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| From collapseofindustrialcivilization.com |
Ten years after the U.S.-led invasion that toppled the
brutal regime of Saddam Hussein, Iraq remains enmeshed in a grim cycle of human
rights abuses, including attacks on civilians, torture of detainees and unfair
trials, says Amnesty International in a press
release today (see the watchdog’s full
report here).
A decade of abuses
exposes a chronology of torture and other ill treatment of detainees committed
by Iraqi security forces and by foreign troops in the wake of the 2003
invasion.
It highlights the Iraqi
authorities’ continuing failure to observe their obligations to uphold human
rights and respect the rule of law in the face of persistent deadly attacks by
armed groups, who show callous disregard for civilian life.
“Ten years after the
end of Saddam Hussein’s repressive rule, many Iraqis today enjoy greater freedoms
than they did under his Baathist regime, but the fundamental human rights gains
that should have been achieved during the past decade have signally failed to
materialize,” said Hassiba Hadj Sahraoui, Middle East and North Africa Deputy
Director at Amnesty International.
“Neither the Iraqi
government nor the former occupying powers have adhered to the standards
required of them under international law and the people of Iraq are still
paying a heavy price for their failure.”
Torture is rife and
committed with impunity by government security forces, particularly against
detainees arrested under anti-terrorism while they are held incommunicado for
interrogation.
Detainees have alleged
that they were tortured to force them to “confess” to serious crimes or to
incriminate others while held in these conditions. Many have repudiated their
confessions at trial only to see the courts admit them as evidence of their
guilt, without investigating their torture allegations, sentencing them to long
term imprisonment or death.
Adding to the
injustice, the authorities have paraded detainees before press conferences or
arranged for their “confessions” to be broadcast on local television in advance
of their trials or trial verdicts in gross breach of the presumption of
innocence and of the right of every accused to receive a fair trial.
The death penalty was
suspended after the 2003 invasion but quickly restored by the first Iraqi
government on coming to power, and executions resumed in 2005.
Since then, at least
447 prisoners have been executed, including Saddam Hussein, some of his main
associates, and alleged members of armed groups.
Hundreds of prisoners
await execution on death row. Iraq, where 129 prisoners were hanged in 2012, is
now one of the world’s leading executioners.
“Death sentences and
executions are being used on a horrendous scale,” said Hadj Sahraoui, “It is
particularly abhorrent that many prisoners have been sentenced to death after
unfair trials and on the basis of confessions they say they were forced to make
under torture.
“It is high time that
the Iraqi authorities end this appalling cycle of abuse and declare a
moratorium on executions as a first step towards abolishing the death penalty
for all crimes.”
Since December,
thousands of demonstrators have taken to the streets in areas where Sunni
Muslims are in the majority, to protest against arbitrary detention, abuses of
detainees, the use of the anti-terror law, and an end to what they see as
government discrimination against the Sunni population.
Meanwhile, Sunni armed
groups continue to attack not only government targets but Shi’a civilians,
including religious pilgrims.
Although the
semi-autonomous Kurdistan Region in northeast Iraq has remained largely free of
the violence that has engulfed the rest of the country, its two ruling Kurdish
political parties maintain a tight grip on power and incidents of detainee
abuses have also been reported.
The removal of Saddam
Hussein in 2003 should have been followed by a process of fundamental human
rights reform but almost from day one the occupying forces began committing
torture and other serious violations against prisoners, as the Abu Ghraib
scandal involving U.S. forces and the beating to death of Baha Mousa in the
custody of British soldiers in Basra graphically demonstrated,” said Hadj
Sahraoui.
In the UK and the USA,
despite investigations into individual cases, there has been a failure to
investigate systematically the widespread human rights violations committed by
forces from those countries, and to hold those responsible to account at all
levels. Iraqi victims of U.S. human rights violations have found the route to
remedy in the U.S. courts blocked.
The Iraqi authorities
have periodically acknowledged torture and other ill treatment but they have
generally sought to explain them away as isolated occurrences or, in a few high
profile cases, have announced official inquiries whose outcomes, if any,
subsequently were never revealed.
Yet, as Amnesty
International’s report shows, torture and other abuse of detainees has been one
of the most persistent and widespread features of Iraq’s human rights
landscape, and the government shows little inclination either to recognize its
extent or take the measures necessary to consign such grave abuses to the past.
Methods of torture
reported by detainees include, electric shocks applied to the genitals and
other parts of the body, partial suffocation by having a bag placed tightly
over the head, beatings while suspended in contorted positions, deprivation of
food, water and sleep, and threats of rape or that their female relatives will
be detained and raped. Women detainees are particularly vulnerable and the
report cites several cases in which women have alleged they were sexually
abused in detention.
“Iraq
remains caught in a cycle of torture and impunity that should long ago have
been broken,” said Hadj Sahraoui. “It is high time the Iraqi authorities take
the concrete steps needed to entrench a culture of human rights protection, and
do so without further prevarication or delay.”
