Military - new material (60)
01 October 2007
Leave No Marks: enhanced interrogation techniques and the risk of criminality. Physicians for Human Rights and Human Rights First, August 2007, pp. 44. This report examines the "enhanced" interrogation techniques advocated by former US Secretary for Defence, Donald Rumsfeld. These include stress positions, beating, temperature manipulation, waterboarding, threats of harm to a person, his family or friends, sleep deprivation, sensory bombardment (noise and light), violent shaking, sexual humiliation and prolonged isolation and sensory deprivation. It concludes that such practices "may cause severe physical and mental pain upon detainees" and says that: "Given this knowledge, US policy makers and interrogation personal should understand that if such techniques are practiced, it would be reasonable for courts to conclude that the resulting harm was inflected intentionally." PHR: http://www.physiciansforhumanrights.org
As British leave, Basra detiorates: violence rises in Shiite city once hailed as a success story, Karen DeYoung and Thomas E. Ricks. Washington Post 8.7.07. As the remaining 5,500 British troops stationed there beat a retreat from their former headquarters at Basra palace, a senior US intelligence officer has told the Washington Post that "The British have basically been defeated in the south" and, as another official put it, they are now "surrounded like cowboys and indians" - which is evidenced by the number of military fatalities in the city in recent weeks. Meanwhile the major Shia political groups and their militias are extending their influence in official institutions, municipal offices and the neighbourhood streets, waiting to fill the vacuum left by the British troops. It is widely predicted that these warring militias, each with its own representatives in the government of Nouri al-Maliki, will escalate the street battles as they fight for control of neighbourhoods and resources.
Hollanditis.Nu, pp36, Euro 3 (print version). This new publication by Dutch peace and anti-militarist groups was named after the anti-nuclear protest movement of the 1980s which saw mass demonstration in Amsterdam (1981) and The Hague (1983). It is an attempt to unite the peace movement after its demise in the 1990s during a time when consecutive wars in the Balkans, Afghanistan, Iraq and Sudan brought mass action. The publication provides information about war zones and the arms industry, aiming to work towards building a world without war and violence. Published and edited by: Haags Vredesplatform, Vredesbewegingvereniging Pais, Antimilitaristies Onderzoekskollektief VD AMOK and the Dutch branch of the Women's League for Peace and Freedom, available in print from bestelling@hollanditis.nu, articles free online at http://hollanditis.nu
Torturer's bazaar, Mark Thomas. The Guardian 8.8.07. The comedian and political activist discusses the Defence Systems and Equipment International arms fair where he found three companies "offering electro-shock torture equipment", just around the corner from the Association of Chief Police Officers stall. Most of the remainder of the article deals with his frustrating attempts to persuade Customs officers to take action against the "banned stun guns and leg irons" advertised at the arms fair. The Mark Thomas website can be accessed at: http://www.markthomasinfo.com
The Iraqis don't deserve us. So we betray them...Robert Fisk. The Independent 23.8.07, p 2. One of the important things about Fisk's writing is that, unlike the architects of the illegal Iraq invasion, he actually knows something about the region and its history. Here he takes us on a guided tour of Iraq's recent failed leaders imposed and appointed by the US or "elected" with its financial backing. He starts with Ahmed Chalabi, the fabricator of Iraq's "weapons of mass destruction" who is wanted on fraud charges, and concludes with Nouri al-Malaki, a man "with whom Bush could do business": "He couldn't get the army togethe