Re: Protest in Afghanistan after Quran burning
What is the procedure employed in the extraction of information from criminals in the US? You certainly cannot torture them. Why should there be a double standard?
Also, torture for the purpose of extracting information, implies the prisoner has already been found guilty. However, many of these individuals were not given trials. Indeed, it was assumed that putting them on trial would lead to their release for lack of evidence. Hence the legal/diplomatic/philosophical gymnastics that the Bush administration had to do in order to get around irritants like due process, the Geneva convention etc etc.
Regardless of what you call it, the US has to abide by certain established codes of conduct. They use terms like “enemy combatant” (how do they determine who is an enemy combatant without a trial?) because this implies, however subtly, that Geneva codes dont apply since they are not member of a regular army. Its dispicable how people like Chenney used such distortions, including terms like “enhanced” interrogations to justify grave human rights abuses.
It really is all word play. At the end of the day, these people were held prisoner, never given a trial, and tortured and an unknown number died. Its as simple as that.
By the way, in a US prison, you run the risk of being raped or stabbed with a toothbrush, your toilet is a foot away from the bed, and you better hope there is a race you can fit in with so as to avoid the above. Not much of a step up…