| Detainees In Cia Custody |
Shopping Prisoners |
Website Links For Prisoners |
Information AboutDetainees In Cia Custody |
|
In this context, the U.S. government has been accused of maintaining covert interrogation centres, called Black Site s, operated by both known and secret Intelligence Agencies . Several dozen captives suspected of being from the most senior ranks of 2006 ] While Secretary Of Defense Donald Rumsfeld has described those detained in Camp Delta at Guantánamo Bay , Cuba , as "the worst of the worst", it is now known those with the highest intelligence value are not detained or interrogated in Cuba, and are thought to be held at " Black Site " facilities in Eastern Europe constructed and used by the former Soviet Union to incarcerate Political Prisoner s. SUSPECTS HELD BY US CIVILIAN INTELLIGENCE AGENCIES American intelligence officials have made public the names of some of the suspects they hold. The capture of other detainees is not acknowledged. According to the US military this is in order to spread disorder among their opponents. It also has the effect of keeping critics of the extrajudicial detention in the dark as to the circumstances of detention and conditions in the prisons. LEGAL STATUS OF DETAINEES IN THE GLOBAL WAR ON TERROR See Also: illegal combatant Shortly after the Invasion Of Afghanistan the Bush administration announced a policy that combatants captured "on the battlefield" in Afghanistan would not be afforded the protections of POW status as described in the Geneva Conventions . This policy triggered debate both within and outside of the US government. The Bush administration argument in favor of this policy was that the Geneva Conventions the USA signed protected the fighters of only recognized states, and al Qaeda fighters didn't qualify. Further, they argued, the Taliban wasn't a real government either. They characterized Afghanistan as a "failed state" — one without a legitimate government. Legal issues of classifying captives as "illegal combatants" The Bush administration calls these captives " Illegal Combatants " or "unlawful combatants." These terms are not explicitly used in the Geneva Conventions. The Third Geneva Convention , however, signed prior to World War II , does define " Lawful Combatant ." The Convention obliges signatories to afford captured lawful combatants significant rights and protections. Such captives are entitled to be classified as Prisoners Of War . Internal critics within the US military and US government argue that failing to afford POW protections to combatants captured in the global war on terror would endanger American soldiers, when they were captured, in current and future conflicts. Other critics argue that classifying all combatants as illegal combatants is in violation of article 5 of the third Geneva Convention, which describes how a captor should treat combatants who are suspected of violating the Geneva Conventions such that they strip themselves of its protections. Article 5 says that combatants suspected of violations of the Conventions are to be afforded POW protection until the captors have convened a "competent tribunal." The Bush administration has expanded the criteria for classifying captives as illegal combatants. Individuals captured around the world are now classified as such if US intelligence officials believe they have sufficient evidence to tie the individual to terrorism. Judicial branch challenges to the policy classifying detainees as "illegal combatants" The US government has Three Branches . The President heads the executive branch. There are circumstances when the legislative and judicial branches can overrule the executive branch. In Rasul V. Bush , the US Supreme Court ruled that detainees in the global war on terror did have the right to mount legal challenges within the US judicial system. Debate over interrogation techniques The '', described as the first senior al Qaeda captive. It reported that initially his interrogation was being conducted by the FBI because they had the most experience interrogating criminal suspects. Their interrogation approach was based on building rapport with suspects. They did not use coercive techniques. They argued that coercive techniques produced unreliable false confessions and that using coercive techniques would mean that the evidence they gathered could not be used by the prosecution in a trial in the US judicial system. However, the ''Washington Post'' reported that impatience for actionable intelligence led to the handover of responsibility for interrogation to the CIA , who were authorized to use "enhanced interrogation techniques." The Washington Post reported in a July 27 , 2004 , article that as part of the reaction to the release of the abuse pictures from Abu Ghraib , the CIA suspended the use of "enhanced interrogation techniques." {Link without Title} Legal justification for the use of "enhanced interrogation techniques" Secretary Rumsfeld assured the world that the detainees held in Guantánamo Bay were going to be treated in a manner consistent with the treatment of Geneva Convention POWs. In 2004, confidential memos surfaced that discussed the limits to how much pain, discomfort and fear could be used in the interrogation of detainees in the global war on terror. The memos showed that there was active debate within the Bush administration. Some human rights critics believe that the existence of those memos is tacit acknowledgment that American intelligence officials had already been engaging in coercive interrogation techniques. Legislative challenges to the Bush administration interrogation policy US Senator John McCain , a former POW from the War In Vietnam , attached a passage to a military spending bill that would proscribe inhumane treatment of detainees and restrict US officials to only use the interrogation techniques in the US Army 's Field Manual On Interrogation . Ninety of the one hundred Senators supported this amendment. On Thursday, October 20 , 2005 , Vice President Dick Cheney proposed a change to McCain. Cheney tried to get McCain to limit the proscription to just military personnel, thus allowing CIA personnel the freedom to use more brutal techniques. McCain declined to accept Cheney's suggestion. {Link without Title} U.S. Government Denial of Allegations of Mistreatment ''Main article: Periodic Report Of The United States Of America To The United Nations Committee Against Torture '' The United States government, through the State Department , makes periodic reports to the United Nations Committee Against Torture . In October 2005 , the report focused on pretrial detention of suspects in the War On Terror , including those held in Guantánamo Bay and Afghanistan . This particular Periodic Report is significant as the first official response of the U.S. government to allegations that prisoners are mistreated in Guantánamo Bay . The report denies the allegations. However, the report does not address detainees held elsewhere by the CIA . The CIA's Inspector General said to be investigating "erroneous renditions" An article published in the December 5 , 2005 , '' Washington Post '' reported that the CIA 's Inspector General was looking into erroneous renditions. The Post's anonymous sources say that the Inspector General was looking into a number of cases where innocent men were captured and transported through " Erroneous Renditions " -- extraordinary renditions based on mistaken identity or bad intelligence. The story said that 3,000 individuals had found themselves in CIA custody. LOCATION OF THE SUSPECTS HELD BY US CIVILIAN INTELLIGENCE AGENCIES REFERENCES SEE ALSO SOURCES Human Rights Watch Human Rights Watch published a long, detailed document , heavily sourced, that summarizes what they were able to learn about the suspected terrorists in CIA custody. One of the pages — Eleven Detainees in Undisclosed Locations — specifically lists names. EXTERNAL LINKS
|
|
|