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Torture & Human Rights: A Guide
Thursday, June 19, 2008
The right to be free from torture
is one of the most fundamental human rights recognized by the global community
today. It is UUSC's firm position that any government-sponsored acts of torture
under any circumstances are profoundly immoral, unjustified, and illegal. As an
organization that promotes human rights, we are committed to bringing such
practices to an end.
- What is torture?
- What does the U.S. Constitution have to say about torture?
- The Geneva Conventions and the U.N. Convention Against Torture
- U.S. Statutory law
- Humane interrogation methods do work
- Abu Ghraib was not an anomoly
- Who has been prosecuted for Abu Ghraib?
- Extraordinary rendition
- "Ghost prisoners"
- The downside of the United States' use of torture
What is torture?
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There is no doubt that torture violates rights established by the Bill of Rights. Torture also violates state constitutions where provisions parallel protections set forth in the federal Bill of Rights. Constitutional amendments that provide protection against torture include:
- The Fourth Amendment: the right to be free of unreasonable search or seizure;
- The Fifth Amendment: the right against self-incrimination (which encompasses the right to remain silent during interrogations);
- The Fifth and the Fourteenth Amendments: the right to due process of law (ensuring fundamental fairness in the criminal justice system);
- The Eighth Amendment: the right to be free of cruel or unusual punishment.
In numerous cases, the U.S. Supreme Court has condemned the use of force amounting to torture or other forms of ill treatment during interrogations. The Court has rejected the use of: whipping; slapping; deprivation of food, water, or sleep; keeping a prisoner naked or in a small cell for prolonged periods; holding a gun to a prisoner's head; or threatening a prisoner with mob violence.
The Geneva Conventions and the U.N. Convention Against Torture
The Geneva Conventions, which regulate international law in times of war, clearly ban cruel and degrading punishment. They prohibit the torture of both prisoners of war (POWs) and noncombatants (civilians). The torture of any noncombatant is specifically prohibited by the Geneva Convention relative to the Protection of Civilian Persons in Time of War (1949). Moreover, the Convention Against Torture bans the torture of any human being under any circumstances, even during times of war.
U.S. statutory law
The use of torture by U.S. agents or officials outside the United States is a felony under both the Anti-Torture Statute (18 U.S.C. 2340) and the Federal War Crimes Act. Please visit the Cornell Law School website for more information.
Humane interrogation methods do work
Effective interrogation methods have been used by skilled police and FBI personnel for decades. These include: cross-checking facts, sharing information, using "good cop/bad cop" teams and positive incentives, and slowly winning over the suspect and engaging him or her in dialogue. Interestingly, some Middle Eastern countries report that the use of a local Muslim religious leader with a terrorist suspect has produced important information.
Abu Ghraib was not an anomaly
Inside Abu Ghraib prison in Iraq, detainees were subjected to cruel and degrading treatment, which in many cases amounted to torture. In a deliberate pattern of prisoner abuse, detainees were stripped of their clothes, beaten with cables, threatened, made to perform humiliating sexual acts, and deprived of sleep. These methods of "softening up detainees" have been practiced by trained CIA agents, Special Operations troops, and military intelligence officials in Iraq, Afghanistan, Guantánamo Bay Prison System, and elsewhere.
It is important to note that similar torture methods have been used for years in Central America, South America, and Vietnam, where U.S. intelligence networks operated. The hooded and wired Iraqi prisoner in the infamous Abu Ghraib photograph is posed in what specialists call the "Vietnam" position. It is highly improbable that such sophisticated methods were enacted by low-level soldiers by sheer coincidence.
Who has been prosecuted for Abu Ghraib?
To date, only low-ranking military personnel have been tried for perpetrating abuses in Abu Ghraib. However, there is mounting evidence that these methods were discussed and authorized at the highest levels, by Pentagon, CIA, and White House officials. Yet no CIA or military intelligence officials who issued the orders to torture has been tried, nor have charges been brought against any high-level U.S. officials in Washington, D.C.
Extraordinary rendition
Extraordinary rendition is the practice of transferring or deporting detainees to another country that is known to permit torture. Once detainees are in a third country, security personnel can use torture and other interrogation procedures on them. States practice extraordinary rendition in order to avoid committing violations of international law in its own territory where it is bound by national and international law. The United States is known to engage in this practice. As one U.S. official stated, "We don't kick the [expletive] out of them here. We send them to other countries so they can kick the [expletive] out of them."
According to several reports, U.S. intelligence officers will accompany a prisoner to a "torturing country," such as Egypt and Syria, and even provide a list of questions to be asked during the interrogation. Money pipelines to such nations are said to be well oiled with U.S. funding.
The case of Maher Arar is one example. Arar, a Canadian citizen, was seized in New York's John F. Kennedy Airport as he awaited a flight home. He was detained by U.S. agents and sent to Syria, where he was tortured for nearly a year. To learn more about this case, visit www.maherarar.ca.
"Ghost prisoners"
Ghost prisoner are detainees who are secretly held and interrogated by the CIA in undisclosed locations. No one knows who they are, why or where they are detained, or what interrogation methods are being used on them. They have not been properly reported to the International Committee of the Red Cross. One such ghost prisoner was the dead man packed in ice in the notorious Abu Ghraib photograph. He was never logged in the Abu Ghraib prison books.
The downside of the United States' use of torture
Our country's current practice of torture and illegal detention jeopardizes the safety and well-being of our own service men and women. If the United States casts aside the Geneva Conventions as "quaint and obsolete," there is no guarantee that other countries will not do to same and violate the rights of our military men and women to be free from torture. For this reason, many military leaders, including former Secretary of State Colin Powell, vehemently opposed torture policies. Moreover, the use of harsh methods has only increased, and will continue to increase, animosity against the United States globally, especially in the Arab and Muslim worlds.
Following the disastrous policies of the Bush administration in the past few years, it is imperative that the United States proves to the world we are committed to human rights and mending relationships with the Arab and Muslim worlds.
