Home Mobile Archives Reader Blogs Register Login

Monday, May 30, 2005

More Baseless Abuse Claims Being Hyped By Media

Unbelievable.

LONDON - One Guantanamo prisoner told a military panel that American troops beat him so badly he wets his pants now. Another detainee claimed U.S. troops stripped prisoners in Afghanistan and intimidated them with dogs so they would admit to militant activity.

Tales of alleged abuse and forced confessions are among some 1,000 pages of tribunal transcripts the U.S. government released to The Associated Press under a Freedom of Information Act lawsuit --ť the second batch of documents the AP has received in 10 days.

The testimonies offer a glimpse into the secretive world of Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, where about 520 men from 40 countries remain held, accused of having links to Afghanistan's ousted Taliban regime or Osama bin Laden's al-Qaida network. Many have been held for three years.


Of course, there is absolutely no support for these claims outside of the testimony of the prisoners making the claims in the first place. But that won't stop the media from hyping them for ratings (and to continue their bail-out of Newsweek) and the anti-war left from using them as political weapons.

Why is it that we can't just declare a moratorium on these accusations until there's some proof to go with them? The Newsweek disaster in and of itself proved how hurtful this sort of reporting can be, it seems crazy to continue it.

Comments

Avatar for WOOF

Baseless? Proof?
People are already in jail for torture in Afghanistan and Iraq.
Gitmo:
FBI reports
“The agents wrote of finding prisoners “chained hand and foot in a fetal positionâ€? for up to 24 hours at a time, and of prisoners who had “urinated or defecated on themselves.”

Another FBI document says an interrogator grabbed a detainee’s thumbs and “bent them backwards� and “grabbed his genitals.� One FBI agent reported that he saw a detainee had been “gagged with duct tape that covered much of his head.�

“FBI agents at Guantanamo thought so, too. He warned FBI headquarters the military was using “torture techniques.â€?…
“FBI agents were being instructed not to be a part of interrogations where they thought torture and abuse was taking place.”

http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2005/04/28/60minutes/main691602.shtml

WOOF on May 30, 2005 at 06:06 pm
Avatar for The Big Picture

[...] Meanwhile, most in the media and on the anti-war left continue to swallow every unfounded accusation of abuse the detainees at Guantanamo Bay and other places care to aim in their direction.  07:23 AM • Permalink & Comments (0) • Blogroll The Big Picture! • Trackbacks (0) [...]

The Big Picture on January 21, 2006 at 10:01 pm
Page 1 of 1        

Post a Comment


Before commenting, please recite:

Grant me the serenity to ignore the trolls,
the courage to debate with honest opponents,
and the wisdom to know the difference.

Name   
Email   
URL   
Human?
  
 

Upload Image    

Remember my personal information

Notify me of follow-up comments?

Note: Notifications will only be sent to confirmed email addresses.