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Iraq's Child Prisoners - [Sunday Herald]

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Sun, 31 Jul 2005 14:24:55 -0700

#Iraq's Child Prisoners - [sunday Herald]

 

 

 

 

 

<http://www.sundayherald.com/43796>

 

Iraq's Child Prisoners

 

 

A Sunday Herald investigation has discovered that coalition forces are

holding more than 100 children in jails such as Abu Ghraib. Witnesses

claim that the detainees – some as young as 10 – are also being

subjected to rape and torture

By Neil Mackay

 

 

It was early last October that Kasim Mehaddi Hilas says he witnessed

the

rape of a boy prisoner aged about 15 in the notorious Abu Ghraib prison

in Iraq. " The kid was hurting very bad and they covered all the doors

with sheets, " he said in a statement given to investigators probing

prisoner abuse in Abu Ghraib. " Then, when I heard the screaming I

climbed the door … and I saw [the soldier's name is deleted] who was

wearing a military uniform. " Hilas, who was himself threatened with

being sexually assaulted in Abu Graib, then describes in horrific

detail

how the soldier raped " the little kid " .

 

In another witness statement, passed to the Sunday Herald, former

prisoner Thaar Salman Dawod said: " [i saw] two boys naked and they were

cuffed together face to face and [a US soldier] was beating them and a

group of guards were watching and taking pictures and there was three

female soldiers laughing at the prisoners. The prisoners, two of them,

were young. "

 

It's not certain exactly how many children are being held by coalition

forces in Iraq, but a Sunday Herald investigation suggests there are up

to 107. Their names are not known, nor is where they are being kept,

how

long they will be held or what has happened to them during their

detention.

 

Proof of the widespread arrest and detention of children in Iraq by US

and UK forces is contained in an internal Unicef report written in

June.

The report has – surprisingly – not been made public. A key section on

child protection, headed " Children in Conflict with the Law or with

Coalition Forces " , reads: " In July and August 2003, several meetings

were conducted with CPA (Coalition Provisional Authority) … and

Ministry

of Justice to address issues related to juvenile justice and the

situation of children detained by the coalition forces … Unicef is

working through a variety of channels to try and learn more about

conditions for children who are imprisoned or detained, and to ensure

that their rights are respected. "

 

Another section reads: " Information on the number, age, gender and

conditions of incarceration is limited. In Basra and Karbala children

arrested for alleged activities targeting the occupying forces are

reported to be routinely transferred to an internee facility in Um

Qasr.

The categorisation of these children as `internees' is worrying since

it

implies indefinite holding without contact with family, expectation of

trial or due process. "

 

The report also states: " A detention centre for children was

established

in Baghdad, where according to ICRC (International Committee of the Red

Cross) a significant number of children were detained. Unicef was

informed that the coalition forces were planning to transfer all

children in adult facilities to this `specialised' child detention

centre. In July 2003, Unicef requested a visit to the centre but access

was denied. Poor security in the area of the detention centre has

prevented visits by independent observers like the ICRC since last

December.

 

" The perceived unjust detention of Iraqi males, including youths, for

suspected activities against the occupying forces has become one of the

leading causes for the mounting frustration among Iraqi youths and the

potential for radicalisation of this population group. "

 

Journalists in Germany have also been investigating the detention and

abuse of children in Iraq. One reporter, Thomas Reutter of the TV

programme Report Mainz, interviewed a US army sergeant called Samuel

Provance, who is banned from speaking about his six months stationed in

Abu Ghraib but told Reutter of how one 16-year-old Iraqi boy was

arrested.

 

" He was terribly afraid, " Provance said. " He had the skinniest arms

I've

ever seen. He was trembling all over. His wrists were so thin we

couldn't even put handcuffs on him. Right when I saw him for the first

time, and took him for interrogation, I felt sorry for him.

 

" The interrogation specialists poured water over him and put him into a

car. Then they drove with him through the night, and at that time it

was

very, very cold. Then they smeared him with mud and showed him to his

father, who was also in custody. They had tried out other interrogation

methods on him, but he wasn't to be brought to talk. The interrogation

specialists told me, after the father had seen his son in this state,

his heart broke. He wept and promised to tell them everything they

wanted to know. "

 

An Iraqi TV reporter Suhaib Badr-Addin al-Baz saw the Abu Ghraib

children's wing when he was arrested by Americans while making a

documentary. He spent 74 days in Abu Ghraib.

 

" I saw a camp for children there, " he said. " Boys, under the age of

puberty. There were certainly hundreds of children in this camp. "

Al-Baz

said he heard a 12-year-old girl crying. Her brother was also held in

the jail. One night guards came into her cell. " She was beaten, " said

al-Baz. " I heard her call out, `They have undressed me. They have

poured

water over me.' "

 

He says he heard her cries and whimpering daily – this, in turn, caused

other prisoners to cry as they listened to her. Al-Baz also told of an

ill 15-year-old boy who was soaked repeatedly with hoses until he

collapsed. Guards then brought in the child's father with a hood over

his head. The boy collapsed again.

 

Although most of the children are held in US custody, the Sunday Herald

has established that some are held by the British Army. British

soldiers

tend to arrest children in towns like Basra, which are under UK

control,

then hand the youngsters over to the Americans who interrogate them and

detain them.

 

Between January and May this year the Red Cross registered a total of

107 juveniles in detention during 19 visits to six coalition prisons.

The aid organisation's Rana Sidani said they had no complete

information

about the ages of those detained, or how they had been treated. The

deteriorating security situation has prevented the Red Cross visiting

all detention centres.

 

Amnesty International is outraged by the detention of children. It is

aware of " numerous human rights violations against Iraqi juveniles,

including detentions, torture and ill-treatment, and killings " . Amnesty

has interviewed former detainees who say they've seen boys as young as

10 in Abu Ghraib.

 

The organisation's leaders have called on the coalition governments to

give concrete information on how old the children are, how many are

detained, why and where they are being held, and in what circumstances

they are being detained. They also want to know if the children have

been tortured.

 

Alistair Hodgett, media director of Amnesty International USA, said the

coalition forces needed to be " transparent " about their policy of child

detentions, adding: " Secrecy is one thing that rings alarm bells. "

Amnesty was given brief access to one jail in Mosul, he said, but has

been repeatedly turned away from all others. He pointed out that even

countries " which don't have good records " , such as Libya, gave Amnesty

access to prisons. " Denying access just fuels the rumour mill, " he

said.

 

Hodgett added that British and US troops should not be detaining any

Iraqis – let alone children – following the recent handover of power.

" They should all be held by Iraqi authorities, " he said. " When the

coalition handed over Saddam they should have handed over the other

3000

detainees. "

 

The British Ministry of Defence confirmed UK forces had handed over

prisoners to US troops, but a spokes man said he did not know the ages

of any detainees given to the Americans.

 

The MoD also admitted it was currently holding one prisoner aged under

18 at Shaibah prison near Um Qasr. Since the invasion Britain has

detained, and later released, 65 under-18s. The MoD claimed the ICRC

had

access to British jails and detainee lists.

 

High-placed officials in the Pentagon and Centcom told the Sunday

Herald

that children as young as 14 were being held by US forces. " We do have

juveniles detained, " a source said. " They have been detained as they

are

deemed to be a threat or because they have acted against the coalition

or Iraqis. "

 

Officially, the Pentagon says it is holding " around 60 juvenile

detainees primarily aged 16 and 17 " , although when it was pointed out

that the Red Cross estimate is substantially higher, a source admitted

" numbers may have gone up, we might have detained more kids " .

 

Officials would not comment about children under the age of 16 being

held prisoner. Sources said: ``It's a real challenge ascertaining their

ages. Unlike the UK or the US, they don't have IDs or birth

certificates. " The Sunday Herald has been told, however, that at least

five children aged under 16 are being kept at Abu Ghraib and Camp

Bucca.

 

A highly placed source in the Pentagon said: " We have done

investigations into accusations of juveniles being abused and raped and

can't find anything that resembles that. "

 

The Pentagon's official policy is to segregate juvenile prisoners from

the rest of the prison population, and allow young inmates to join

family members also being detained. " Our main concern is that they are

not abused or harassed by older detainees. We know they need special

treatment, " an official said.

 

Pentagon sources said they were unaware how long child prisoners were

kept in jail but said their cases were reviewed every 90 days. The last

review was early last month. The sources confirmed the children had

been

questioned and interrogated when initially detained, but could not say

whether this was " an adult-style interrogation " .

 

The Norwegian government, which is part of the " coalition of the

willing " , has already said it will tell the US that the alleged torture

of children is intolerable. Odd Jostein Sæter, parliamentary secretary

at the Norwegian prime minister's office, said: " Such assaults are

unacceptable. It is against international laws and it is also

unacceptable from a moral point of view. This is why we react strongly

We are addressing this in a very severe and direct way and present

concrete demands. This is damaging the struggle for democracy and human

rights in Iraq. "

 

In Denmark, which is also in the coalition, Save the Children called on

its government to tell the occupying forces to order the immediate

release of child detainees. Neals Hurdal, head of the Danish Save the

Children, said the y had heard rumours of children in Basra being

maltreated in custody since May.

 

Human Rights Watch (HRW) said it was " extremely disturbed " that the

coalition was holding children for long periods in jails notorious for

torture. HRW also criticised the policy of categorising children as

" security detainees " , saying this did not give carte blanche for them

to

be held indefinitely. HRW said if there was evidence the children had

committed crimes then they should be tried in Iraqi courts, otherwise

they should be returned to their families.

 

Unicef is " profoundly disturbed " by reports of children being abused in

coalition jails. Alexandra Yuster, Unicef's senior adviser on child

detention, said that under international law children should be

detained

only as a last resort and only then for the shortest possible time.

 

They should have access to lawyers and their families, be kept safe,

healthy, educated, well-fed and not be subjected to any form of mental

or physical punishment, she added. Unicef is now " desperately " trying

to

get more information on the fate of the children currently detained in

coalition jails.

--

The cosmos is a gigantic fly-wheel making ten-thousand revolutions a

minute and man is a sick fly taking a dizzy ride on it. Religion is

the theory that the wheel was designed and set spinning to give him

the ride. --- H.L. Mencken (1880 - 1956)

 

 

Not dead, in jail, or a slave? Thank a liberal!

Pay your taxes so the rich don't have to.

 

http://www.zeppscommentaries.com

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