Chester County Religious Campaign Against Torture - CCRCAT

The Al-Jazeera photographer was released after more than 6 years in American custody. He had been on a hunger strike to protest worsening conditions at Guantánamo and had been force-fed by medical staff there, in violation of medical ethics.

See:

http://www.andyworthington.co.uk/2008/05/01/sami-al-haj-released-from-guantanamo

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/americas/7378828.stm

Conditions are more isolating than many death rows and maximum-security prisons in the United States, said Jules Lobel, a law professor at the University of Pittsburgh who is an expert on U.S. prison conditions….

Salim Ahmed Hamdan, a Yemeni who was once a driver for Osama bin Laden…is suicidal, hears voices, has flashbacks, talks to himself and says the restrictions of Guantánamo “boil his mind.”

Pentagon officials say that Guantánamo holds dangerous men humanely and that there is no unusual quantity of mental illness there. Guantánamo, a military spokeswoman said, does not have solitary confinement, only “single-occupancy cells.”

http://www.commondreams.org/archive/2008/04/27/8555/

from ccrcat.wordpress.com posted with vodpod

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Speakers in order of appearance:

Dr. Denise Michultka, Liberty Center for Survivors of Torture
Dr. Mazhar Rishi (at podium), Pres., Council for American-Islamic Relations, PA Chapter
Rev. Patrick Seyler, Southeastern Pennsylvania Synod of the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America
Rev. Ken Beldon, WellSprings Congregation (UU)
Dr. Bernard G. Prusak, Center for Liberal Studies, Villanova University

Sunday, April 13, 2008, 2:00-4:00pm

Unitarian Fellowship of West Chester, 501 S High St
West Chester, PA 19382

A panel of clergy and scholars of different faith traditions (Christian and non-Christian) spoke on the teachings of their respective religious communities concerning US-sponsored torture and responded to questions from the audience.

Event co-sponsored by the Beyond War group of the Unitarian Fellowship of West Chester (http://www.ufwc.org), the Chester County Religious Campaign Against Torture (http://ccrcat.wordpress.com) and the Chester County Peace Movement (http://www.ccpeace.org/).

“Bates’ opinion ignores the underlying injustice that pervades al-Ghizzawi’s case and Guantánamo generally: The US has imprisoned him for more than five years without charge or a fair hearing. Worse, after the Defense Department’s status review tribunal initially found al-Ghizzawi was not an “enemy combatant,” the Defense Department ordered a “do-over.” (Where lo and behold, the tribunal found al-Ghizzawi an “enemy combatant.”) So, if, al-Ghizzawi is distrustful of Guantánamo’s medical staff, as Bates noted, he has good reason: he knows the status review tribunals are a sham and the results rigged. ”

http://www.slate.com/blogs/blogs/convictions/archive/2008/04/15/more-hypocrisy-at-guantanamo.aspx

NEW URGENT ACTIONS!! from Attorney Candace Gorman:
1. Sign the online petition…..

Mr. al-Ghizzawi’s attorney thanks everyone who wrote letters and signed the online petition. She requests  no more petitioning Judge John Bates on her client’s behalf, as he has ruled (unfavorably) on his case.

http://gtmodocuments.blogspot.com/2008/04/his-own-fault.html

“Judge Bates entered the order yesterday… I know I shouldn’t be surprised that the judge continues to believe everything the government says and refuses to allow us to even see the medical records… but I am. In fact one would think that even if the judge was not going to allow Al-GHizzawi his records… that he would ask to see them himself to clarify the misstatments of the government… sigh…The judge actually goes so far as to blame Al-Ghizzawi for his health problems and trivializes his condition….”

from the blog of attorney H. Candace Gordon
http://gtmoblog.blogspot.com/2008/04/no-medical-care-for-al-ghizzawi.html

See also: A Sickening Truth at Guantánamo

The Justice Department [in the person of John Yoo] sent a legal memorandum to the Pentagon in 2003 asserting that federal laws prohibiting assault, maiming and other crimes did not apply to military interrogators who questioned al-Qaeda captives because the president’s ultimate authority as commander in chief overrode such statutes.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2008/04/01/AR2008040102213.html

The Nightmares of Interrogation

DATE: Wednesday, April 9
TIME: 4:30pm
LOCATION: Bartley 1001, 4:30 pm

Eric Fair will speak about his experiences while serving as an interrogator in Iraq at Abu Ghraib in early 2004. He will address the corrosive effects abusive interrogation has on those who wield it as a tool as well as the irrevocable damage it has done to our nation and its institutions. Ample time will be provided for questions from the audience.

ABOUT ERIC FAIR: In 2001, Mr. Fair was hired as a police officer in Bethlehem, PA. He left the department in 2003 in order to be a part of the war effort in Iraq. He was hired as an interrogator by CACI and worked in Baghdad, Abu Ghraib, and Fallujah. He resigned this position in the summer of 2004, was hired by the National Security Administration (NSA), and returned to Iraq in 2005 as an intelligence analyst. Mr. Fair left government service in early 2006 and published an op-ed in The Washington Post in early 2007 about his experiences with coercive interrogation. He is currently a student at Princeton Theological Seminary pursuing an MDIV and seeking ordination in the Presbyterian Church (USA).

Sponsored by the Ethics Program, College of Liberal Arts, Villanova University 

Links to related info:
“An Interrogator’s Nightmare” - Eric Fair’s op-ed in Washington Post
CACI
Democracy Now! report on CACI

A gravely ill detainee I represent, never charged with a crime, has been neglected by military doctors. Will he be the next to die inside the notorious prison?

By H. Candace Gorman

http://www.salon.com/opinion/feature/2008/03/14/sick_in_guantanamo/