Posted on 05/30/2005 5:52:51 AM PDT by SJackson
On a weekend when we praise those who serve in our military, you might want to know how that military is being criticized.
Last week, Amnesty International issued its annual report. In it, the United States was criticized for:
Thumbing "its nose at the rule of law and human rights."
Abuse and mistreatment of prisoners.
Not acting quickly enough on legal challenges from detainees.
Attempting to "redefine" torture.
Making a "mockery of justice."
And, in the wallop sentence that Amnesty Secretary General Irene Khan knew would make headlines, Guantanamo Bay was called "the gulag of our times."
The gulag of our times? Wow. How embarrassing. You feel like the kid who comes home with a black eye and tells his parents, "Before you say anything, you should see the other guy."
Except that, in the Amnesty International report, we don't see the other guy.
And that's the problem.
We don't see pages devoted to Osama bin Laden, or a call for him to be "fair" to prisoners.
We don't see criticism of Iraqi insurgents' "policies," or a call for them to cease their beheadings because they violate the Geneva Convention.
(Excerpt) Read more at jewishworldreview.com ...
I call for the immediate investigation of the following left-wing anti-American fascist organizations for treason:
Amnesty International USA, Human Rights Watch, the Center for Constitutional Rights, the ACLU, the American Bar Association, and Human Rights First (formerly known as the Lawyers Committee for Human Rights).
They are enemies of the American People and are using my tax money to give aid and comfort to the enemy in direct violation of the Constitution:
These anti-American fascist traitors have joined in a call for a special prosecutor to investigate Bush, Rumsfel & Gonzales. I call for an investigation into why they are allowed to give aid and comfort to the enemies, of the American people, using my tax money.
They are scum who must be taken off of the free money rolls and put in jail. By their actions, they are responsible for the death of American Service Personnel and other personnel. No American is safe in the world because of their lies, treason and help for the terrorist enemy.
Put these scumbags in jail where they belong and pass a law that removes them from receiving my tax money for TREASON.
The reason for that is simple -- fear.
If AI actually criticized the terrorists like it did the US the liberals running AI would never be able to walk safely in the Middle East.
Cowards that they are the AI liberals criticize those they know won't hurt them.
Attempting to "redefine" torture.
1. a. Infliction of severe physical pain as a means of punishment or coercion.
b. An instrument or a method for inflicting such pain.
2. Excruciating physical or mental pain; agony: the torture of waiting in suspense.
3. Something causing severe pain or anguish.
Humiliation has never been considered “torture” that I am aware of – until very recently. I would even take exception of the 2nd definition above - the torture of waiting in suspense. It is a metaphor, not actual torture.
I figured he'd be a flaming lib, but apparently he's pretty smart, as well as a good writer.
This crew of lefty cowards always and only criticizes the good guys because their "friends" would just kill them.
The sadman murders hundreds of thousands, rapes and really tortures many thousands more, yet we are the bad guys for a handful of our soldiers putting underware on some ones head, or for touching a quran with one hand.
To compare gitmo to the soviet guglags where upwards of 20 million were killed is hyperbole at its finest. Where did the gitmo prisoners get their qurans from in the first place? Since they don't like us looking at them or touching them simply have them removed. Also, change the menu, bacon for breakfast, ham for lunch and pork roast for dinner. Nothing else to be served. We will soon see if their religion takes precedence over their empty stomachs. If so, let them starve, it is a peaceful and euphoric way to go, ask Terri Schaivo.
From Amnesty International Website
"US-led forces in Iraq committed gross human rights violations, including unlawful killings and arbitrary detention, and evidence emerged of torture and ill-treatment. Thousands of Iraqi civilians were killed during armed clashes between US-led forces and Iraqi security forces on the one side, and Iraqi armed groups on the other.
Armed groups committed gross human rights abuses, including targeting civilians, hostage-taking and killing hostages. Women continued to be harassed and threatened amid the mounting daily violence. The death penalty was reinstated in August by the new interim government."
The Link: http://web.amnesty.org/report2005/irq-summary-eng
The MSM doesn't, of course , because that would be fair and unbiased. But AI is fairly consistent in condemning both sides of a conflict. The fact that they chose to list the US accusations first is perhaps telling of their approximate view, but the second paragraph contradicts your claim.
Actually, Albom *is* a flaming lib, but he's right on this one. Stopped clocks being right, blind squirrels and acorns, y'know.
}:-)4
WWW.Timesonline.co.uk
March 18, 2003
See men shredded, then say you don't back war
By Ann Clwyd
“There was a machine designed for shredding plastic. Men were dropped into it and we were again made to watch. Sometimes they went in head first and died quickly. Sometimes they went in feet first and died screaming. It was horrible. I saw 30 people die like this. Their remains would be placed in plastic bags and we were told they would be used as fish food . . . on one occasion, I saw Qusay [President Saddam Hussein’s youngest son] personally supervise these murders.”
This is one of the many witness statements that were taken by researchers from Indict — the organisation I chair — to provide evidence for legal cases against specific Iraqi individuals for war crimes, crimes against humanity and genocide. This account was taken in the past two weeks.
Another witness told us about practices of the security services towards women: “Women were suspended by their hair as their families watched; men were forced to watch as their wives were raped . . . women were suspended by their legs while they were menstruating until their periods were over, a procedure designed to cause humiliation.”
The accounts Indict has heard over the past six years are disgusting and horrifying. Our task is not merely passively to record what we are told but to challenge it as well, so that the evidence we produce is of the highest quality. All witnesses swear that their statements are true and sign them.
For these humanitarian reasons alone, it is essential to liberate the people of Iraq from the regime of Saddam. The 17 UN resolutions passed since 1991 on Iraq include Resolution 688, which calls for an end to repression of Iraqi civilians. It has been ignored. Torture, execution and ethnic-cleansing are everyday life in Saddam’s Iraq.
Were it not for the no-fly zones in the south and north of Iraq — which some people still claim are illegal — the Kurds and the Shia would no doubt still be attacked by Iraqi helicopter gunships.
For more than 20 years, senior Iraqi officials have committed genocide, war crimes and crimes against humanity. This list includes far more than the gassing of 5,000 in Halabja and other villages in 1988. It includes serial war crimes during the Iran-Iraq war; the genocidal Anfal campaign against the Iraqi Kurds in 1987-88; the invasion of Kuwait and the killing of more than 1,000 Kuwaiti civilians; the violent suppression, which I witnessed, of the 1991 Kurdish uprising that led to 30,000 or more civilian deaths; the draining of the Southern Marshes during the 1990s, which ethnically cleansed thousands of Shias; and the summary executions of thousands of political opponents.
Many Iraqis wonder why the world applauded the military intervention that eventually rescued the Cambodians from Pol Pot and the Ugandans from Idi Amin when these took place without UN help. They ask why the world has ignored the crimes against them?
All these crimes have been recorded in detail by the UN, the US, Kuwaiti, British, Iranian and other Governments and groups such as Human Rights Watch, Amnesty and Indict. Yet the Security Council has failed to set up a war crimes tribunal on Iraq because of opposition from France, China and Russia. As a result, no Iraqi official has ever been indicted for some of the worst crimes of the 20th century. I have said incessantly that I would have preferred such a tribunal to war. But the time for offering Saddam incentives and more time is over.
I do not have a monopoly on wisdom or morality. But I know one thing. This evil, fascist regime must come to an end. With or without the help of the Security Council, and with or without the backing of the Labour Party in the House of Commons tonight.
AI is in no way balanced. I've read many of their yearly reports.
The amount of time and space spent by AI on substantial human rights abuses versus the United States is telling. See my last post here as an example.
If I were to sit down an alien and give them an AI report, they could only conclude from it that the U.S. is the greatest oppressor on the planet.
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