After Abu Ghraib [interview with femal prisoner]

[kayell]

http://www.guardian.co.uk/Iraq/Story/0,2763,1308346,00.html

snip

On December 23, the Americans arrested another of Alazawi's brothers, Ayad, 44. It was at this point that she decided to confront the Americans directly. She marched into the US base in Adhamiya, one of Saddam Hussein's former palaces. "A US captain told me to come back with my two other brothers. He said we could talk after that." On Christmas Eve she returned with her brothers, Ali and Mu'taz. "I waited for four hours. An American captain finally interrogated me. After 10 minutes he announced that I was under arrest." Like thousands of other Iraqis detained by the Americans since last year's invasion, Alazawi was about to experience the reality of the Bush administration's "war on terror".


"They handcuffed me and blindfolded me and put a piece of white cloth over my eyes. They bundled me into a Humvee and took me to a place inside the palace. I was dumped in a room with a single wooden chair. It was extremely cold. After five hours they brought my sister in. I couldn't see anything but I could recognise her from her crying."

Alazawi says that US guards left her sitting on the chair overnight, and that the next day they took her to a room known by detainees as "the torturing place". "The US officer told us: 'If you don't confess we will torture you. So you have to confess.' My hands were handcuffed. They took off my boots and stood me in the mud with my face against the wall. I could hear women and men shouting and weeping. I recognised one of the cries as my brother Mu'taz. I wanted to see what was going on so I tried to move the cloth from my eyes. When I did, I fainted."

Like most Iraqi women, Alazawi is reluctant to talk about what she saw but says that her brother Mu'taz was brutally sexually assaulted. Then it was her turn to be interrogated. "The informant and an American officer were both in the room. The informant started talking. He said, 'You are the lady who funds your brothers to attack the Americans.' I speak some English so I replied: 'He is a liar.' The American officer then hit me on both cheeks. I fell to the ground.

more

[tlcandie]

1. I don't think we will ever know to the fullest extent the rapes and

abuses of the women in AG prisons or elsewhwere because of the shame of it all and possible death or shunning from family members...

<snipped from original article>
Now Alazawi is trying to piece her life back together. She is back at work in Baghdad, where she runs businesses importing foreign cars and electrical goods, surrounded by respectful staff who bring endless cups of sweet Iraqi coffee. Business appears to be flourishing. Friends of the family in Arab dish-dash - many of whom come from Iraq's Sunni elite - drop in and exchange gossip on her white leather sofas. But after her release, her millionaire husband announced that he was divorcing her.

"For a woman in an eastern society to spend months in US custody is very difficult," she says. Several of the other former women detainees in Abu Ghraib are believed to have disappeared; others have husbands who have also disowned them. Alazawi's surviving brothers, Ali - prisoner number 156215 - and Mu'taz - 156216 - are still inside Abu Ghraib. The US military continues to detain them and 2,400 other prisoners without charge or legal access, in contravention of the Geneva Convention. Alazawi says that she has hired lawyers to pursue the Iraqi informant who she blames for her brother's death.

All the other women detainees, meanwhile, have refused to talk about their ordeal; she is the first to give testimony. As Iraq lurches from disaster to disaster, from kidnapping to suicide bombing, from insurgency towards civil war, from death to death, what does she think of the Americans now? "I hate them," she says.
<snip>

[nosmokes]

11. the student is gone, the master has arrived.

but we're sposed to be talkin' about the memos and medals and dental exams and crying 3 year olds and other inconsequential shit. this stuff matters so i don't think it's been cleared for discussion.

[Jacobin]

2. We've created some potent enemies

Sad story.

[Catfight]

3. This is civilized America trying to teach how to be civilized through

brutality. It is sickening to the very core.

[NNN0LHI]

4. This is the 800 pound gorilla in the room

Bush doesn't talk too much about rape rooms in Iraq these days.

Don

[Dhalgren]

5. I understand her sentiment completely

She was asked what she thinks "of the Americans now? "I hate them," she says." So do I...

[Mizmoon]

6. so do you?

What does that mean? Are you an American?

[AFSCME girl]

7. I have to say, as an American,

I would hate ANYONE who did this to me or one of my family members. With this type of behavior, on the part of the Americans over there, we are breeding enemies for generations to come.

[Mizmoon]

8. Gotcha n/t

[legally blonde]

9. every time I read

an article like this, I want to scream. I hate what Americans have become--this is no better than what Saddam did. And there are idiots in this country who actually think that this type of behavior is just swell. :mad: :mad: :mad:

[thecrow]

10. This is just a horrible statement:

"The fact that abuses occurred isn't really news any more. We know they did and those who are accused are being prosecuted for it."

The blamem goes all the way to the top.
Why haven't the generals, and the top brass (like Rumsferatu) been FIRED????

[Disturbed]

12. Fired?

Rumsfailed should have been charged with War Crimes a long time ago.

Rumsfailed Admitted to Violating Geneva Convention

Rumsfailed admitted in public on TV that when CIA Director Tenet requested that an Iraqi prisoner be sent to a secret Afghan/US Prison that Rumsfailed did so. After four months a DOD Attorney stated that this was an illegal act. Rumsfailed then ordered that this prisoner be sent back to Abu Graihib but the prisoner was purposefully not listed at that location, also an illegal act. Rumfailed has commted two violations of the Geneva Convention; thereby also violations of The Constitution of the USA. Recently it has been found out that even more detainees were "ghost detainees". The fact that Rumsfailed and Tenet have not been charged speaks volumes. If Congress wishes to garner any respect they should move forward with Rep. Rangle's Impeachment Declaration of Rumsfailed and also proscecute Ex. CIA Tenet.

Does the US, Govt., Congress, and the Justice Dept no longer abide by the Geneva Convention or the Constitution of the USA?

It is obvious that this is the case!.