U.N. Report Calls for End to Guantánamo Detentions

Posted on February 16, 2006

Back in October the ACLU submitted a 37-page report to the UN claiming U.S. breaches of the political and civil rights covenant.

The report included sections on “Excessive Government Secrecy”; “Racial Profiling of the U.S. Arab, South Asian, and Muslim Communities”; “Criminalization of Political Protest”; “Increased Surveillance Powers”; and “Random Searches.”

Today the UN responds.

United Nations human rights investigators called on the United States today to shut down the Guantánamo Bay camp and give detainees quick trials or release them, but the White House promptly dismissed the report.

Arguing that many of the interrogation and detention practices constituted abuses amounting to torture, the report stated, “The United States government should close the Guantánamo Bay detention facilities without further delay.”

Alert to the report’s conclusions from news accounts circulating based on a draft and reacting quickly to its publication today, the White House suggested the investigators had based their conclusions on disinformation deliberately spread by terror groups.

I would like to add….and the ACLU, a terror groups best friend.

“I think some of this appears to be a rehash of some of the allegations that have been made by lawyers for some of the detainees,” said Scott McClellan, the White House spokesman.

“We know that Al-Qaeda detainees are trained in trying to disseminate false allegations.”

The report said the Defense Department should immediately revoke “all special interrogation techniques” it had authorized and that the United States needed to “refrain from any practice amounting to torture or cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment or punishment, discrimination on the basis of religion and violations of the right to health and freedom of religion.”

Mr. McClellan asserted that the American military already treated detainees humanely. “These are dangerous terrorists that we are talking about who are there,” he said. “Nothing had changed in terms of our views.”

In a response included in an appendix to the 54-page report, the United States noted that the investigators had turned down an invitation to visit Guantánamo Bay, and it rejected the findings and faulted the investigators for using selective information to support their conclusions.

The investigators declined to go to the camp after being told that they would be denied the opportunity to interview detainees.

The report had an extensive list of torture including handling them roughly, not allowing them to starve to death , restraining them, leaving them by themselves (solitary confinement), discomforting room temperatures, bringing dogs to bark at them, and making them sleep on non-fluffed pillows….without the complimentary mints.

Oh my! Thinking Meat corrects me! There was also the horrible torture of “forced” hygiene!!! Not to mention they had to stand for more than four hours! Plus they were disrobed into their birthday suits! He also lists such things as removal of comfort items like their sheep porn mags, actual interroagation for several hours, deprivation of light, changes in scenery, unpleasant smells such as flatuation, having hoods put on their heads…and probably panties, and sleep deprivation!!!! Such terrible torture!

Other torture methods I neglected to mention: Deprivation from cable television, and late night shows; cafeteria style food, subjection to profanity, and not being allowed to sleep in late on Saturdays.

Give me a break!, I had worse torture in Basic Training. If this is what the left is defininging as torture, we’re gonna get nowhere in the war against these extremist killers!

Captain’s Quarters is calling for a blogswarm to evaluate the findings at Guatanamo Bay. We would be more than happy to help in this review.

» Filed Under ACLU, News, War On Terror

Trackback URL

Comments

One Response to “U.N. Report Calls for End to Guantánamo Detentions”

apostle on February 18th, 2006 12:19 am

Give me a break!, I had worse torture in Basic Training

Likewise. ThinkingMeat would do better to ask the U.N. human rights investigators about all the gang rape their organization seems to do in third world countries. But thanks for coming out ThinkMeat.