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Rock - Hurling Prisoners Riot at Main U.S. POW Camp
Reuters via NYTimes.com ^ | 04/13/2002

Posted on 04/13/2003 12:13:25 PM PDT by GeneD

Filed at 2:56 p.m. ET

UMM QASR, Iraq (Reuters) - Hurling rocks, bottles filled with sand and wooden stakes, detainees at the only permanent U.S. prisoner-of-war camp in Iraq riot almost daily, military officials said on Sunday.

Anger over slow food lines or disputes between different ethnic groups can spark uprisings -- especially with ringleaders quick to incite riots inside the prison that houses about 6,000 Iraqis under long white open tents, they said.

``Pretty much every day there's a riot. It can get real ugly in there for the MPs (military police),'' said Maj. Joel Droba of the 13th Psychological Operations battalion, which broadcasts orders for calm over loudspeakers and interrogates prisoners to weed out instigators.

On Sunday, clashes broke out when some prisoners opposed an Iraqi general attempting to organize a hunger strike, he said. Hours later, the camp appeared calm to a Reuters correspondent.

Prisoners wearing T-shirts and trousers milled around or chatted in groups of up to a dozen. Some gazed at the guards, leaning on the 6-foot-high chain-linked fence topped with barbed wire and draped with bright red blankets billowing in gusty winds.

The riots have generally not been widespread among the prisoners but military police have regularly had to enter to quell violence at the camp, which is a few miles outside Umm Qasr at the southeastern tip of Iraq.

``They'll throw anything. There's rock throwing, bottles filled with sand and crude weapons like the tent stakes,'' said Sgt. Brian Mathias.

``HUMANE'' CONDITIONS

The United States has been criticized by rights groups for shackling, blindfolding and housing prisoners captured during the war in Afghanistan in open cages in Guantanamo Bay, Cuba.

Capt. Lisa Weidenbush, the U.S. operations officer for the camp, said the United States was sensitive about that criticism but assured visiting journalists who were kept at about 300 from the prisoners their treatment was ``humane.''

``I can tell you from firsthand knowledge they are being taken care of very well,'' she said.

Tamara al-Rifai, a spokeswoman for the International Committee of the Red Cross said they had interviewed about 3,800 prisoners over the last week at the camp but declined to comment on the prison conditions.

British troops built the camp outside Umm Qasr, the first Iraqi town to be taken in the U.S.-led invasion that toppled Saddam Hussein.

Receiving Iraqis from all over the battlefield, they placed the prisoners in tents that can hold about 250 people each and provided them with hot meals such as rice and vegetables.

British and Spanish military doctors tend to prisoners' gunshot and shrapnel wounds and give them medicine for chronic illnesses, such as diabetes.

The guards play Iraqi music, broadcast readings from the Koran and have laid out carpets for the prisoners to pray, military officials said.

Last week, a roughly 800-strong U.S. military police force took command of the camp and plans in the next few days to transfer the prisoners to a new complex on the site where they will be in tents in groups of up to 15 and have running water.

The United States labeled the prisoners held in the U.S. Navy base in Cuba as ``unlawful combatants'' -- a classification that means they are not automatically afforded the rights of the Geneva Convention given to prisoners of war.

All the detainees at Umm Qasr had prisoner of war status and none were known to be non-Iraqi, military officials said. U.S. troops planned to hold tribunals that might classify prisoners as ``unlawful combatants'' if they met certain criteria, including fighting without any identification, Maj. Doug Proietto said.


TOPICS: Foreign Affairs; Front Page News; Government; News/Current Events
KEYWORDS: embeddedreport; epw; icrc; iraq; iraqifreedom; powcamps; pows; psyops; riots; ummqasr; warlist
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1 posted on 04/13/2003 12:13:25 PM PDT by GeneD
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To: GeneD
"Rock - Hurling Prisoners Riot at Main U.S. POW Camp"

Time to expand Gitmo.

2 posted on 04/13/2003 12:18:31 PM PDT by Enterprise
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3 posted on 04/13/2003 12:18:36 PM PDT by Support Free Republic (Your support keeps Free Republic going strong!)
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To: GeneD
Whatever we do, let's not "fix" this problem by admitting these ass-clowns to the USA as "refugees."
4 posted on 04/13/2003 12:21:12 PM PDT by dagnabbit (Leftist racists feel Iraqis aren't worthy of freedom)
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To: Enterprise
I say gun 'em down. Breakout a chain gun and see if ya can't melt the barrelon 'em...
5 posted on 04/13/2003 12:22:48 PM PDT by sit-rep
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To: sit-rep
barrelon 'em... = barrel on 'em...
6 posted on 04/13/2003 12:23:42 PM PDT by sit-rep
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To: GeneD
Rocks are weapons....open fire!
7 posted on 04/13/2003 12:24:26 PM PDT by VaBthang4 (Could someone show me one [1] Loserdopian elected to the federal government?)
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To: dagnabbit
Whatever we do, let's not "fix" this problem by admitting these ass-clowns to the USA as "refugees."

That is one of my biggest worries - how many are we going to deem worthy of bringing into this country. I say none - if their country is going to be rebuilt and become a democracy - it will need all it citizens over there - we do not need them.

8 posted on 04/13/2003 12:25:51 PM PDT by nanny
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To: GeneD
Notice how quickly the Iraqis learn. In a Baghdad hotel an Iraqi woman shouted "Americans go home" after U.S. troops entered the lobby. At a POW camp there are daily riots. We know would have happened in both instances if Hussein was still in power and these acts of disobedience were directed at his regime. I am reminded of the "useful idiots" who protest in the U.S. or, even, those who protest against Israel or seek to commandeer a Cuban ferry. They know the difference between the reaction from a civilized nation verses a totalitarian state. Except a few unfortunately have miscalulated in the West Bank. But, notice none of those brick and mortar shields (after all they seek to protect houses) have ever gotten on an Israeli bus to protect school children from homicide bombers.
9 posted on 04/13/2003 12:31:45 PM PDT by Pharlap
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To: GeneD
Notice how quickly the Iraqis learn. In a Baghdad hotel an Iraqi woman shouted "Americans go home" after U.S. troops entered the lobby. At a POW camp there are daily riots. We know would have happened in both instances if Hussein was still in power and these acts of disobedience were directed at his regime. I am reminded of the "useful idiots" who protest in the U.S. or, even, those who protest against Israel or seek to commandeer a Cuban ferry. They know the difference between the reaction from a civilized nation verses a totalitarian state. Except a few unfortunately have miscalulated in the West Bank. But, notice none of those brick and mortar shields (after all they seek to protect houses) have ever gotten on an Israeli bus to protect school children from homicide bombers.
10 posted on 04/13/2003 12:32:30 PM PDT by Pharlap
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To: sit-rep

What a loon.

11 posted on 04/13/2003 12:32:32 PM PDT by Cultural Jihad
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To: GeneD; *war_list; W.O.T.
OFFICIAL BUMP(TOPIC)LIST
12 posted on 04/13/2003 12:32:57 PM PDT by Ernest_at_the_Beach (Where is Saddam? and where is Tom Daschle?)
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To: sit-rep
"Gimme three steps, gimme three steps mister, gimme three steps towards the door
Why don't you gimme three steps, gimme three steps mister, and you won't see me no more." (Lynyrd Skynyrd)
13 posted on 04/13/2003 12:33:50 PM PDT by Enterprise
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To: GeneD
It's a problem. A lot of these people are incorrigible, and we don't really want to spend the next fifty years keeping them under guard.
14 posted on 04/13/2003 12:43:14 PM PDT by Cicero (Marcus Tullius)
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To: Cultural Jihad; sit-rep
Sit-rep offered a viable solution. What is yours?

15 posted on 04/13/2003 12:46:43 PM PDT by Eaker (64,999,987 firearm owners killed no one yesterday. Somehow, it didn't make the news.)
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To: Cicero
Aren't there some empty cells in Iraq right now? Let the Iraqis at 'em.
16 posted on 04/13/2003 12:48:38 PM PDT by snooker
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To: snooker
Indeed. A taste of standard Iraqi justice would go a long way to calming things. Hopefully we are doing more than taking away the ringleaders' morning Fruit-Loops.
17 posted on 04/13/2003 12:57:05 PM PDT by Paul_B
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To: Eaker

His 'viable solution' is to make a mockery of Thomas Jefferson's Declaration of Independence.

18 posted on 04/13/2003 12:57:07 PM PDT by Cultural Jihad
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To: GeneD
During World War II, there was a big problem with German POW camps in the U.S. The hard-core Nazi POW's terrorized the other German POW's and enforced Nazi orthodoxy.

The problem was addressed by segregating the hard-core Nazis from the rest of the German POW's within the same camp and even creating separate camps for the hard-core Nazis.

In Iraq, this has already been done. The regular Iraqi Army POW's were simply allowed to go home. The Iraqis still locked up are the hard-core Baathist fanatics and these are the ones that are now causing trouble.

It will not be possible to simply release these fanatics once the war is over. They will only start terrorizing their fellow Iraqis.

We will need to hold them until they can be turned over to the new Iraqi Government who can then deal with them in their own way......"O.K., Mohammed, we will give you a 10 second head start and then the lynch mob will start chasing you."

19 posted on 04/13/2003 1:01:51 PM PDT by Polybius
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To: GeneD
There are moments when I don't believe that certain groups of people are capable of civilization. I have to remind myself of the conditions in which they have lived, their education, their religion, etc. And I know that under similar conditions, I would perhaps behave in a similar fashion as they behave now. What an incredible job lies ahead for those in charge of restoring order and introducing democracy. When has the need ever been so great?!

How truly blessed we are to live in a western society! God bless the USA: the best of the west!

And...thank God for Christianity. Where God's son died so that we may be with God rather than our sons (and daughters)having to die so that we can be with God.

Their's is a religion of peace? Seems more like a religion of death and chaos.

20 posted on 04/13/2003 1:03:57 PM PDT by GBA
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