UPCOMING
EVENTS
Thursday,
February 28, 7:30 PM. Monthly Meeting 414 S. Holliston, Caltech Y Lounge.
Help us plan future actions on Afghanistan, Tibet, the Campaign against Torture
and abolition of the death penalty.
Wednesday,
March 6, 8:00 PM. Women’s Day Event. Baxter
Lecture Hall, Caltech. “Women Shaping the World: Voices from Afghanistan,
East Timor and Guatemala.” For more information call the Caltech Women’s Center
at 626-395-3221.
Saturday,
March 9, 7:45PM. Women’s Day Event. Simon
Wiesenthal
Center Museum of Tolerance, 9786 West Pico Boulevard, Los Angeles. Advanced
Reservations Required: 310-772-2528. “Freedom from
Torture: Every Women’s Right.” Speakers: Sumaya Karimi,
Afghanistan, Tseten Phanucharas, Tibet. Music by Gloria Orosko,
Colombia.
Tuesday,
March 12, 7:30 PM.
Letter-writing Meeting at the Athenaeum.
Corner of California & Hill in the basement recreation area. An informal meeting, a great place for
first-timers to ask questions!
Wednesday,
March 13, 7:00 PM. International
Criminal Court Event. Beckman Institute Auditorium,
Caltech. Marvin Schacter and Dan
Mengal of the International Criminal Court Alliance
speak.
Sunday, March
17, 6:30 PM. Rights Readers Human Rights Book Discussion
Group. Vroman’s Bookstore (695 E. Colorado Boulevard in Pasadena) This month we discuss Unspeakable Acts, Ordinary
People: The Dynamics of Torture by
John Conroy. (See below for more information about the book).
COORDINATOR’S
CORNER
First, some seriously good news: since the last newsletter, prisoners of conscience Dr. Saad Eddin Ibrahim in Egypt and General Jose Gallardo in Mexico were released (see the article inside for more details). Both had been designated by Amnesty International as Special Focus Cases, and were the subject of intense action by AI members, including our group.
This should encourage us in our work on behalf of our group's adopted prisoner of conscience, Tibetan monk Ngawang Pekar, especially after the recent release of his colleague Ngawang Choepel. As I write, it is the eve of Bush's visit to China, with indications of a possible release of prisoners of conscience on the occasion. Many of us wrote to Bush reminding him of Ngawang Pekar's case and encouraging him to press for his release; I've got my fingers crossed that the message might have got through.
Last month, Amnesty International called upon the US to respect the human rights of the detainees captured in Afghanistan and to clarify their legal status (see Schulz's article inside). This stance has generated a lot of attention and controversy for AI. I received an e-mail from somebody who said that he had been a supporter of AI, but changed his mind after hearing about this. I sincerely hope he will reconsider the question of universality of human rights, even for nasty people (and people who will be proved to be nasty, if and when the evidence if objectively evaluated...). In this context (and everywhere), AI continues to be a voice of conscience, arguing that our society should not resort to such inhumane and dehumanizing devices as secret tribunals, torture, and the death penalty.
I look forward to seeing you in our monthly meeting (Thursday evening, Feb. 28; see the calendar for details of all these events). The following week, I hope you can commemorate International Women's Day with us at a special event we will be co-sponsoring at Caltech on Wednesday evening, March 6. Our collaborator Ravinder Bhatia has organized an exceptional panel of women from Afghanistan, East Timor and Guatemala, and it promises to be an extremely interesting program. The Saturday evening after that (March 9), there will be another great Women's Day program across town at the Museum of Tolerance, featuring speakers from Afghanistan and Tibet (the speaker from Tibet gave a memorable presentation to our group last year). The Wednesday after that (March 13), there will be another event at Caltech on an important and timely topic, the International Criminal Court.
Finally, I'd like to (belatedly) welcome new members Ido Dooseman, Hanna Nedich, Lance Christensen and Yvonne Apollonio.
Cheers,
Larry Romans 818-354-5809
Group Coordinator ljr@ljr.net
PRISONER OF CONSCIENCE
Ngawang Pekar, Tibetan
Monk
Our group remains
committed to working for the release of prisoner of
conscience (POC) Ngawang Pekar (naw-wan pee-kar), a Tibetan Buddhist monk.
Pekar has been imprisoned since 1989 after being arrested by Chinese
authorities for participating in a peaceful demonstration in the city of Lhasa,
Tibet Autonomous Region, in support of Tibetan
independence.
Good news this month! On January 20, Amnesty prisoner of
conscience Ngawang Choephel was released on medical parole from prison in Tibet
after serving 6 1/2 years of an 18-year sentence. Choephel, a Tibetan
ethnomusicologist who studied at Middlebury College in Vermont as a Fulbright
scholar in 1993 and 1994, was arrested in Shigatse, Tibet, in September of 1995
while filming a documentary on traditional Tibetan music and dance. One year
later, Chinese authorities announced that he had been sentenced and imprisoned
after being found guilty of committing "espionage" and
"counter-revolutionary activities." This is despite the fact that 16
hours of video footage he managed to give to a western traveler before his
arrest revealed not even a single scene of political activity. During his
incarceration, Choephel developed several serious health problems as a result
of harsh prison conditions and, though only in his thirties, was nicknamed
Gyakar Pola (Indian grandfather) by his fellow prisoners due to his frail
health.
Apart from, and perhaps largely as a result of, Amnesty
International's intensive efforts on his behalf, Choephel's case was also
championed by several other non-governmental organizations, singer-songwriter
Annie Lennox, and U.S. diplomats and members of Congress. Of note is that
Chinese officials are reported to have stated that Choephel was a
"beneficiary of more letters from members of Congress than anyone
else." Following his release, Choephel thanked Amnesty members for their
years of work to get him released and urged members to continue their work to
get other Tibetan prisoners released: "It is important that you succeed in
other cases likeyou succeeded in my case."
As the case of Ngawang Choephel shows, letters and
legislative action can definitely make a difference. As it has been some time
since we last wrote to him, for out action this month on behalf of Ngawang
Pekar we ask that you write to the Premier of the People's Republic of China.
Below is a letter that you can either copy or use as a guide in composing your
own letter:
Your Excellency,
I am writing to you out of concern for a prisoner being
held in Tibet Autonomous Region Prison No. 1. The prisoner's name is NGAWANG
PEKAR (layname: Paljor).
Ngawang Pekar, a Tibetan monk, was arrested in 1989 for
participating in a peaceful demonstration in the city of Lasashi and sentenced
to 8 years in prison. Subsequently, his sentence was increased by an additional
6 years Amnesty International considers him to be a prisoner of conscience and
I a concerned that he has been imprisoned solely for the peaceful exercise of
his universally recognized right to freedom of expression. I am further deeply
concerned about reports that he has been beaten and denied access to medica
care since his arrest.
I respectfully urge you to request that Ngawang Pekar's
case be reviewed and that he be immediately and unconditionally released in
accordance with the international laws to which China is signatory. I further
request that he be allowed access to independent non-governmental agencies so
that his current state of well-being may be determined and made
known.
I thank you for your attention to this important matter and
would greatly appreciate any further information that your office may be able
to provide.
Sincerely,
Address your letter to:
ZHU
Rongji Zongli
Guowuyuan
9
Xihuangchenggenbeijie
Beijingshi
100032
People's
Republic of China
Overseas postage for a normal letter is 80 cents, 70 cents
for an aerogram. Should you receive a reply, please notify Group
22.
GOOD NEWS! MAJOR
RELEASES
Gallardo, Choephel and Ibrahim Freed
In addition to the
good news in the Pasko case below, three high profile individuals we have
featured in this newsletter were released in the last month: General Jose
Gallardo of Mexico, Ngawang Choephel of Tibet and Saad Eddin Ibrahim of Egypt..
NGAWANG
CHOEPHEL. The Chinese
Government released Ngawang Choephel on medical grounds after he served
six-and-a-half years of his 18-year sentence, and he has been flown to the USA
for medical treatment. Amnesty
International welcomed the release of the Tibetan music scholar, but urged the
Chinese authorities to go one step further by freeing all those jailed in Tibet
in violation of their fundamental
human rights.
Ngawang Choephel is
thought to be suffering from lung and liver ailments contracted during his time
in prison and is currently undergoing medical tests. Tibetan prisons are
notorious for their poor food and poor sanitary conditions which contribute to
long-term health problems for many prisoners. Poor conditions of detention coupled with widespread torture
and abuse make life extremely harsh for all those jailed in Tibet.
Ngawang Choephel is a
musicologist specialising in traditional Tibetan performing arts. He grew up in
Tibet's exile community in India, but travelled to Tibet in July 1995 to make a
video documentary about Tibetan music and dance. He failed to return to India
as scheduled and unofficial reports later suggested that he had been arrested
and detained. The Chinese authorities only confirmed his detention one year
later, when an official radio report announced that he had been sentenced and
imprisoned for 18 years after being found guilty of committing
"espionage" and "counter-revolutionary
activities".
His trial was held in
secret and the authorities failed to produce any evidence linking him to these
"crimes" giving rise to serious concerns that he had been imprisoned
solely for exercising his fundamental human right to freedom of
expression.
JOSE
GALLARDO. Brigadier General Gallardo was freed on
February 8th after more than eight years in prison in Mexico. General Gallardo was imprisoned in
November 1993 after he called for the appointment of a special ombudsman to
investigate human rights abuses, corruption, and drug trafficking within the
armed forces. Amnesty
International declared him to be a prisoner of conscience and Amnesty activists
have campaigned relentlessly for his release. President Fox reduced General Gallardo's sentence from 28
years to time served.
The Washington Post
reported that upon his release, General Gallardo told journalists, "I
thank President Fox for issuing this order; he is complying with Mexico's
international commitments to human rights. A military ombudsman is necessary to encourage reforms. Reforming the state cannot be done
without reforming the Mexican army."
"It's great that
he is out, but we are concerned that there is no recognition of his
innocence," said Diego Zavala, a Mexico specialist with Amnesty
International, USA. "It would have been a stronger message to declare that
Gallardo had been wrongly imprisoned."
SAAD EDDIN
IBRAHIM. Saad Eddin Ibrahim was released from prison on February 7, 2002,
when Egypt's highest appeals court ordered a new trial for Dr. Ibrahim and 27
co-defendants. The release comes
after an intensive campaign by Amnesty International and other organizations to
win the release of the respected sociologist and human rights advocate. Amnesty International welcomes the
release of Dr. Ibrahim and his colleagues, but notes that the releases are
conditional, pending a new trial.
The organization maintains that the charges against Dr. Ibrahim and his
colleagues from the Ibn Khaldoun Center were politically motivated and tied to
the center's efforts to expose alleged election fraud in Egypt. Amnesty had declared Saad Ibrahim to be
a prisoner of conscience, jailed for the peaceful expression of his political
views and for his legitimate human rights activities.
THANK YOU to all of
you who took action on behalf of Saad Eddin Ibrahim, Jose Gallardo and Ngawang
Choephel.
AIUSA ANNUAL GENERAL
MEETING 2002
Reframing
Globalization:
The Challenge For Human Rights
Seattle, Washington,
April 19-21
This year's Annual
General Meeting will take place in Seattle, Washington, the site of the
now-symbolic protests against the World Trade Organization. Amnesty
International members and activists from across the country will come together
to discuss creative strategies for confronting today's most pressing human
rights challenges.
"Globalization"
has come to be the accepted terminology for rapid economic change, the transfer
of technology, trade and its impact on the nation-state. Such characterization
typically shortchanges the social justice component essential to globalization
and the advancement of the human rights of all individuals as a measure of
global progress. Amnesty International (AI) is positioned to play a key role in
bringing social justice into the common notion of globalization. As a global
grassroots movement working in solidarity for the protection of human dignity,
we stand in a unique position to "reframe" the meaning of
globalization and secure human rights in the central vision for global
progress.
The focus for our
conference in Seattle will address the expanding concerns of the international
AI movement. The recent decisions of the 2001 International Council Meeting
(ICM) in Dakar, Senegal will enable AI to work not only against torture or for
prisoners of conscience but against all forms of discrimination, whether they
affect political and civil rights or economic, social and cultural (ESC)
rights. The AGM will be an opportunity for us to determine how the movement
should address ESC rights and consider the effectiveness of our human rights
strategies in today's context of rapid change.
While continuing to
address core AI human rights concerns such as abolition of torture and the
death penalty, panelists and featured speakers will also explore these key
issues and other from the perspective of how socio-economic injustice and
racial inequality make certain groups of individuals more vulnerable to human
rights violations. They will help us to understand both the obstacles we face
as a globalized society, as well as the opportunities for activism in
a worldwide
human rights movement.
The Annual General
Meeting is an exciting weekend with policy discussions for AIUSA members,
organizational strategic planning sessions, activist and youth leadership
meetings, networking sessions and special gatherings. For more information or to register on line, please visit
the AIUSA website: www.amnestyusa.org.
Or call to request a brochure: 310-815-0450.
JUST EARTH
NETWORK
Court Victory for Pasko but No
Release
The Russian Supreme Court's military collegium
this past Tuesday declared the conviction of
environmental defender Grigory Pasko illegal. The ruling was a major victory in the struggle to defend
Pasko's right to free speech and his release from
prison.
As you
will all recall, Pasko was arrested by Federal Security Service officers and
accused of espionage and revealing state secrets, primarily because he filmed
and reported on the human and environmental threats stemming from the illegal
dumping of nuclear waste by the Russian Navy into
the Sea
of Japan. He was on the basis of a secret military decree on December 25, 2001
and sentenced to four years in a labor camp.
Amnesty
International adopted Pasko as a prisoner of conscience on January 4, 2002 and
has raised concerns about the fairness of the trial, and the impartiality and
independence of the court. For
more information on this case, please visit our website at
www.amnestyusa.org/justearth or the Bellona Foundation's website at
www.bellona.org
While this ruling is a positive development,
Pasko remains in jail pending the
final determination of his case.
This is a good time to increase your grassroots activism on the case. Continue
to write to the Russian authorities demanding
the immediate and
unconditional
release of Grigory Pasko. Ask that
Pasko be acquitted of all charges, as there is no evidence that he committed
any crime under Russia
laws. Emphasize that the information Pasko released
was already public and did not constitute a
threat to national security.
Remind the authorities that the government of Russia has committed itself to
upholding the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, including the right to
freedom of opinion and expression.
Send
appeals to:
President of the Russian Federation
Vladimir Vladimirovich Putin
Prezidentu Rossiyskoy Federatsii
g. Moskva
Kreml
Russian Federation
e-mail: president@gov.ru
His Excellency
YuriUshakov
Ambassador
Embassy of the Russian
Federation
2650 Wisconsin Avenue,
NW
Washington, DC 20007
RIGHTS
READERS
Human
Rights Book Discussion Group
Vroman’s Bookstore
(695 E. Colorado Boulevard in Pasadena)
Sunday, March 17, 6:30 PM
|
|
Unspeakable Acts,
Ordinary People: by
John Conroy Unspeakable
Acts, Ordinary People is a riveting book that exposes the potential in each of us for
acting unspeakably. John Conroy sits down with |
torturers from several nations and comes to understand
their motivations. His compelling narrative has the tension of a novel. He
takes us into a Chicago police station, two villages in the West Bank, and a
secret British interrogation center in Northern Ireland, and in the process we
are exposed to the experience of the victim, the rationalizations of the
torturer, and the seeming indifference of the bystander. The torture occurs in
democracies that ostensibly value justice, due process, and human rights, and
yet the perpetrators and their superiors escape without punishment, revealing
much about the dynamics of torture.
LETTER COUNT
Campaign Against Torture &nb
sp;
10
Government Action Network
3
Just Earth Network &nb
sp;
3
Death Penalty &nb
sp;
2
Urgent Actions: &nb
sp;
19
Total:
&nb
sp;
37
Want to add your letters to the
total? Get in touch with lucas.kamp@jpl.nasa.gov
CAMPAIGN AGAINST
TORTURE
Kenya: Violence Against
Women
Thousands of women
and girls are killed or injured each year in deliberate acts of violence.
Violence committed by soldiers, police officers, prison guards or by people
they know such as husbands, fathers, employers or neighbors. Such violence is rooted in
discrimination against women. International human rights law imposes
obligations on governments to protect everyone from torture or ill-treatment,
whether committed by state agents or private individuals. Rape and other
deliberate acts of violence against women constitute torture when the state has
failed to fulfill its obligation to provide effective protection and prohibit,
investigate and punish such acts.
On 8 March 2000,
Hadaja Choro and two other women prisoners held in GK Prison, Kakanuga, were
sent to fetch water for the prison. They went with one female prison warden to
the gates of the Water Department, where they say that they saw an askari
(watchman) give the warden money.
The warden told
Hadaja Choro and the other prisoners to follow the man and not to ask
questions, or she would beat them and leave them to die. Inside the Water
Department two other watchmen were waiting. According to Hadaja, each man took
a woman and raped her.
Hadaja Choro was
serving a two-and-a-half-year sentence for the manslaughter of the daughter of
her husband's second wife, a charge she denies. Her husband and his second
wife, who had accused her of the crime, did not go to court for her trial, and
the magistrate told her that she would be kept in prison for her own safety,
because she had enemies. She says that in prison she was tortured by female
prison wardens, who regularly beat the inmates and denied them hospital
treatment for their injuries.
Two months after the
rape, Hadaja realized that she was pregnant. It was only then that she reported
the incident to a senior officer at the prison. The officer told her not to
mention it again, as she would get the officer involved
sacked.
Hadaja Choro says she
was told never to go out of the prison again and was kept isolated from the
other prisoners. "During isolation, if I was found with others then I
would be beaten," she says, "but if I stayed alone then I was not
beaten." One of the other two prisoners who had been raped was taken to
the remand wing of the same prison, the other was transferred to another
prison.
On December 2 2000
Hadaja Choro gave birth to a boy. On 12 December she received a presidential
pardon and was released from prison. Her husband divorced her because of her
child, leaving her without a home or any means of
support.
Hadaja Choro reported
the rape to Kakamega police station, but she has never been asked to give a
statement nor has there been any investigation by the
police.
Hadaja's story is
typical of many in Kenya, where violence against women in detention is
widespread. The government has failed to protect women from abuses. Prison
officers, police and security officials are rarely held to account for their
actions and therefore commit acts of torture, including rape, with
impunity.
ACT
NOW
Amnesty International
is campaigning to improve respect for women's human rights in Kenya. Add your
voice to ours.
Write to
the Kenyan Commissioner
of Prisons. Ask him to initiate a prompt, thorough and impartial investigation
into the rape and other torture of Hadaja Choro and to ensure that those
responsible are brought to justice.
Send your letters to:
Abraham Kamaril
Kenya Prisons Service
Headquarters
PO Box 30175
Nairobi,
Kenya
DEATH PENALTY
ACTION
Texas: Psychotic Inmate to be
Executed
Monty Delk (m),
white, aged 34, is scheduled to be executed in Texas on 28 February 2002. He
was sentenced to death in 1988 for the 1986 shotgun murder of Gene Olan Allen,
a white man. Monty Delk was 19 years old at the time of the crime.
Monty Delk's lawyer
has raised serious doubts about his client's competency to be executed, that is
whether he understands the reason for and reality of his punishment. Monty
Delk's apparent mental health problems first emerged in 1989. In 1990, the
prison medical authorities diagnosed him with bipolar disorder with psychotic
features, and also raised the possibility that he was suffering from
schizo-affective disorder, another severe mental illness. He was given
anti-psychotic drugs and lithium.
Monty Delk has
displayed a pattern of disturbed behaviour over his years on death row,
including covering himself in faeces, and incoherent jabbering. He has
repeatedly expressed delusional beliefs, such as that he is a submarine
captain, a CIA or FBI agent, or a member of the military. At a court hearing in
1993, at which an earlier execution date was set, he responded to the judge in
prolonged streams of unbroken gibberish. Amnesty International has received an
unofficial tape recording of this hearing.
At another hearing in
1997 to determine his competency to continue with his appeals, Monty Delk was
gagged and then removed from the courtroom after repeatedly
interrupting the court
with nonsensical utterances. He was later brought back in, but removed again
when he continued to utter nonsense, such as saying to the judge 'I is you';
'Will you please blow my head off'; and 'I'm an FBI agent'. At the hearing, a
former chief mental health officer with the Texas prison system said that his
review of the prison records and his own contact with Monty Delk suggested that
the prisoner suffered from a severe mental illness.
Three years earlier,
the prison diagnosis of Monty Delk had been changed to one of malingering -
that he was feigning mental illness to avoid execution. This followed an
alleged statement to this effect made by Delk to another inmate and overheard
by a prison staff member. In 1999 when the state's death row was transferred
from Huntsville to Livingston, medical staff at the new unit diagnosed Delk
with bipolar disorder. However, after they were made aware of the 1994
re-diagnosis, the official position once again became that his mental illness
was a pretence.
Monty Delk's current
lawyer has represented him since 1996. He says that he has been unable to have
any rational communication with his client in that time. For example, when he
visited him in December 2001, Monty Delk did not acknowledge his presence, or
provide any useful information. He apparently continued to believe that he was
in the military and that he was in control of a large and powerful
organization.
Monty Delk's lawyer
is seeking a hearing on the question of his client's competency for execution
under a Texas law enacted in 1999. The prosecution's position is that the
execution should go forward as scheduled on the basis that he was found
competent to continue his appeals in 1997.
BACKGROUND
INFORMATION
The execution of the
insane - those who do not understand the reason for or reality of their
punishment - is prohibited under a 1986 US Supreme Court ruling, Ford v.
Wainwright. Nevertheless, the minimal standards that pertain to competency
determinations have meant that numerous individuals have been executed despite
lingering doubts about whether they truly understood what was happening to them
and why.
The United Nations
Safeguards Guaranteeing Protection of the Rights of Those Facing the Death
Penalty prohibit the execution of 'persons who have become insane'. In
resolutions in recent years, the UN Commission on Human Rights has repeatedly
called on retentionist countries not to impose or carry out the death penalty
on any person suffering from 'any form of mental
disorder'.
While the extent of
Monty Delk's mental health problems remains in dispute, what is clear is that
the death penalty against anyone contradicts emerging global standards of
decency and justice, with 109 countries now abolitionist in law or practice,
and the vast majority of executions carried out in a small number of countries,
including China, Iran, Saudi Arabia and the United States of
America.
Since the USA resumed
executions in 1977, 759 men and women have been put to death, more than 600 of
them since 1990. Texas accounts for a third of US executions, having lethally
injected 260 people. Ten men have been executed in the USA so far in 2002, four
of them in Texas.
Amnesty International
opposes the death penalty unreservedly. It is a symptom of a culture of
violence, not a solution to it. It tends to be applied in an arbitrary and
discriminatory manner, it can never be free of the risk of irrevocable error,
and it is inescapably cruel, both to the condemned and to their families. It is
a government policy that encourages feelings of hatred and vengeance, and
diverts resources and energies from constructive efforts to combat violent
crime and to assist those who suffer the appalling trauma of losing a relative
to murder.
RECOMMENDED
ACTION: Please send appeals to arrive as quickly as
possible:
* noting
evidence that Monty Delk's mental health has deteriorated during his time on
death row, including diagnoses of bipolar disorder;
* noting that
his disturbed behaviour has continued for over a decade;
* noting
continuing doubts about his legal sanity, which raise questions about the
constitutionality of his execution, and noting international
standards;
* calling for
commutation of Monty Delk's death sentence;
* calling, at
the very least for a reprieve to allow for full determination of Monty Delk's
mental competency.
APPEALS
TO:
Gerald
Garrett
Chairperson
Texas Board of
Pardons and Paroles
P.O. Box
13401
Austin, Texas
78711-3401
Fax: 1 512
463 8120
The Honorable Rick
Perry
Governor of
Texas
State
Capitol
PO Box
12428
Austin, TX
78711
THE FATE OF QAEDA
PRISONERS
By William F.
Schulz
Executive Director of
Amnesty International USA
Originally published in The New York
Times,
January 19, 2002
Even as
representatives of the International Red Cross go to work in Guantánamo
Bay, interviewing Taliban and Qaeda prisoners and inspecting their cage-like
cells, many Americans seem to find this concern for the prisoners hard to
understand. After all, some of these men may well be responsible, directly or
not, for the horror of Sept. 11 and for terrible crimes during Taliban rule. So
what if they are subjected to some discomfort, particularly in light of the
observation by Gen. Richard B. Myers, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff,
that some of them "would gnaw hydraulic lines in the back of a C-17 to
bring it down"? Why should anyone care?
The Red Cross is not
alone in its concern for the treatment of these men. Mary Robinson, United
Nations high commissioner for human rights, has said they should be treated in
accordance with international law. Human rights groups have raised questions
about the prisoners' conditions. My own organization, Amnesty International,
expressed concern last week that some prisoners were being hooded, shackled or
sedated during the 27-hour trip from Afghanistan to Cuba and then would be held
in 6-by-8- foot cages open to the elements.
It is important to
recognize that human rights organizations do not act out of sympathy for
prisoners guilty of crimes. Amnesty International denounced the Taliban for its
repressive rule from the moment it came to power in 1996, even while the United
States government was initially welcoming the overthrow of the mujahadeen. One
of the most dangerous problems in the world today is that those who commit
human rights violations so frequently get away with them. It is therefore
critical that everyone responsible for the Sept. 11 attacks and for human
rights crimes in Afghanistan be brought to justice.
How that happens,
however, will ultimately help determine the success of the war on terrorism.
President Bush has made it clear that this is a war not just to protect
national security but also to defend principles of freedom and the rule of law.
It is those very principles, as embodied, for example, in the Geneva
Conventions on prisoners of war and civilian protection and in the United
Nations Body of Principles for the Protection of All Persons Under Any Form of
Detention or Imprisonment, that require prisoners to be treated
humanely.
To the extent that
the United States has decided to accord Taliban and Qaeda detainees at least
some of the rights of prisoners of war, it should be commended. But the
International Red Cross has declared that they should be treated as prisoners
of war until proven otherwise, and to the extent that the United States ignores
that ruling and disregards international standards, we compromise the very
integrity of the struggle we are waging. The danger is that we hand the enemies
of the rule of law — those who are looking for any opportunity
to convince
the world of our hypocrisy — a perfect excuse and an easy
victory.
And we do two things
more. We provide cover to other governments to ignore human rights standards
and in the process make their regions of the world less stable. If the United
States does not abide by human rights rules, why should others? And, perhaps
most compelling, we may subject our own troops to greater
peril.
President Bush has
said that the war on terrorism will be a long one and American servicemen and
women may be called upon for years to risk their lives overseas. If that is the
case, it is almost inevitable that some of them will be captured one day.
Surely the odds of retrieving them unharmed will be greater if we have not been
guilty of violating the very human rights standards that constitute the best
hope for their protection.
All police and
military officers have the right to take appropriate measures to protect
themselves from prisoners who pose a danger. Reasonable restraint is fully
justified. No one expects prisoners of war to be housed in a Hilton. What is
required is that they not be brutalized. Showing respect for the human rights
of our adversaries is one of the surest ways to make the world safer for
ourselves.
Editor's Last
Word:
Read us on line:
http://www.cco.caltech.edu/~aigp22
Martha Ter Maat, 626-281-4039 /
mtermaat@hsc.usc.edu
