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[casi-analysis] casi-news digest, Vol 1 #101 - 2 msgs



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Today's Topics:

   1. [Peace&Justice] Resolutionary Road to Iraq Transition (IRC Communications)
   2. General is said to have urged use of dogs (Mark Parkinson)

--__--__--

Message: 1
Date: Wed, 26 May 2004 14:14:01 -0600
To: peaceandjustice@lists.riseup.net
From: IRC Communications <communications@DELETETHISirc-online.org>
Subject: [Peace&Justice] Resolutionary Road to Iraq Transition


[ Presenting plain-text part of multi-format email ]

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Peace and Justice News from FPIF
http://www.fpif.org/

May 26, 2004
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Introducing a new commentary from Foreign Policy In Focus

The Resolutionary Road to a Transition in Iraq
By Ian Williams

The draft resolution on Iraq that the British and the Americans proposed
for discussion on May 24th is an outstanding example of fuzzy diplomacy in
its desperate attempt to obscure all the difficult parts.

Even before the members of the Security Council who are not members of the
Coalitional Provisional Authority in Iraq got their hands on the text, it
already showed signs of intense negotiations, both between the British and
Americans, and inside Washington between the various factions. And we have
yet to hear from yet to be named Iraqi Interim government, which is the
ghost at the feast of this diplomatic party!

Ian Williams contributes frequently to Foreign Policy in Focus (online at
www.fpif.org) on UN and international affairs.

See new FPIF commentary online at:
http://www.fpif.org/commentary/2004/0405iraqtrans.html

With printer friendly PDF version at:
http://www.fpif.org/pdf/gac/0405iraqtrans.pdf

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Distributed by FPIF:"A Think Tank Without Walls," a joint program of
Interhemispheric Resource Center (IRC) and Institute for Policy Studies (IPS).

For more information, visit www.fpif.org. If you would like to add a name
to the "What's New At FPIF" specific region or topic list, please email:
communications@irc-online.org, with "subscribe" and giving your area of
interest.

To add your name to this list, send a blank email, send a blank email to:
peaceandjustice-subscribe@lists.riseup.net.To unsubscribe, send a blank
email to: peaceandjustice-unsubscribe@lists.riseup.net.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Interhemispheric Resource Center (IRC)
http://www.irc-online.org/
Siri D. Khalsa
Communications Coordinator
Email: communications@irc-online.org





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Message: 2
From: "Mark Parkinson" <mark44@DELETETHISmyrealbox.com>
To: newsclippings@casi.org.uk
Date: Wed, 26 May 2004 23:22:36 +0100
Subject: General is said to have urged use of dogs


By: R. Jeffrey Smith, Washington Post on: 26.05.2004 [15:44 ] (71
reads)

A U.S. Army general dispatched by senior Pentagon officials to
bolster the collection of intelligence from prisoners in Iraq last
fall inspired and promoted the use of guard dogs there to frighten
the Iraqis, according to sworn testimony by the top U.S. intelligence
officer at the Abu Ghraib prison.

According to the officer, Col. Thomas Pappas, the idea came from Maj.
Gen. Geoffrey D. Miller, who at the time commanded the U.S.
militarydetention center at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, and was implemented
under a policy approved by Lt. Gen. Ricardo S. Sanchez, the top U.S.
military official in Iraq.

"It was a technique I had personally discussed with General Miller,
when he was here" visiting the prison, testified Pappas, head of the
205th Military Intelligence Brigade and the officer placed in charge
of the cellblocks at Abu Ghraib prison where abuses occurred in the
wake of Miller's visit to Baghdad between Aug. 30 and Sept. 9, 2003.

"He said that they used military working dogs at Gitmo (the nickname
for Guantanamo Bay), and that they were effective in setting the
atmosphere for which, you know, you could get information" from the
prisoners, Pappas told the Army investigator, Maj. Gen. Antonio M.
Taguba, according to a transcript provided to The Washington Post.

Pappas, who was under pressure from Taguba to justify the legality
and appropriateness of using guard dogs to frighten detainees, said
at two separate points in the Feb. 9 interview that Miller gave him
the idea. He also said Miller had indicated the use of the dogs "with
or without a muzzle" was "okay" in booths where prisoners were taken
for interrogation.

But Miller, whom the Bush administration appointed as the new head of
Abu Ghraib this month, denied through a spokesman that the
conversation took place.

"Miller never had a conversation with Colonel Pappas regarding the
use of military dogs for interrogation purposes in Iraq. Further,
military dogs were never used in interrogations at Guantanamo," said
Brig. Gen. Mark Kimmitt, spokesman for U.S. forces in Iraq.

Pappas's statements nonetheless provide the fullest public account to
date of how he viewed the interrogation mission at Abu Ghraib and
Miller's impact on operations there. Pappas said, among other things,
that interrogation plans involving the use of dogs, shackling,
"making detainees strip down," or similar aggressive measures
followed Sanchez's policy, but were often approved by Sanchez's
deputy, Maj. Gen. Walter Wojdakowski, or by Pappas himself.

The claims and counterclaims between Pappas and Miller concern one of
the most notorious aspects of U.S. actions at Abu Ghraib, as revealed
by Taguba's March 9 report and by pictures taken by military
personnel that became public late last month. The pictures show
unmuzzled dogs being used to intimidate Abu Ghraib detainees,
sometimes while the prisoners are cowering, naked, against a wall.

Taguba, in a rare classified passage within his generally
unclassified report, listed "using military working dogs (without
muzzles) to intimidate and frighten detainees" as one of 13 examples
of "sadistic, blatant, and wanton criminal abuses" inflicted by U.S.
military personnel at Abu Ghraib.

Experts on the laws of war have charged that using dogs to coerce
prisoners into providing information, as was done at Abu Ghraib,
constitutes a violation of the Geneva Conventions that protect
civilians under the control of an occupying power, such as the Iraqi
detainees.

"Threatening a prisoner with a ferocious guard dog is no different as
a matter of law from pointing a gun at a prisoner's head and ordering
him to talk," said James Ross, senior legal adviser at Human Rights
Watch. "That's a violation of the Geneva Conventions."

Article 31 of the Fourth Geneva Convention bars use of coercion
against protected persons, and Common Article Three bars any
"humiliating and degrading treatment," Ross said. Experts do not
consider the presence in a prison of threatening dogs, by itself, to
constitute torture, but a 1999 United Nations-approved manual lists
the "arranging of conditions for attacks by animals such as dogs" as
a "torture method."

But Pappas, who was charged with overseeing interrogations at Abu
Ghraib involving those suspected of posing or knowing about threats
to U.S. forces in Iraq, told Taguba that "I did not personally look
at that (use of dogs) with regard to the Geneva Convention,"
according to the transcript.

Pappas also said he did not have "a program" to inform his civilian
employees, including a translator and an interrogator, of what the
Geneva Conventions stated, and said he was unaware if anyone else
did. He said he did not believe using force to coerce, intimidate or
cause fear violated the conventions.

Brig. Gen. Janis L. Karpinski, who commanded the prison guards at Abu
Ghraib's cellblocks 1A and 1B until Nov. 19, when Pappas assumed
control, said in an interview that Navy, Army and Air Force dog teams
were used there for security purposes. But she said military
intelligence officers "were responsible for assigning those dogs and
where they would go."

Using dogs to intimidate or attack detainees was very much against
regulations, Karpinski said. "You cannot use the dogs in that
fashion, to attack or be aggressive with a detainee. . . . Why were
there guys so willing to take these orders? And who was giving the
orders? The military intelligence people were in charge of them."

Taguba never interviewed Miller or any officer above Karpinski's rank
for his report. Nor did he conduct a detailed probe of the actions of
military intelligence officials. But he said he suspected that Pappas
and several of his colleagues were "either directly or indirectly
responsible for the abuses at Abu Ghraib."

In a Feb. 11 written statement accompanying the transcript, Pappas
shifted the responsibility elsewhere. He said "policies and
procedures established by the Abu Ghraib Joint Interrogation and
Debriefing Center relative to detainee operations were enacted as a
specific result of a visit" by Miller, who in turn has acknowledged
being dispatched to Baghdad by Undersecretary of Defense Stephen A.
Cambone, after a conversation with Secretary of Defense Donald H.
Rumsfeld.

Cambone told lawmakers recently that he wanted Miller to go because
he had done a good job organizing the detention center at Guantanamo
Bay, and wanted Miller to help improve intelligence-gathering in
Iraq.

Some senators, however, have noted that the Bush administration
considers Guantanamo detainees exempt from the protections of the
Geneva Conventions, and wondered if Miller brought the same
aggressive interrogation ideas with him to Iraq, where the
conventions apply.

When asked at a May 19 Senate hearing if he and his colleagues had
"briefed" military officers in Iraq about specific Guantanamo
interrogation techniques that did not comply with the Geneva
Conventions, Miller said no.

He said he brought "our SOPs (standard operating procedures) that we
had developed for humane detention, interrogation, and intelligence
fusion" to Iraq for use as a "starting point." He added that it was
up to the officers in Iraq to decide which were applicable and what
modifications to make.

But Pappas said the result of Miller's visit was that "the
interrogators and analysts developed a set of rules to guide
interrogations" and assigned specific military police soldiers to
help interrogators =97 an approach Miller had honed in Guantanamo.

After calling the use of dogs Miller's idea, Pappas explained that
"in the execution of interrogation, and the interrogation business in
general, we are trying to get info from these people. We have to act
in an environment not to permanently damage them, or psychologically
abuse them, but we have to assert control and get detainees into a
position where they're willing to talk to us."

Pappas added that it "would never be my intent that the dog be
allowed to bite or in any way touch a detainee or anybody else." He
said he recalled speaking to one dog handler and telling him "they
could be used in interrogations" anytime according to terms spelled
out in a Sept. 14, 2003, memo signed by Sanchez.

That memo included the use of dogs among techniques that did not
require special approval. The policy was changed on Oct. 12 to
require Sanchez's approval on a case-by-case basis for certain
techniques, including having "military working dogs" present during
interrogations.

That memo also demanded =97 in what Taguba referred to during the
interview as its "fine print" =97 that detainees be treated humanely
and in accordance with the Geneva Conventions.

But Pappas told Taguba that "there would be no way for us to actually
monitor whether that happened. We had no formal system in place to do
that =97 no formal procedure" to check how interrogations were
conducted. Moreover, he expressed frustration with a rule that the
dogs be muzzled. "It's not very intimidating if they are muzzled,"
Pappas said. He added that he requested an exemption from the rule at
one point, and was turned down.

In the interview transcript, Taguba's disdain for using dogs is
clear. He asked Pappas if he knew that after a prison riot on Nov.
24, 2003, five dogs were "called in to either intimidate or cause
fear or stress" on a detainee. Pappas said no, and acknowledged under
questioning that such an action was inappropriate.

Taguba also asked if he believed the use of dogs is consistent with
the Army's field manual. Pappas replied that he could not recall, but
reiterated that Miller instigated the idea. The Army field manual
bars the "exposure to unpleasant and inhumane treatment of any kind."

At least four photographs obtained by The Washington Post =97 each
apparently taken in late October or November =97 show fearful prisoners
near unmuzzled dogs.

One MP charged with abuses, Spec. Sabrina D. Harman, recalled for
Army investigators an episode "when two dogs were brought into
(cellblock) 1A to scare an inmate. He was naked against the wall,
when they let the dogs corner him. They pulled them back enough, and
the prisoner ran . . . straight across the floor. . . . The prisoner
was cornered and the dog bit his leg. A couple seconds later, he
started to move again, and the dog bit his other leg."


Mark Parkinson
Bodmin
Cornwall






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