Tag: krigen mod terror

Blev kidnappet og forsøgte at slå igen: 86 år i fængsel

Prøv at forestille dig, at en dansker i Afghanistan bliver kidnappet af al-Qaeda. 5 år må han henslæbe i skumle og ubehagelige fangelejre, indtil han en skønne dag ser en chance: Han griber én af fangevogternes gevær og forsøger at skyde sig fri.

Ingen kommer noget til, men den afghanske regering griber nu ind og beslutter at statuere et eksempel: Danskeren stilles for retten, anklaget for mordforsøg. Dom. 86 års fængsel. Han anfører forgæves, at han i fem år har været kidnappet i strid med enhver international lovgivning og blot forsøgte at forsvare sig selv.

Ville en sådan dom være en sejr for det afghanske demokrati, et bevis for, at vi endelig har opnået det demokrati, vore soldater har kæmper for? Sådan vil alle nok ikke opfatte det.

Sådan er det heller ikke alle, der opfatter det, nu hvor en kvindelig pakistansk neurolog er dømt for det samme – godt nok ikke i det nye, demokratiske Afghanistan, men i det nye, demokratiske USA:

Siddiqui, 38, was convicted of attempted murder this year after shooting at US soldiers and FBI agents in Afghanistan in 2008 as she tried to escape from custody. Siddiqui claimed she had been abducted by US agents and held incommunicado in Afghanistan for five years. The case has drawn appeals from the Pakistani government for her release, and divided legal opinion.

Protesters took to the streets across Pakistan after the sentence, lighting fires and chanting anti-American slogans. The Jamaat-e-Islami religious party announced a national strike after weekly prayers. Opposition leader Nawaz Sharif said he was “saddened”‚ by the sentence; his brother Shahbaz, the chief minister of Punjab province, called the sentence a “crime against humanity”.

Siddiqui’s family in Karachi accused the US justice system of bias against Muslims. “This is the beginning of the greatest travesty of justice,” said her sister Fowzia, who has campaigned for the past two years. “My sister is going to come back. This is not her downfall. This is her victory.”

Although the FBI accused Siddiqui of supporting al-Qaida, she was not charged with terrorism. But prosecutors alleged that when she was arrested in Afghanistan two years ago she was found with instructions on how to assemble bombs and a list of New York city landmarks.

86 års fængsel. For at skyde op i luften efter at have været indespærret uden lv og dom  (det, vi andre kalder “kidnappet”) i fem år. Velbekomme d’herrer, som stadig tror på “krigen mod terror”.

Link: Pakistan neurocientist given 86 years for shooting at US agents

Jon Stewart om Obamas brudte løfter

Som Cory Doctorow observerer: I didn’t expect the guy to walk on water, but I’d love it if he wouldn’t wallow in shit.

Eller Greenwald:

When ACLU Executive Director Anthony Romero last week addressed the progressive conference America’s Future Now, he began by saying:  “I’m going to start provocatively . . . I’m disgusted with this president.”  Last night, after Obama’s Oval Office speech, Jon Stewart began his show with an 8-minute monologue on Obama’s executive power and civil liberties record which, in essence, provided just some of the reasons why Romero’s strong condemnation is so justified.  None of this will be remotely new to any readers here, but it’s still nice to see its being distilled so clearly by a voice which even the most hardened Obama loyalists have decided is a credible and trustworthy one.

Link: Jon Stewart on Obama’s executive power record

“Krigen mod terror” havde intet at gøre med terror

Det er Gary Younges konklusion i hans indlæg i dagens Guardian. “Bush’s anti-terror strategy was not about protecting people but about scaring them“:

When it actually came down to it, to forestall a near-calamitous terrorist atrocity in the US the authorities didn’t even have to go in search of information or informants. The alleged terrorist’s father came to the US embassy in Nigeria of his own free will and warned them that his son, Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab, had disappeared and could be in the company of Yemeni terrorists.

Meanwhile the National Security Agency had heard that al-Qaida in Yemen was planning to use an unnamed Nigerian in an attack on the US. If that were not enough, then came Abdulmutallab himself, a 23-year-old Nigerian bound for Detroit who bought his ticket in cash, checked in no bags and left no contact information. For seven years the American state manipulated the public with its multicoloured terror alerts. But when all the warning lights were flashing red, it did nothing.

To brand this near miss a “systemic failure”, as Barack Obama has done, is both true and inadequate. It reduces the moral vacuity, political malevolence and enduring strategic recklessness that has been the enduring response to the 9/11 attacks to a question of managerial competence.

Hvis den manglende afsløring af den nigerianske bombemand in spe skulle betegnes som en “systemfejl”, ville det jo nemlig forudsætte, at hele terror- og advarsels- og sikkerhedssystemet ikke havde virket efter sin hensigt – men det er helt forkert.

“Krigen mod terror” har fungeret helt fejlfrit. Dens formål er bare ikke at fange terrorister, men at opskræmme befolkningen, så den bliver lettere at kontrollere og de bitre kontrol- og overvågningspiller bliver lettere at få til at gå ned. At sådan en Abdulmutallab kan slippe igennem, er vel nærmest at betragte som en ekstra bonus, der kan bruges som påskud for yderligere skærpelser og stramninger, så skruen kan drejes endnu en tand, mens vi venter på det næste påskud til at skære endnu en skive af vores frihed.

Link: The war on terror has been about scaring people, not protecting them

Dagens citat: Terrorbekæmpelse

Cory Doctorow på Boing Boing:

Al Quaeda are not anti-aviation activists. They want to create terror, not ground airplanes. You fight that by arresting them, not by sticking airports in safes and throwing away the keys.

Link: Fight terrorism by arresting terrorists, not by looking at our genitals at airports

Tortur: Hvorfor Obamas afvisning af at rejse sag ikke er i orden

Brugeren PaulR slår hovedet på sømmet i en kommentar på Boing Boing:

When you learn something, you learn in two ways. For example, you learn that the derivative of f(x)=3x is f(x) = 3. You also learn that you hate calculus.
(I don’t, but this way it’s funnier.)

So when, for example, your government says:
“Under no circumstance will we use the Death Penalty. EVEN IF the victim as a little girl who was raped. EVEN IF the victim was a policeman. EVEN IF the victim was the Prime Minister. EVEN IF the victim was home-invaded.”
or
“You will not be charged directly for medical care, and that care will be based on need, not on ability to pay.”

When the elite Canadian Airborne Regiment was found to have tortured a Somali teenager in 1993, the regiment was disbanded. See http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Somalia_Affair – warning graphic photo.

In these cases, the government also sends out a very strong message that human life has value. This message has a subtle but powerful effect on the population.

In Texas, the penal system denies any shred of humanity to prisoners on death row. Even the possibility of making/writing a final statement in the days just before their execution. Y’see, the prisoner’s life has no meaning. He’s just pond scum.
Likewise with torture:
When the American government doesn’t punish torture,
EVEN THOUGH it’s banned by international law,
EVEN THOUGH the Nuremburg trials established that “I was just following orders” isn’t a valid excuse,
EVEN THOUGH it’s illegal according to American law,
EVEN THOUGH it’s been proven, over and over that IT DOESN’T WORK!,
then you give the green light to anyone else who wants to torture.

Now, how can Americans be surprised when torture is performed in other places? How can the American government, the only one that might have influence on the leaders in the UAE, even express their concerns about this story without looking like hypocrites?

Det er nødvendigt, én gang for alle, at slå fast at tortur er strafbart og ulovligt uanset om man har fået lov til det af sine overordnede, eller ligefrem ordre til det. Der skal ikke være straffrihed for den slags, med mindre man vil have Guantanamoer og Abu Ghraib’er over det hele.

• Læs også: Obama giver frit lejde til torturbødler