Rumsfeld involved in Abu Ghraib torture

Former US Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld

Source: Press TV
http://www.presstv.ir/detail/163683.html

Governmental documents indicate that former US Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld, among other US officials, played a role in the torture policies in the notorious Abu Ghraib prison in Iraq.

In his new autobiography, Rumsfeld says Abu Ghraib's prisoner abuse was perpetrated by rogue soldiers, despite governmental documents hinting at pro-torture policies issued by senior US officials, such as Rumsfeld, himself.

"There were decisions made by Secretary Rumsfeld, himself, and by other members of the Bush cabinet to endorse torture to allow the use of interrogation methods that in the past, the United States had regarded as war crimes," Hameel Jaffer told Press TV's US Desk in an interview.

As a result of these policies, Abu Ghraib, Guantanamo Bay, and other worldwide US-run detention facilities have used severe torture techniques, previously regarded as war crimes in the United States.

Since 2004, numerous accounts of “systematic and illegal abuses of detainees” have been reported. Cases including rape, torture, and murder have been among those reported.

An estimated 1,300,000 Iraqi civilians have been killed, while about 4.7 million have been displaced since the US-led invasion of the country in 2003.

During these seven years, 4,436 US troops have been reported as being killed.

Ex-US defense secy. accused of torture

Former US Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld

Source: Press TV
http://www.presstv.ir/detail/160063.html


A US rights group has filed a lawsuit charging former US Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld with involvement in torturing former prisoners in American prisons in Iraq and Afghanistan.

American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) catapulted the torture case into prominence on Thursday after it lodged an appeal to a court in the District of Columbia, alleging that Rumsfeld and some senior US military officials were quite aware of a torture case involving nine detainees between 2002 and 2004 in American prisons in the two countries, AFP reported.

The case initially was brought forth in December 2006, but later on was withdrawn by a federal court in March 2007 on the grounds that the ex-defense secretary and other top American military officials were immune from prosecution.

The US-based human rights group stated that under the Constitution and international law, torture is strictly prohibited and commanders are obliged to act when they know or should have known of such abuses.

The ACLU argued that the 78-year-old Rumsfeld and other military officials were repeatedly notified of abuse and torture at detention facilities in Iraq and Afghanistan by the International Red Cross and other reports as well as complaints by human rights organizations, thus they are directly responsible for the abuses.

The group further touched upon a case involving a prisoner identified as Ali.V, adding that prisoners, who were later released without charge, “were beaten, tortured, and sexually abused.”

Meanwhile, three judges at an appeals court in the District of Columbia said the case has a little chance to succeed.

The remarks came as a group of activists, each wearing black hoods and orange jumpsuits representing the prisoners at the US prison camp in Guantanamo Bay staged a rally in front of the court room on Thursday to protest against negligence over the torture case.

Rumsfeld is currently putting finishing touches on the release of his memoire book titled “Known and unknown”, which is due to hit bookshelves in the US on 8 February.

'US govt. lawyers okayed torture'

Philippe Sands is a British lawyer at Matrix Chambers
and is ‎a professor of international law at University
College London


Source: Press TV
http://www.presstv.ir/detail.aspx?id=138719§ionid=3510203


Senior US government lawyers of the Bush administration schemed to circumvent the Geneva Conventions in order to torture the Guantanamo detainees more aggressively, a certified Queen's Counsel says.

In an interview with Press TV, Philip Sands, the author of Torture Team, blamed lawyers close to former Vice President Dick Cheney and former Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld for marginalizing international laws to sanction the torture of detainees at US-run prisons.

Sands cited a memo that Rumsfeld signed on December 2, 2002 as proof of the US officials' crime. The memo sought to help the US government coerce imprisoned suspected terrorists into revealing intelligence.

The memo authorized the use of controversial practices that were later employed at prisons in Guantanamo, Abu Ghraib, Afghanistan, and elsewhere.

Many human rights activists have criticized these techniques, saying they are in violation of international definitions of torture such as Common Article 3 of the 1941 Geneva Conventions.

In 2006, the US Supreme Court ruled that President George W. Bush's decision to waive the Geneva Conventions was wrong and illegal.

El Baradei calls for reforms in Egypt

Source: PressTV
http://www.presstv.ir/detail.aspx?id=122325§ionid=351020502


The Egyptian former director general of the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) Mohamed ElBaradei has issued a public call for change in Egypt.

ElBaradei, protected by plainclothes security officials, urged about 700 people in a village in northern Egypt on Friday to add their names to a petition calling for reform, reported Reuters.

"Once we gather as many names as possible we will put it forward and bring about real change," ElBaradei said.

The petition seeks constitutional change to make it easier for independents like ElBaradei to run for president after decades of autocratic rule under President Hosni Mubarak. It also aims to revoke the Emergency Law that allows detention without charge and bans anti-government political activity like ElBaradei's outdoor public speech and earlier visit to Mansoura, where up to 1,500 supporters greeted him.

"The state may be a centralized power, but the people are stronger," he told the crowd, part of which had come with him from the nearby provincial capital Mansoura in the Nile Delta.

Returning home after 12 years as head of the Vienna-based IAEA, ElBaradei said that he may run for next year's presidential election.

Mubarak, 81, who returned from Germany on March 27 after gallbladder surgery, has not said whether he plans to run for a sixth six-year term in the election. If he does not, many Egyptians believe he will try to hand power to his son Gamal. Both father and son deny such plans.

Ex UN arms inspector: Iran truth overcomes US mendacity

Source: PressTV
http://www.presstv.ir/detail.aspx?id=118449§ionid=351020104


Former Chief UN Weapons Inspector Scott Ritter says the truth about Iran's nuclear program is prevailing over the hype the western media is creating against Iran.

The former UN official took aim at the existing western media hype against the Iranian nuclear program and some personalities who are very good at marring the image of Iran, including David Albright, whose “commentary and analysis is more colored by the opinions of his US and Israeli contacts and connections than it is by his first hand experience.”

“I see the truth about Iran's nuclear program prevailing over the fictions David Albright and others are putting out there,” Ritter told Press TV.

Ritter made the remarks after Albright, who is the head of a nuclear think-tank close to the White House, claimed that Iran is on course to produce enough highly-enriched uranium to make nuclear weapons.

Ritter ruled out any likely military offensive against Iran, as he said Iran had law and facts on his side.

Albright was described by Ritter as "a biased personality” regarding Iran's nuclear program who relies on other people's information.

“He is specialized in exploiting the preconceived notions that exist in the West, in the United States and elsewhere about the evil intent of Iran. It is not a fact based analysis. This is faith-based analysis,” the ex-UN official added.

“When it comes to Iran, the truth does not matter. What matters is that the public has been conditioned by the media and the media uses personalities like David Albright to create hype, to create a mythology of wrong-doing that does not focus on the facts of the situation,” he maintained.

“Albright, definitely has an agenda and he is somebody who is not willing to put the facts on the table and let the facts drive you towards conclusion. He is obviously a person who has a bias against Iran. It's a built-in bias that presumes guilt on the part of Iran; therefore he interprets every piece of data that is coming out of Iran as being evidence of wrong doing on the part of Iran."

He accused Albright of taking advantage of Iran's nuclear dispute to get his name and his organization's name in the spot light on a frequent basis through the “fantastic quotes” he provides for reporters to use in their articles.

“It's all about image as opposed to substance. That's unfortunately where we are today when it comes to mainstream western media analysis of Iran and Iran's nuclear program. It's not about the substance. It's not about the reality, it's about the image,” he opined.

Prior to the US invasion of Iraq in March 2003, Ritter publicly argued that Iraq possessed no significant weapons of mass destruction (WMDs). He became a popular anti-war figure and talk show commentator as a result of his stance.