Monday 28 July 2008

Torture and Guantanamo


Listened to "The Moral Maze" (available at http://www.bbc.co.uk/iplayer/episode/b00cm9pd//b00cm9n5 until tuesday 29th July 2008)

It reminded me of why we are thinking of doing some action to try to make some differences on Guantanamo. Michael Burke says,

"In the week that the first of the suspects held at Guantanamo Bay goes on trial for war crimes, there is a growing sense of unease that we have given up the moral high ground by using torture to fight the so called, 'war on terror'. The Americans acknowledge using techniques like 'waterboarding' (a sort of simulated drowning) to get information. Last week a Canadian court ordered the release of a video showing a sixteen-year-old prisoner at Guantanamo pitifully begging for his mother after being deprived of more than three hours sleep at a time for 21 days. An American government lawyer is on record as saying, "torture is a matter of perception". Here, at the weekend, a Commons committee accused our government of 'out-sourcing' torture of British nationals to others, notably the Pakistani security services."
And, don't forget, the inmates of Guantanamo have, on the whole, not been charged with anything.

What more reason do we need than to do something about this?

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