U.S.: Rice Miscasts Policy on Torture (Human Rights Watch)

(This is directly from the Human Rights Watch website, it just came up in my RSS reader.)

U.S.: Rice Miscasts Policy on Torture

Remarks at Start of Europe Visit Leave Concerns Unanswered

(New York, December 6, 2005) – In remarks at the start of a five-day trip to Europe, the U.S. Secretary of State mischaracterized the U.S. government’s “rendition” of terrorist suspects to make it appear lawful, Human Rights Watch said today.

Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice said the U.S. government had not transported detainees to other countries “for the purpose” of interrogation using torture, but she failed to mention that the United States has transported detainees to countries such as Egypt and Syria where it knows torture is commonplace. The Convention Against Torture, to which the United States is a party, outlaws such a practice.

Secretary Rice also failed to address a central concern of European governments: that the CIA has allegedly held detainees in secret locations in Europe. “Condi Rice can't deny that secret prisons exist, because they do," said Tom Malinowski, Washington advocacy director of Human Rights Watch. "But she can't say where they are because that would embarrass the United States and put the host countries in an impossible position -- something the Bush administration should have thought of when it launched this shortsighted policy."

On renditions, Secretary Rice merely cited historical precedents for suspects being rendered to the United States for prosecution and suggested that legal methods for detaining and interrogating suspects were not always appropriate. In fact, the U.S. government has frequently resorted to extra-legal rendition to other countries as a means of interrogating detainees indefinitely without judicial interference. “Secretary Rice made extra-legal rendition sound like just another form of extradition,” said Malinowski. “In fact, it’s a form of kidnapping and ‘disappearing’ someone entirely outside the law.”

<http://hrw.org/english/docs/2005/12/05/usint12147.htm>
(more at link above)

What a waste of perfectly good air...

since it just pointed out all the more clearly the lie she was telling...
what a whore.

I swear, I can't believe we have to discuss torture as an appropriate means of extracting information. Secret prisons in repressive countries. Coy public officials like this horrible woman skipping around the issue.
Off topic a bit , but my understanding is that the organized terrorists stucture is set up so they can't give up a lot of information about others. These "cells" we keep hearing about. These people come from countries where torture is a matter of course and have taken it into consideration. So not only is it evil and wrong, not to mention proven ineffective as far as information goes--it's stupid as well.

...about the regime's torture policy. "It's simple, we don't do it, period." Could the author of the so called legal justification for torture now deny that such a policy exists? No problem. Just say it on tv. This administration is appalling!

public forum - whether the question gets posed to Condi, Rummy, Bush or Scotty...

Are these detainees being released to their home countries, extradited to their home countries, remanded (in the legal sense) to their home countries for local crimes or transferred to extraterritorial - and secret - US institutions? And what is the purpose?

If they want to continue this endless parsing of terminology (see "insurgents") and use of well cloaked phraseology, they ought to be called on it, publicly. It'd be a great follow-up for the press...

...very trivial doesn't it?

Of course, I always knew what President Bill Clinton meant by that anyway.:evilgrin:

teh "right" wording for a simple message (this, according to Bush at War by Woodward). I see Rummy's hands all over this "rendition" phraseology.

to a United States throne.

out of abusing non-christians, just because they can and get away with it.

If you don't actually die from the "drowning" then nah, it's not torture.

She also tried to justify their "not torturing" shell game yesterday by saying that it had prevented other terrorist attacks both in the US and Europe. These sicko's are torturing people, many of whom are innocent bystanders caught up in the sweeps.

Absolutely amazing that these things can be allowed to happen. No one is minding the store.

http://news.amnesty.org/index/ENGAMR511982005

USA: 800 secret CIA flights into and out of Europe

Press release, 12/05/2005

<snip>
Amnesty International today revealed that six planes used by the CIA for renditions have made some 800 flights in or out of European airspace including 50 landings at Shannon airport in the Republic of Ireland.

The information contradicts assurances given last week by the US Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice to the Irish Foreign Minister Dermot Ahern, that Ireland's Shannon airport had not been used for "untoward" purposes, or as a transit point for terror suspects.

The organisation also rejected assertions by the US Secretary of State as she began a four-nation tour of Europe. In a statement today, Ms Rice argued that rendition -- transferring detainees from country to country without legal process -- was permissible under international law. Although the victims of rendition usually end up in countries known to use torture in their interrogations, Ms Rice added that the US government seeks assurances on treatment from receiving nations.

"Flying detainees to countries where they may face torture or other ill-treatment is a direct and outright breach on international law with or without so called "diplomatic assurances". These assurances are meaningless. Countries known for systematic torture, regularly deny the existence of such practices," said Claudio Cordone, Amnesty International's Senior Director of Regional Programmes.

Why do you ask?

...until 2006, and hope that it all just goes away.

But as we all know here, if we don't fight to get rid of these bastards, who will?

...investigate, prosecute, and when appropriate convict.

Make these bastards pay with hard time turning big rocks into little rocks.