|
The War Profiteers - War Crimes,
Kidnappings & Torture |
|
July 17th,
2009 - Iraq Government Faces Claims of Prisoner Abuse |
|
Iraq Government
Faces Claims of Prisoner Abuse By Deb Riechmann & Bushra Juhi Associated Press July 17, 2009 Baghdad - Iraqi officials
outraged by the abuse of prisoners at the U.S.-run Abu Ghraib prison are
trying to contain a scandal of their own as allegations continue to surface
of mistreatment inside Iraqi jails. Accounts of Iraqis being
beaten with clubs, blindfolded and coerced into signing false confessions are
attracting increased attention partly because the United States is getting
out of the prison business in Iraq. The U.S. has transferred 841 detainees
into Iraq's crowded prison system and more are on the way. Allegations of mistreatment
have persisted since 2005, when U.S. troops raided an Interior Ministry
lockup in a predominantly Shiite area of southeastern Baghdad and found
scores of emaciated prisoners. The matter returned to the spotlight after the
June 12 assassination of Sunni lawmaker Harith al-Obeidi, an outspoken
advocate of prisoner rights. The issue is a test of Prime
Minister Nouri al-Maliki's commitment to the rule of law and to reconcile
with the Sunni minority, who account for most of the prisoners held in
security cases. Sunnis claim they are being unfairly targeted by security
forces run by al-Maliki's Shiite-dominated government. "The cases are as bad
as what took place at Abu Ghraib, but it is painful when these things take
place in Iraqi prisons," said Sunni lawmaker Salim Abdullah. "We
met some of those who were released and saw the scars on their skins. They
use different kinds of torture like tying the shoulders and hanging the body,
which normally leads to dislocation of the shoulders." The allegations pale in
comparison with the horrific accounts of Saddam Hussein's prisons, where
inmates were systematically beaten, jammed into tiny windowless cells and
executed on the flimsiest of evidence and where men were forced to watch
their wives and daughters raped. Still, the current Iraqi
leadership came to power with the promise to hold itself to a higher standard
and respect human rights. Iraqi officials acknowledge
some abuse and insist improvements are being made. The issue, however, poses
a thorny question for Americans: How can the United States transfer detainees
into a system where abuse has occurred? The U.S. military says it
sends Iraqi prisoners only to detention facilities approved by Iraq's
Ministry of Justice. However, Iraqi lawmakers,
human rights advocates and the Human Rights Ministry claim most of the abuse
is not taking place in prisons run by the Justice Ministry, but in those
operated by the Interior and Defense Ministries. Prisoners there are
generally accused of links to Sunni and Shiite insurgent groups. Abu Ali al-Rikabi, a father
of five who owns a vegetable shop in Diwaniyah, said scars on his legs and
back are evidence of his mistreatment at the hands of the Iraqi police who
accused him of being involved with a former Shiite militia. "At dawn one day in
November 2007, I was sleeping in my room with my wife when the Iraqi police
broke in, handcuffed me and took me blindfolded to their headquarters,"
al-Rikabi told The Associated Press. "As soon as they reached the place,
they began beating me severely with thick clubs and batons, hitting every part
of my body, especially my legs and back. They kept on doing that for three
days." He said he was ultimately
transferred to another prison in Diwaniyah, 80 miles south of Baghdad, and
was released the following October. "No one told me why I was arrested
or why I was released," he said. An eight-member panel that
al-Maliki set up after al-Obeidi's assassination to look into abuse is
expected to complete its investigation in a month of two. A military spokesman, Maj.
Gen. Qassim al-Moussawi, said the panel has visited three detention centers
in Baghdad and will inspect others. He said most of the abuse uncovered so
far took place in Rusafa prison in eastern Baghdad. At a human rights symposium
this month, al-Maliki said allegations would be investigated. The prime minister
said detainees should have rights but that no one should ignore the victims
of crime - "orphans and the widows who lost their husbands because of
terrorism." "If every imprisoned
person is innocent ... then who has destroyed the country? Who killed
people?" he asked. Al-Maliki's prison
investigation follows a limited Interior Ministry probe of 112 complaints of
abuse. Of those, the ministry found 23 cases of human rights abuses and 20
cases where inmates were incarcerated without warrants. Interior Minister
Jawad al-Bolani said 43 police officers face charges. A 2008 report by the Human
Rights Ministry identified 307 cases of alleged torture and ill-treatment
among 26,249 detainees in Iraqi custody at the end of last year. The Iraqi
prison population has risen to nearly 30,000 since then and is slated to grow
as the U.S. either releases or transfers its remaining 10,429 detainees. The ministry report stated
that most of mistreatment occurs when the detainee is first arrested and
taken to facilities run by combat soldiers and not trained prison guards. "It's an uncomfortable
place to be in an (Iraqi) Ministry of Defense facility," said David
King, a British adviser to Iraq's Ministry of Defense. "They are very
overcrowded and they are very poorly equipped." King said, however, that the
Iraqi government was interested in improving the system and supplying clean
bedding and clothing and allowing relatives to visit detainees. That's little consolation to
Iraqis who say they have been abused. Mohammed al-Obeidi, 28, a
Sunni, told the AP that he was selling mobile phones in a rented shop in
Amiriyah, 25 miles west of Baghdad, when Iraqi soldiers arrived in Humvees
and apprehended him and six others in 2006. He said they were taken to a
prison in northern Baghdad where he was blindfolded and handcuffed during
interrogation. "The investigation
officer used to tell me to confess that I was a terrorist and was planting
roadside bombs," said al-Obeidi, who was never charged and was released
for lack of evidence. "They used insults and sectarian slander. They
normally tied me to a hook on the ceiling to keep me hanging, and then they
were beating me with electric sticks. In one of these investigation sessions,
my left shoulder was dislocated." Politicians loyal to Muqtada
al-Sadr, a firebrand anti-American Shiite cleric, also are pressuring the
government on the issue. Al-Sadr's followers were rounded up in droves last
year as part of a government crackdown against militia fighters. Sadrist lawmaker Falah
Hassan Shanshal said he visited a month ago with detainees facing the death
sentence. "One of them was 22
years old. He was crying and asked to talk to me in private," Shanshal
said. "He told me that officers raped him and abused him sexually and
then forced him to confess things he did not commit." "These officers were committing
the same violation conducted during the former regime," he said. Copyright © 2009 The
Associated Press. External link: http://www.google.com/hostednews/ap/article/ALeqM5iEkwUufYTM6JOVHVu11y3j1Lqt6AD99GDEO01 |