Today marks the 12^th anniversary of the unlawful detention of Walid Yunis Ahmad in the Kurdish Region of Iraq.

You may recognize his name. Perhaps the longest serving detainee in Iraq, Walid was featured in our report, “New Order, Same Abuses: Unlawful Detention and Torture in Iraq” and has been the subject of several Amnesty International actions.

Walid Yunis Ahmad is a Turkomen and father of three who worked for a local radio and TV station. He was arrested on February 6, 2000.

He was “disappeared” for three years, tortured, and detained without charge or trial for ten years.

In 2010, he finally was charged with directing terrorist activity from prison in 2009.  His 2000 detention remains unexplained.  At his one-day trial in 2011, his lawyer was not allowed to question “secret informants” whose testimony was accepted as the basis of the apparently fabricated charges against him.

He was sentenced to five years in prison, dating from the time he was charged in 2010.  In yet another bizarre perversion of justice, the court determined that, because the first decade of his detention was unlawful, it did not count.  Now, Walid Yunis Ahmad is to be held until 2015.

Walid should not be forced to pay for being unlawfully detained. There are no signs that those responsible will be held to account.

We need your help TODAY to urge the Kurdish Regional authorities to order Walid Yunis Ahmad’s immediate release, drop all charges against him, and compensate him and his family for his years of torture and unlawful detention.

Here is what you can do:

Tweet the accounts of the Kurdish Prime Ministers (current and incoming), Barhim Salih at @barhamsalih and Nechirvan Barzani at @NBarzani, the KRG government at @Kurdistanregion, and the Kurdistan Regional Government Representative in the US, Qubad Talabani, at @qubadjt.

Include this information in your tweets:

• @BarhamSalih @NBarzani @Kurdistanregion @qubadjt so that the incoming and outgoing Prime Ministers, Kurdish government and the KRG representative in the US all receive them
• The tags #KRG and #Kurdistan so that we can track all messages sent

Key messages and example of tweets:

@BarhamSalih @NBarzani @Kurdistanregion Today is 12th anniv of Walid Yunis arrest. Detained in #KRG & sentenced in an unfair trial. Why?

Walid Yunis Ahmad spent 12 yrs in #KRG prison & was sentenced on fabricated charges @BarhamSalih @NBarzani @Kurdistanregion Release him now!

@BarhamSalih @NBarzani @Kurdistanregion @qubadjt We urge you to immediately release Walid Yunis Ahmad in #Kurdistan http://owl.li/8TFkH

@BarhamSalih @NBarzani @Kurdistanregion @qubadjt We won’t forget Walid Yunis Ahmad, sentenced in an unfair trial in #KRG last yr http://owl.li/8TFkH

2 yrs in prison in #KRG & no evidence of crime. Release Walid Yunis Ahmad now! @BarhamSalih @NBarzani @Kurdistanregion @qubadjt http://owl.li/8TFkH

You can also send emails and letters to the Kurdish Regional authorities.

Beth Ann Toupin contributed to this post.

Pawiak Prison Museum in Warsaw, Poland.

Last week I had the opportunity to visit the Pawiak Prison Museum in Warsaw, Poland.

During the Nazi occupation of Poland in World War II Pawiak was the largest political prison in the country – approximately 100,000 prisoners passed through its cells.

37,000 of those men and women died in Pawiak – many under interrogation by the Gestapo. Another 60,000 were sent to German concentration camps. Very few survived the war.

The museum is most famous for the bronze memorial tree fixed with mourning plates commemorating the lives of some of those who died inside. The tree was the last surviving relic of the prison yard.

When the tree died in the 1980s the Polish government filled it with concrete. This bought it another 10 years but it continued to deteriorate and was finally replaced with a bronze replica. It is an extraordinarily affecting monument.

The Nazis blew up the prison itself during their retreat from Poland – presumably to erase any evidence of their crimes. Now only the basement of one building remains and its cells house exhibits about life in Pawiak under Nazi occupation.

In a small exhibition space at the end of the basement cell block you find a series of displays about the prison’s history. Most of the inmates were held there because the Nazis suspected they had ties to the Polish underground.

The inmates had information the Nazis wanted and they weren’t inhibited about using any method they could think of to get it. As the museum guidebook puts it:

“No law was respected inside prison.”

I came across sketches made by former prison inmates of interrogations conducted by the Gestapo and was stunned to see two scenes in particular that resembled the enhanced interrogation techniques approved by the Bush administration for use on suspected terrorists.

In the first picture a prisoner lies huddled in a ball on the floor of an office while two dogs tear at his clothes, a third dog is being held back in reserve by a uniformed Nazi. The image irresistibly calls to mind Abu Ghraib:

In the next picture an inmate lies strapped to a board while two Nazis pour water down his throat. Although the method differs slightly, it is an all too familiar variant of the waterboarding technique used in CIA black sites on Khalid Sheikh Mohammed, Abu Zubaydah and Abd al-Rahim al-Nashiri.

Now, I want to be very clear – my point is not to equate the War on Terror and the Nazi occupation of Poland. I do not think that is a comparison you can make. However, the two coercive techniques depicted in the Pawiak museum were used deliberatively by US personnel and that should make every US citizen feel very uncomfortable.

In an election season in which aspirant Presidential candidates can – without any apparent backlash – express support for the reintroduction of interrogation techniques like waterboarding, it is instructive to consider how these techniques are perceived by others around the world.

So, the next time someone tells you that waterboarding isn’t torture, think of the inmates of Pawiak Prison. They knew torture when they saw it.

2010 SABAH ARAR/AFP/Getty Images

‘If you don’t, we won’t either.’

That’s the agreement the Saudi and Iraqi government found on the matter of executing prisoners each is holding from the other country.

Arab News reported Friday that government officials of both countries came to a consent, at least in principle, to put executions of Saudi and Iraqi prisoners on death row on hold. This ‘in principle’ agreement reportedly will last two months until a final agreement to swap prisoners is reached. Currently, there are 138 Iraqi nationals imprisoned in the Saudi Kingdom, most of whom were charged with involvement in terrorist operations.  Eleven Iraqis were sentenced to death.

The news of Friday’s ‘in principle’ agreement to put executions on hold until any further consent has been reached to swap prisoners, may appear as a step forward toward decreasing the shockingly accumulating numbers of executions posed on prisoners in the Kingdom. However, in reality it’s only a band-aid solution to a larger problem: Since March 2011, the Saudi Arabian authorities have launched a new wave of repression in the name of security, including attacks on political opponents, religious minorities and even foreign nationals.

Sentences based upon alleged terrorist affiliation are common in Saudi Arabia. The country is in the process of passing a new anti-terror law that provides for the prosecution of acts of peaceful dissent as ‘terrorist crimes’ such as ‘harming the reputation of the state or its position.’ If the law is passed as written, questioning the integrity of the king or the crown prince would be punishable by a minimum of 10 years in prison.

The human rights threats of the new anti-terror law are vast according to the Amnesty International report, ‘Saudi Arabia: Repression in the name of security’, published last month. The vague and broad definition of terrorism offenses, the unlawful restrictions of freedom of expression, as well as the violations of rights of detainees are just a few of many key parts of the new law that pose tremendous threats to human rights in Saudi Arabia.

The prisoner swap with Iraq is good news, but it’s not enough.  The Saudi government must radically amend the anti-terror law draft to bring it into line with international human rights law and standards and fair treatment for foreign nationals within its border.

During last month’s Amnesty International’s Write for Rights campaign, we focused on a Sudanese man, Hamad al-Neyl Abu Kassawy, who has been held in Saudi Arabia without charge or trial since 2004.

To take action on his case, click here.

Lara Zuzan Golesorkhi, Saudi Arabia country specialist for AIUSA, contributed to this article. 

Wednesday, January 11 marked 10 years since the US government brought the first twenty Muslim men to the US Naval base at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, in order to detain and interrogate them outside of the law.

People around the world protested the anniversary by issuing a resounding “Not in my name!” to the US government’s use of torture, indefinite detention and unfair trials, as part of the Day of Action Against Guantanamo and the 2012 National Defense Authorization Act (NDAA).

Check out photos, video and news articles: Washington Post story and slideshow; the Miami Herald slideshow; Amnesty USA’s Facebook photos; AI France’s Statue of Liberty stunt; AI’s Spain’s demonstration in front of the US embassy in Madrid; Witness Against Torture’s Live Stream; and Andy Worthington’s overview.

In Washington DC, Amnesty International joined with the Center for Constitutional Rights, the National Religious Campaign Against Torture, Witness Against Torture and over 60 other organizations for a demonstration in front of the White House and a symbolic human chain march past the Department of Justice and Capitol to the Supreme Court.

Our goal with the global day of action was to show the US government that citizens worldwide demand security with human rights. With hundreds of demonstrations, tens of thousands of petition signatures to the global petition against Guantanamo and extensive media coverage, I think we the people did a pretty darn good job.

And in the wake of January 11 activism, there have been positive developments:

• A Spanish judge reopened an investigation into torture at Guantanamo.
• UK police will investigate UK complicity in the US government’s rendition of two Libyans to torture, and a panel will be set up to investigate the claims of abuse by a number of Guantanamo detainees, including Shaker Aamer, the last British resident still held at Guantanamo.
• A French judge has initiated an investigation into the treatment of French citizens at Guantanamo, and has requested a visit to the prison.
• The Russian Foreign Ministry called Guantanamo a “flagrant violation of international law” and condemned the National Defense Authorization Act. Russia has plenty of human rights violations of its own, but the statement highlights how the US needs to get its own house in order if it is to push other countries on human rights.

Tell the US government what you think: sign Amnesty’s global petition against Guantanamo, take action for Shaker Aamer and sign this WhiteHouse.gov petition against Guantanamo.

And tell us what you did on January 11: use the comments section and upload photos to the Security with Human Rights Facebook page.

(Pierre-Yves Brunaud)

Ten years ago today the first twenty prisoners arrived at the US military detention facility in Guantanamo Bay. As we mark this dismal anniversary, it is instructive to take a moment to reflect on the damage Guantanamo continues to do to the global cause of human rights.

Guantanamo is much more than simply the sum of its parts, and outlined below are 10 powerful anti-human rights messages that the continued existence of the detention facility sends out to the world:

1. The whole world is a battleground in a global war in which human rights don’t apply.

Some Guantanamo inmates were first detained 1000s of miles from any active military conflict in countries as diverse as Mauritania, Georgia, Bosnia, Azerbaijan, Thailand, Kenya and Iran. Yes, you read that last country right. At least two inmates handed over to the US were initially detained by Iran. Every misstep in the past ten years starts with the decision to treat the threat posed by Al Qaeda as a military challenge.

2. Humane detainee treatment is a policy choice, not a legal requirement.

By ignoring long established standards of detainee treatment at a time of national emergency the United States has given authoritarian states around the world the political cover to do the same. In doing so the US has acted not so much as the ‘city on a shining hill’, but rather more like ‘the little shop of horrors’.

Writing last weekend in The New York Times, former detainee Murat Kurnaz described the moment he landed back home on German soil having been freed from Guantanamo after five years ill-treatment and without ever having been charged with any offense:

“When we landed, the American officers unshackled me before they handed me over to a delegation of German officials. The American officer offered to re-shackle my wrists with a fresh, plastic pair. But the commanding German officer strongly refused: ‘He has committed no crime; here, he is a free man.’

I was not a strong secondary school student in Bremen, but I remember learning that after World War II, the Americans insisted on a trial for war criminals at Nuremberg, and that event helped turn Germany into a democratic country. Strange, I thought, as I stood on the tarmac watching the Germans teach the Americans a basic lesson about the rule of law.”

3. Even detentions found unlawful by the courts can continue indefinitely.

In 2010 a US federal judge ordered the release of Guantanamo detainee Mohamedou Ould Slahi noting:

“A habeas court may not permit a man to be held indefinitely upon suspicion, or because of the government’s prediction that he may do unlawful acts in the future.”

At the time of the hearing Slahi had been imprisoned in Guantanamo for eight years – he is still in prison today.

4. The right to a fair trial depends on where you come from.

In the immediate aftermath of the 9/11 attacks the US government began to craft an approach to the threat posed by Al Qaeda that drew a clear distinction between the treatment of US citizens and foreign nationals. The passage of the 2012 National Defense Authorization Act (NDAA) cemented that distinction in US law requiring that non-US persons be treated automatically as enemy combatants rather than criminal defendants while US persons were exempted from this requirement. Equality before the law is one of the most fundamental principles of justice.

5. Justice can be manipulated to ensure the government always wins.

Like the Bush administration, Team Obama has kept its thumb firmly placed on its side of the scales of justice. As Congressman Jerrold Nadler (D-NY) bluntly put it as Chair of the House Subcommittee on the Constitution in July 2009:

“Those whom we have good evidence against will get fair trials; those we have weak evidence against we’ll give less fair trials; those we have no evidence against, we’ll just keep them locked up in preventative detention without any trial at all.”

6. Execution is acceptable – even after an unfair trial.

Today 139 countries have abolished the death penalty in law or in practice. Fair trial guarantees are especially important in capital cases – to apply the death penalty in a Military Commission that fails to meet the “regularly constituted court” that “afford[s] all the judicial guarantees … recognized as indispensable by civilized peoples” standard set by Common Article 3 of the Geneva Conventions is unconscionable. More prosecutors have resigned in protest at the shortcomings of the Military Commissions process than the Commissions themselves have actually convicted.

7. Victims of human rights violations can be left without remedy.

The right to an effective remedy is recognized in all major international and regional human rights treaties, including the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights (ICCPR), which the USA ratified in 1992. Yet, like its predecessor, the Obama administration continues to block attempts by former detainees and torture victims to pursue remedy in the US courts. In stark contrast to the United States both the United Kingdom and Canada have paid millions of dollars in compensation to former detainees held by the US and its proxies in the course of the ‘Global War on Terror’.

8. Looking forward means turning a blind eye to truth and accountability.

In November 2011 President Obama restated his belief that “waterboarding is torture” after aspirant Republican presidential candidates endorsed its use in a television debate. The use of torture is a serious domestic criminal offense and a war crime. To paraphrase Sen. Lindsay Graham (R-SC) that’s rather more serious than knocking over a corner liquor store. Those most responsible for the torture of prisoners in US custody have not been held accountable. We hold foreign leaders to a higher standard than we hold our own.

9. Respect for human rights comes second to ‘local values’.

Cultural relativism has long been a convenient excuse for authoritarian regimes resisting the application of human rights law. The problem with citing ‘local values’ as one’s moral compass is that these typically tend to be poorly defined and much contested.

10. Double standards, not universal standards, apply.

In June 2003 President Bush issued a statement to mark the United Nations International Day in Support of Victims of Torture in which he described freedom from torture as “an alienable human right”, proclaimed that “torture anywhere was an affront to human dignity everywhere” and asserted that “the United States is committed to the world-wide elimination of torture and we are leading this fight by example.”

Just weeks earlier Khalid Sheikh Mohammed had been subjected to waterboarding in a program President Bush had himself authorized. Hypocrisy is toxic to reputation. Small wonder then that when three American hikers held for almost two years without trial in Iran’s notorious Evin prison complained about their treatment, their jailers replied that it was no different than that meted out to US detainees in Guantanamo.

At least 12 of the 171 men still held at Guantanamo were among the first arrivals at Guantanamo on January 11, 2002. Only one has been charged and convicted of an offense, the other 11 have been held for decade – more than twice the length of World War II – without a single charge being brought against them.

In his memoir Decision Points, President Bush recalls that by his second inauguration in January 2005 he had come to appreciate that Guantanamo had become “a propaganda tool for our enemies, and a distraction for our allies.”

That is every bit as true today as it was ten years ago today when the first prisoners arrived in Cuba.

But Guantanamo is also something even more dangerous. It is a symbol that emboldens predatory states around the world to ignore fundamental human rights. Those rights exist to protect the powerless from the powerful, and every single one of us is a little less secure as long as Guantanamo remains open.

Take action: 10 years too long! Close Guantanamo and end indefinite detention