General Accuses White House of War Crimes 18 Jun 2008 The two-star general who led an Army investigation into the horrific detainee abuse at Abu Ghraib has accused the Bush administration of war crimes and is calling for accountability. In his 2004 report on Abu Ghraib, then-Major General Anthony Taguba concluded that "numerous incidents of sadistic, blatant, and wanton criminal abuses were inflicted on several detainees." He called the abuse "systemic and illegal." Now, in a preface to a Physicians for Human Rights report based on medical examinations of former detainees, Taguba adds an epilogue to his own investigation. The new report, he writes, "tells the largely untold human story of what happened to detainees in our custody when the Commander-in-Chief and those under him authorized a systematic regime of torture. This story is not only written in words: It is scrawled for the rest of these individual's lives on their bodies and minds... In order for these individuals to suffer the wanton cruelty to which they were subjected, a government policy was promulgated to the field whereby the Geneva Conventions and the Uniform Code of Military Justice were disregarded. The UN Convention Against Torture was indiscriminately ignored. . . . After years of disclosures by government investigations, media accounts, and reports from human rights organizations, there is no longer any doubt as to whether the current administration has committed war crimes. The only question that remains to be answered is whether those who ordered the use of torture will be held to account." [See: 'I saw ___ ...ing a kid...' (Graphic) Source: The "Taguba Report" On Treatment Of Abu Ghraib Prisoners In Iraq, statement by Kasim Mehaddi Hilas, Detainee #151108, 1300/18 Jan 2004, as published by The Washington Post.]
Torture 'is basically subject to perception.' CIA Played Larger Role In Advising Pentagon 18 Jun 2008 A senior CIA lawyer advised Pentagon officials about the use of harsh interrogation techniques torture on prisoners at Guantanamo Bay in a meeting in late 2002, defending waterboarding and other methods as permissible despite U.S. and international laws banning torture, according to documents released yesterday by congressional investigators. Torture "is basically subject to perception," CIA counterterrorism lawyer Jonathan Fredman told a group of military and intelligence officials gathered at the U.S.-run detention camp in Cuba on Oct. 2, 2002, according to minutes of the meeting. "If the detainee dies, you're doing it wrong." ...By the time of the meeting, the CIA already had used waterboarding on at least one terrorism suspect and was holding high-level 'al-Qaeda' detainees in secret prisons overseas -- actions that Bush administration lawyers had approved.
Report: Exams reveal US electric shock torture of detainees --Report reveals medical evidence of torture, including beatings and electric shock --Study calls on U.S. government to issue a formal apology to tortured detainees 18 Jun 2008 Former terrorist suspects detained by the United States were tortured, according to medical examinations detailed in a report released Wednesday by a human rights group. The Massachusetts-based Physicians for Human Rights reached that conclusion after two-day clinical evaluations of 11 former detainees, who had been held at the Abu Ghraib prison in Iraq, at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, and in Afghanistan. The detainees were never charged with crimes. In a 121-page report, the doctors' group said that it uncovered medical evidence of torture, including beatings, electric shock, sleep deprivation, sexual humiliation, sodomy and scores of other abuses.
U.S. Torture of Detainees Caused Severe Pain, Long-Term Suffering 17 Jun 2008 A team of doctors and psychologists convened by Physicians for Human Rights (PHR) to conduct intensive clinical evaluations of 11 former detainees held in Iraq, Afghanistan, and Guantánamo Bay has found that these men suffered torture and ill-treatment by U.S. personnel, which resulted in severe pain and long-term disability. The men were ultimately released from U.S. custody without charge or explanation.
Western oil giants set to return to Iraq and secure oil wealth 19 Jun 2008 Four Western oil companies are in the final stages of negotiations this month on contracts that will return them to Iraq, 36 years after losing their oil concession to nationalization as Saddam Hussein rose to power. Exxon Mobil, Shell, Total and BP — the original partners in the Iraq Petroleum Company — along with Chevron and a number of smaller oil companies, are in talks with Iraq's Oil Ministry for no-bid contracts to service Iraq's largest fields, according to ministry officials, oil company officials and an American diplomat. The deals, expected to be announced on June 30, will lay the foundation for the first commercial work for the major companies in Iraq since the American invasion, and open a new and potentially lucrative country for their operations... There was suspicion among many in the Arab world and among parts of the American public that the United States had gone to war in Iraq precisely to secure the oil wealth these contracts seek to extract. ['Ya think?] It is not clear what role the United States played in awarding the contracts; there are still American advisers to Iraq's Oil Ministry. Sensitive to the appearance that they were profiting from the war and already under pressure because of record high oil prices, senior officials of two of the companies, speaking only on the condition that they not be identified, said they were helping Iraq rebuild its decrepit oil industry. [The Resistance needs to unite and generate an inhospitable environment, so the Western oil company occupation of Iraq ends. If the Exxon Mobil/Blackwater terrorists win, Iran will be next on their agenda.]
House leaders reach deal on war funding bill 18 Jun 2008 Leaders in the U.S. House of Representatives struck a deal on Wednesday on legislation to provide $162 billion in new funds for the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, ending a long standoff with the White House. DemocRATic and Republican leaders in the House hailed an agreement they said would avoid a veto that President [sic] George W. Bush had threatened over some provisions Democrats had been trying to add beyond the war funds.
Iraq: Five dead including TV reporter 17 Jun 2008 Iraqi officials said an Iraq state TV reporter has been shot dead in the northern city of Mosul. An Iraqi policeman conveyed gunmen emerged from a car Tuesday and opened fire on Muhieddin Abdul-Hamid near his apartment in eastern Mosul.
Blackwater sister company: Crash lawsuit governed by Islamic law --In April, Presidential asked a federal judge in Florida to dismiss the lawsuit because the case is controlled by Afghanistan's Islamic law. 18 Jun 2008 To defend itself against a lawsuit by the widows of three American soldiers who died on one of its planes in Afghanistan, a sister company of the private military firm Blackwater has asked a federal court to decide the case using the Islamic law known as Shari'a. The lawsuit "is governed by the law of Afghanistan," Presidential Airways argued in a Florida federal court. "Afghan law is largely religion-based and evidences a strong concern for ensuring moral responsibility, and deterring violations of obligations within its borders." If the judge agrees, it would essentially end the lawsuit over a botched flight supporting the U.S. military. The company also plans to ask a judge to dismiss the lawsuit on the constitutional grounds that a court should not interfere in military decision-making.
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