Are torture and the melting of flesh human rights?
Notice the headlines out of Iraq in just the last two days:
- After months of denying it, the Pentagon has been forced to admit that US used white phosphorus in Iraq as reported by the Italian TV network RAI last week. Remember that White Phosphorous is a chemical that burns like napalm, sometimes burning flesh right through to the bone. A number of witnesses in Fallujah report seeing the corpses of civilians with their flesh burned off. While legal experts debate whether White Phosphorous is technically a “chemical weapon,” there is no doubt that it is as horrific as the chemical weapons Saddam Hussein is accused of using agaist Iraqis.
- An investigation found at least 170 Iraqis in a prison maintained by the Iraqi Ministry of the Interior, many of whom had been tortured. As Reuters quotes an Iraqi official:
“I saw signs of physical abuse by brutal beating, one or two detainees were paralysed and some had their skin peeled off various parts of their bodies.”
- And new accounts appearing in an ACLU lawsuit give testimony of the depths of torture resorted to by US troops in Iraq. Two Iraqi businessmen report being arrested by US troops, report being threatened with being fed to lions, stunned with Tasers, being threatened with simulated anal rape, witnessing mistreatment of the Koran, and, of course, deprivation of food and water and repeated
beatings. Note that the torture took place at three different sites. One of these sites was Saddam’s Republican Palace, using his lions for the sport of the new brutalizers. This torture, so widespread and so routine, was in no way the actions of a “few bad apples,” but was obviously policy.
Meanwhile, this country locks people up indefinitely without any semblance of a fair trial; the administration fights tooth and nail to preserve the right to torture; and the attacks on Iraqi city after city roll right along.
At this point, the news from these few days alone makes it totally obvious that “freedom,” “democracy,” or “human rights” have absolutely nothing to do with the US invasion and occupation of Iraq. Any prosecution of the fallen dictator by the current torture regimes (US and Iraqi) will only increase the farce. I, for one, would love to see Saddam Hussein on trial, but only if accompanied by his fellow war criminals.
2 comments November 15th, 2005