attorney General of the United States, the person under whom any prosecution would have to be begun is Alberto Gonzales, who himself is very implicated in this whole scandal. It was Alberto Gonzales who advised the President that the Geneva Conventions were obsolete and its protections quaint. It was Alberto Gonzales who put together the working group that told the President that he could commit torture in the name of counterterrorism. Similarly, on the military side, any prosecution would have to be done under the auspices ultimately of the Secretary of Defense, Donald Rumsfeld. So we are in a situation of institutionalized impunity. And the only way around that would be to appoint a special prosecutor.

Now, we have looked at the evidence, and in this report we put together, in particular, the evidence that warrants an investigation, for instance, of George Tenet. Under his direction, the C.I.A. disappeared detainees in secret locations, which is a violation of the Geneva Conventions. There are strong allegations that many of those detainees were tortured. There had been repeated allegations, for instance, that Khalid Sheikh Mohammed was subject to so-called water boarding. That's where you make a prisoner -- you push a prisoner's head under the water and make him think he's going to drown. And that with Tenet's specific authorization, detainees were sent to countries like Syria and Egypt, where they were tortured, which would make George Tenet an accomplice, an aider and abettor to torture.

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