Monday, May 18 2009
US interrogators may have killed dozens, human rights researcher and rights group say
United States interrogators killed nearly four dozen detainees during or
after their interrogations, according a report published by a human rights
researcher based on a Human Rights First report and followup investigations.
In all, 98 detainees have died while in US hands. Thirty-four homicides
have been identified, with at least eight detainees — and as many as 12 — having
been tortured to death, according to a 2006 Human Rights First report that
underwrites the researcher's posting. The causes of 48 more deaths remain
uncertain.
The researcher, John Sifton, worked for five years for Human Rights Watch. In a
posting Tuesday, he documents myriad cases of detainees who died at the hands of
their US interrogators. Some of the instances he cites are graphic.
Most of those taken captive were killed in Afghanistan and Iraq. They include at
least one Afghani soldier, Jamal Naseer, who was mistakenly arrested in 2004.
"Those arrested with Naseer later said that during interrogations U.S. personnel
punched and kicked them, hung them upside down, and hit them with sticks or
cables," Sifton writes. "Some said they were doused with cold water and forced
to lie
in the snow. Nasser collapsed about two weeks after the arrest, complaining of
stomach pain, probably an internal hemorrhage."
Another Afghan killing occurred in 2002. Mohammad Sayari was killed by four U.S.
servicemembers after being detained for allegedly "following their movements." A
Pentagon document obtained by the American Civil Liberties Union in 2005 said
that the Defense Department found a captain and three sergeants had "murdered"
Sayari, but the section dealing with the department's probe was redacted.
Perhaps the most macabre case occurred in Iraq, which was documented in a Human
Rights First report in 2006.
"Nagem Sadoon Hatab… a 52-year-old Iraqi, was killed while in U.S. custody at a
holding camp close to Nasiriyah," the group wrote.
"Although a U.S. Army medical examiner found that Hatab had died of
strangulation, the evidence that would have been required to secure
accountability for his death – Hatab's body – was rendered unusable in court.
Hatab's internal organs were left exposed on an airport tarmac for hours; in the
blistering Baghdad heat, the organs were destroyed; the throat bone that would
have supported the Army medical examiner's findings of strangulation was never
found."
In another graphic instance, a former Iraqi general was beaten by US forces and
suffocated to death. The military officer charged in the death was given just 60
days house arrest.
"Abed Hamed Mowhoush [was] a former Iraqi general beaten over days by U.S. Army,
CIA and other non-military forces, stuffed into a sleeping bag, wrapped with
electrical cord, and suffocated to death," Human Rights First writes.
"In the recently concluded trial of a low-level military officer charged in
Mowhoush's death, the officer received a written reprimand, a fine, and 60 days
with his movements limited to his work, home, and
church."
Another Iraqi man was killed in a US detention facility on Mosul in 2003.
"U.S. military personnel who examined Kenami when he first arrived at the
facility determined that he had no preexisting medical conditions," the rights
group writes. "Once in custody, as a disciplinary measure for talking, Kenami
was forced to perform extreme amounts of exercise—a technique used across
Afghanistan and Iraq. Then his hands were bound behind his back with plastic
handcuffs, he was hooded, and forced to lie in an overcrowded cell. Kenami was
found dead the morning after his arrest, still bound and hooded. No autopsy was
conducted; no official cause of death was determined. After the Abu Ghraib
scandal, a review of Kenami's death was launched, and Army reviewers criticized
the initial criminal investigation for failing to conduct an autopsy; interview
interrogators, medics, or detainees present at the scene of the death; and
collect physical evidence. To date, however, the Army has taken no known action
in the case."
Death from interrogation is hard to separate from simple detainee death while in
US custody. But one particular case stands out that seems to have fallen by the
wayside — the murder of CIA "ghost" detainee named Manadel al-Jamadi, who was
tortured to death by a CIA team at Abu Ghraib in 2003.
"Pictures of Abu Ghraib guards Charles Graner and Sabrina Harman posing with al-Jamadi's
dead body, the so-called Ice Man, were among the most notorious of the Abu
Ghraib photographs published in April 2004," Sifton notes. "A CIA officer named
Mark Swanner and an interpreter led the team that interrogated al-Jamadi. Nine
Navy personnel were also implicated. An autopsy conducted by the U.S. military
five days after al-Jamadi's death found that the cause: "blunt force injuries
complicated by compromised respiration."
"Reporting by The New Yorker's Jane Mayer and NPR's John McChesney revealed that
al-Jamadi was strung up from handcuffs behind his back, a torture tactic
sometimes called a 'Palestinian hanging,'" he adds. "After an investigation, the
CIA referred the case to the Department of Justice for possible criminal
prosecution of the CIA personnel involved, but no charges were ever brought.
Prosecutors accused 10 Navy personnel of the crime; nine were given nonjudicial
punishments, such as rank reductions and letters of reprimand, and a 10th was
acquitted."
Additionally, Sifton notes the CIA may have had some close calls with detainees
nearly dying during interrogations: the May 10, 2005, Bush Administration
torture memo by Stephen Bradbury notes that doctors were nearby to perform a
tracheotomy if during waterboarding the suspect is approaching death.
"Most seriously, for reasons of physical fatigue of psychological resignation,
the subject may simply give up, allowing excessive filling of the airways and
loss of consciousness," Bradbury wrote. "An
unresponsive subject should be righted immediately, and the integrator should
deliver a sub-xyphoid thrust to expel the water. If this fails to restore normal
breathing, aggressive medical intervention is
required….'"
The memo says CIA doctors were on hand with necessary equipment to perform a
tracheotomy if necessary during waterboarding sessions: "[W]e are informed that
the necessary emergency medical equipment is always present—although not visible
to the detainee—during any application of the waterboard."
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