[Marxism] Will Obama close down the other torture chambers?

[Duane Roberts <duaneroberts92804@xxxxxxxxx>]

Although I'm of the opinion President Barack Obama's decision to close the 
military prison at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba was merely a slick public relations 
ploy to spruce up the image of U.S. imperialism, a more important question is 
will he be shutting down the other torture chambers Uncle Sam's been secretly 
operating around the globe like the one currently functioning in Bagram, 
Afghanistan?

Given Obama has made it clear he plans to deploy upwards of 30,000 more U.S. 
troops to that country with the underlying purpose of exterminating the rural 
tribes actively resisting the colonial occupation of their homeland, my guess 
is he'll probably keep the torture chamber at Bagram well stocked with an ample 
supply of cattle prods, orange jumpsuits, and concertina wire.

Sincerely,

Duane J. Roberts
duaneroberts92804@xxxxxxxxx




http://abcnews.go.com/International/story?id=6748537&page=1

ABC News

Is Bagram Closure on Obama's Agenda?
Obama Administration To Make Decision On Prison in Afghanistan

By MATTHIAS GEBAUER
Spiegel Online
Jan 28, 2009â

While the world celebrates the planned closure of Guantanamo there is another 
US military prison full of terror suspects -- at the Bagram Air Force Base in 
Afghanistan. How he deals with the camp will indicate how serious Obama is 
about breaking with his predecessor.

Everyone is talking about Guantanamo these days. Almost every country in the 
world reacted with relief, if not outright euphoria, to one of the very first 
announcements by the new President Barack Obama: The US military prison for 
terror suspects on Cuba would be closed. Torture and CIA secret prisons were 
finally to be a thing of the past.

One week after Obama's inauguration another black mark on the US war on terror 
is in the headlines, another of the sins of his predecessor George W. Bush. On 
Monday the New York Times devoted its top story to the Bagram prison in 
Afghanistan.

Far less well known than its Cuban counterpart, Bagram is based at the US 
military airport of the same name located around 60 kilometers north of the 
Afghan capital Kabul. The newspaper's stark but justified warning is that this 
camp could present Obama with far greater problems than the one at Guantanamo 
Bay.

Bagram could indeed become a test of how serious Obama is about altering the US 
anti-terror policy. He will soon have to say what is going to happen with the 
camp -- and more fundamentally how the US army under its new commander- in- 
chief is supposed to deal with terror suspects around the world.

One of the issues facing Obama is what to do about the plan to construct a new 
prison complex to replace the provisional camp at Bagram, a project that would 
cost millions of dollars.

And now a US court is considering the camp after four of the inmates challenged 
their detention there. The judge is holding off on his decision until Feb. 20 
-- waiting for at least a signal from the White House on Bagram.

So far, Obama has kept quiet on Bagram. He has set up a commission to look at 
the issue of terror suspects held abroad. The commission, though, has been 
given just six months, likely only enough time to obtain an idea of the current 
state of affairs. At a Guantanamo briefing last week, a senior Obama 
administration official said not to expect any changes in operations at Bagram 
before the commission is finished with its review.

The American base at Bagram has been around ever since the US-led war in 
Afghanistan began. Right after the 2001 invasion, the army took over the former 
Russian airbase and completely rebuilt it. Now transport planes, military jets 
and unmanned drones take off and land here 24 hours a day. The site is huge and 
is surrounded by three security walls. Bright spotlights illuminate every 
corner of the base -- it is so bright, the halo of light can be seen from 
Kabul, some 50 kilometers away.

Bagram, known as BAF (Bagram Airfield) in the US Army, is the most important 
logistical base in the region -- alongside Baghdad Airport. Weapons supplies, 
soldiers, cars, food: Almost everything the army needs in Afghanistan is 
transported through BAF. And many wounded soldiers are flown out from the base 
to the US military hospital in Landstuhl, Germany.

In military circles, the camp at Bagram is well known, but it gets little 
publicity. Still, there are three times as many prisoners held there as at 
Guantanamo -- though the figure of 650 is more an estimate than a fact. Only 
the Red Cross has been allowed to visit the camp and it has not made anything 
public about its mission there. Human rights campaigners and journalists are 
strictly forbidden.

'More Isolated Than Guantanamo'

Almost all the prisoners are Afghans or Pakistanis who are suspected of being 
terrorists. Most have been detained by US soldiers during battles in 
Afghanistan. Unlike the Guantanamo inmates, those held at Bagram have almost no 
rights. Although there have recently been some hearings before a military 
judge, none of the prisoners have access to lawyers.

The prisoners differ in another important aspect from those in Guantanamo: In 
legal terms they were arrested in a war zone, thus making martial law 
applicable. The Bush administration consistently argued that the Bagram 
prisoners could thus be held indefinitely -- or at least until the war in 
Afghanistan was over. Obama now has to decide if he wants to continue to follow 
the policy set by the hardliners in the military and the intelligence services.

There is little known about the conditions in Bagram. "Bagram is still a black 
hole," says Carroll Bogart from Human Rights Watch. "The camp is more isolated 
than Guantanamo."

Former inmates who were subsequently transferred to Guantanomo speak of 
maltreatment and torture during interrogations. In December 2002 two Afghan 
prisoners died as a result of blows from US soldiers.

The case of taxi driver Dilawar, allegedly a courier for al-Qaida, is described 
in detail in the impressive documentary "Taxi to the Dark Side." The filmmakers 
spoke with the US soldiers and the prisoners involved and showed terrible 
images of the interrogation room -- with hooks on the wall from which prisoners 
could be hung up and tortured. A few soldiers were punished after the case came 
to light but their commander was not reprimanded.

At the beginning of the war the prison in Bagram was a kind of transit station 
-- a "screening point" in military jargon. Any suspects detained in Afghanistan 
were flown there and most quickly ended up on another plane to Guantanamo. That 
changed in the autumn of 2004 when the US government decided not to send any 
more prisoners to the Cuban base. Since then the number of those held in Bagram 
has risen steadily.

The camp was also an important station in the CIA's "extraordinary renditions" 
program. All the important masterminds behind the Sept. 11 attacks were 
funnelled through Bagram after their arrests. Other suspects were briefly held 
at the camp on the way to secret CIA prisons elsewhere. When the CIA arrested 
suspected terrorists in Somalia in 2007, for example, they were brought to the 
secure base in Afghanistan first.

German diplomats got a brief look at the camp last year. After the US army 
detained an Afghan-born German citizen in January 2008 and held him for months 
before establishing his innocence, the German deputy ambassador went to the 
base to pick him up.

The former prisoner spoke of beatings, solitary confinement and threats from 
the military personnel. He is still undergoing psychological treatment. The 
German diplomat's report about his visit to Bagram provides only a small 
glimpse of the camp -- but it is reminiscent of the early days in Guantanamo. 
The German-Afghan man was led out in an orange jumpsuit, his hands and feet 
were fettered in steel chains, his eyes were covered by a black ski mask. It 
was only possible to speak with the prisoner in a small wooden box while 
heavily armed soldiers never left his side.

'Top Military Priority'

The few people who have seen the prison describe it as spartan. The prisoners 
are held in wire cages inside an aircraft hangar and unlike in Guantanamo there 
are no communal rooms. The sanitary facilities are said to be inadequate.

That is all supposed to change with the construction of the new prison. The 
Bush administration, though, also wanted to continue to prevent prisoners from 
having access to standard legal proceedings.

Now the world is watching to see what President Obama is going to do about 
Bagram. It is going to be a delicate balancing act. On Tuesday, Defense 
Secretary Robert Gates said that Afghanistan is the new president's "top 
military priority." Speaking to the Senate Armed Services Committee, Gates said 
that it was the greatest challenge facing the US military.

Obama wants to see a massive build up of military activities in Afghanistan. 
That, though, will inevitably lead to even more suspects ending up in Bagram.

One solution could be to hand these men over to the Afghan justice system. 
Except that the US doesn't trust it -- fearing that the suspects could easily 
end up buying their freedom or being allowed to escape.

Copyright  2009 ABC News Internet Ventures




      

________________________________________________
YOU MUST clip all extraneous text when replying to a message.
Send list submissions to: Marxism@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
Set your options at: 
http://lists.econ.utah.edu/mailman/options/marxism/archive%40archives.econ.utah.edu