N.Y. judge hesitant on Abu Ghraib photos

LARRY NEUMEISTER

Associated Press

NEW YORK - A judge said Tuesday he was hesitant to release pictures and videotapes of detainee abuse at Iraq's Abu Ghraib prison while top government officials insisted that deaths could result.

U.S. District Judge Alvin K. Hellerstein commented as he listened to Manhattan's top government lawyer and an attorney for the American Civil Liberties Union, which was seeking release of the pictures.

The judge questioned whether he could disregard arguments by Gen. Richard B. Myers, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, who has warned that releasing the photos would aid al-Qaida recruitment, weaken the Afghan and Iraqi governments and incite riots against U.S. troops.

"How can I ignore the expert opinion of General Myers, who is concerned with the safety of his troops?" the judge asked. "I can't substitute my opinion for the opinion of General Myers."

He said troops in Iraq "face danger every day and don't deserve to have that danger enlarged."

The ACLU has sought the release of 87 photographs and four videotapes taken at the prison. The request was part of a 2003 lawsuit demanding information on the treatment of detainees in U.S. custody and the transfer of prisoners to countries known to use torture. The ACLU contends prisoner abuse is systemic.

The judge on Tuesday reduced the number of photographs at issue to 74 and the number of videos to three, saying those he excluded would have required redactions so great as to render them inconsequential. He said the pictures and videos involve a limited number of soldiers engaging in acts that were "distasteful to an extreme degree."

The judge said he recognized the pictures might be useful to the public as it answers questions about the prison scandal, including whether those in command knew about the abuse and how extensive it was.

Yet, he said, there was a "high prurient value" in the pictures.

"A judge cannot look at these without thinking to himself how quickly they'd be put on the 6 o'clock or 11 o'clock news and how easily they could be subverted to create a false picture of this country," he said.

U.S. Attorney David Kelley told the judge that insurgents and propagandists in Afghanistan and Iraq would claim that a judge's order to release the pictures was a "deliberate war act" by the U.S.

He said insurgents who already are increasing the deadliness of their attacks would claim that more pictures were being released to "rub the noses of the Muslim world" in what had happened.

ACLU lawyer Amrit Singh argued that release of the pictures was necessary for the public to assess the scope of the abuse and whether it could have been carried out without the knowledge of military leaders.

The judge did not say when he would rule, but he has indicated that a speedy decision is important so the public's right to know is not compromised.

John Stewart saying this. Why is a comedian saying the
most incisive things about Bush and the war?

Stewart to Hitchens:

The people who say that we shouldn't fight in Iraq aren't saying it's our fault... [edit] There is reasonable dissent in this country about the way this war has been conducted that has nothing to do with people believing we should cut and run from the terrorists or we should show weakness in the face of terrorism or that we believe that we have in some way brought this upon ourselves. They believe that this war is being conducted without transparency, without credibility, and without competence.

[The president] refuses to answer questions from adults as though we were adults and falls back upon platitudes and phrases and talking points that does a disservice to the goals that he himself shares with the very people he needs to convince.

U.S. judge runs ads in Colombia for rebels

DAN MOLINSKI

Associated Press

BOGOTA, Colombia - A U.S. judge has taken out ads in Colombian newspapers and magazines ordering the country's main rebel group to appear in his Washington courtroom to face charges of kidnapping three Americans in 2003.

The Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia, or FARC, are accused in the summons, first published Sunday in a half-dozen Colombian publications, of "taking hostages in violation of U.S. laws."

The Americans - Tom Howes, Marc Gonsalves and Keith Stansell - were captured by the FARC on Feb. 13, 2003, after their small plane crashed in a rebel stronghold in southern Colombia while on an anti-drug mission. The FARC has acknowledged they are holding the men.

The announcement was placed in Spanish by U.S. District Judge Thomas Hogan and is slated to be repeated once a week through September.

Sheldon Snook, Hogan's executive assistant, said judges are required by law to send out a summons order and said the judge chose to issue this one in the Colombian press because "We don't have (the FARC's) address on file."

Besides accusing the FARC as a whole in the kidnappings, the jailed FARC leader Ricardo Palmera has also been named in the case. Palmera, who goes by the alias Simon Trinidad, was extradited to the United States late last year on a May 2004 U.S. indictment that charged him with "conspiring to kidnap" the three Americans.

The 13,000-strong FARC has been fighting for social revolution in Colombia for 41 years, but the group is also deeply involved in drug trafficking and kidnapping for ransom...

Has the 'Tipping Point' on Iraq Been Reached?
by Jim Lobe

Has the U.S. public lost so much confidence in the George W. Bush administration's handling of the Iraq war that its current strategy – to the extent one actually exists – is unsustainable?

With President Bush himself besieged by antiwar protesters on his seemingly endless and ill-timed vacation at his Texas ranch, that appears to be The Big Question, just two weeks before the resumption of official business back in Washington.

Both Republican lawmakers, who face mid-term elections 15 months from now, and the military itself, which, as a result of the Vietnam debacle, has taken as an article of faith that the loss of civilian support must be avoided at all costs, appear increasingly restive and unhappy with the course of events.

"There are more and more voices within the party and military who are beginning to acknowledge that the situation in Iraq is not only not improving, but is actually getting worse," said Jim Cason of the Friends Committee on National Legislation (FCNL), a lobby group that opposed the war.

"The administration is under more and more pressure from within – especially from the Pentagon and influential Republicans on Capitol Hill – and it clearly hasn't figured out what to do about it."

Media coverage of the war has turned particularly gloomy over the past several weeks, and particularly since the Aug. 3 killing of 14 U.S. servicemen in one deadly bombing incident.

The front-page headlines tell the story. "In Iraq, No Clear Finish Line," which ran in the Washington Post a week ago, was soon succeeded by "U.S. Lowers Sights on What Can be Achieved in Iraq," which was then eclipsed by a more general analysis Thursday entitled "U.S. Policy on 'Axis of Evil' Suffers Spate of Setbacks."

Among other points, that article noted that the administration's blunders in Iraq had clearly strengthened the strategic position of North Korea and especially Iran, whose influence with the new government in Baghdad has been growing steadily, much to Washington's discomfort.

As for the other "court paper" of the U.S. capital, the New York Times, a searing critique of Bush's policy by columnist Frank Rich entitled "Someone Tell the President the War Is Over" appeared virtually everywhere on the Internet almost the instant that it was published last Sunday.

And an analysis Thursday, "Bad Iraq War News Has Some in GOP Worried Over '06 Vote," argued that even among staunch war hawks in Congress, Iraq was fast becoming a political albatross of Vietnam-like dimensions.

Even arch-hawk Newt Gingrich, former Republican speaker of the House of Representatives, admitted that the near-victory of the Democratic candidate and Iraq veteran who denounced Bush as a "chickenhawk" in a solidly Republican district in Ohio earlier this month was a "wake-up call" for the party.

Public opinion polls have been telling a similar story. A Newsweek poll taken two weeks ago found that confidence in Bush's handling of the war had fallen to an all-time low of 34 percent, which, as Rich pointed out, was roughly equivalent to the approval rating of former President Lyndon Johnson's handling of th

New Abuse Photos Could Spark Riots, US General Warns

By William Fisher

-- NEW YORK, Civil libertarians and the Pentagon appear
headed for yet another trainwreck in the ongoing dispute over the so-called
second batch of photos from Abu Ghraib prison in Iraq.

In response to a lawsuit by the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU), the
Centre for Constitutional Rights (CCR), and a number of medical and veterans
groups demanding release of 87 new videos and photographs depicting detainee
abuse at the now infamous prison, the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff,
Gen. Richard Myers, said the release would result in "riots, violence and
attacks by insurgents."

In court papers filed to contest the lawsuit, Gen. Myers said he consulted
with Gen. John P. Abizaid, head of the United States Central Command, and
Gen. George W. Casey Jr., the commander of the U.S. forces in Iraq. Both
officers also opposed the release, Gen. Myers said.
He believes the release of the photos would "incite public opinion in the
Muslim world and put the lives of American soldiers and officials at risk,"
according to documents unsealed in federal court in New York.

"The situation on the ground in Iraq is dynamic and dangerous," Myers added,
with 70 insurgent attacks daily. He also said there was evidence that the
Taliban was gaining ground because of popular discontent in Afghanistan.

Gen. Myers cited the violence that erupted in some Muslim countries in May
after Newsweek published an item, which it later retracted, saying that a
Koran had been thrown in a toilet in the United States detention center in
Guantánamo Bay, Cuba. He also said the images could fuel terrorist
disinformation campaigns.

"It is probable that Al Qaeda and other groups will seize upon these images
and videos as grist for their propaganda mill, which will result in, besides
violent attacks, increased terrorist recruitment, continued financial
support and exacerbation of tensions between Iraqi and Afghani populaces and
U.S. and coalition forces," he said.

The 87 "new" photos and four videotapes taken at Abu Ghraib were among those
turned over to Army investigators last year by Specialist Joseph M. Darby, a
reservist who was posted at the prison.

In legal papers unsealed last week, the ACLU and its allied groups urged the
court to order the release of photographs and videos, and also asked the
court to reject the government's attempt to file some of its legal arguments
in secret.

It said that until the first photos of detainee abuse at Abu Ghraib were
made public in April 2004, the government had consistently denied that any
wrongdoing had taken place, despite news reports to the contrary. Since
then, the ACLU has obtained, through a court order, more than 60,000 pages
of government documents regarding torture and abuse of detainees.

At a court hearing on Monday, the judge said he generally ruled in favour of
public disclosure and ordered the government to reveal some redacted parts
of its argument for blocking the release of pictures and videotapes.

U.S. District Judge Alvin K. Hellerstein said his rulings pertained to
arguments by Gen. Myers. "By and large, I ruled in favour of public
disclosure," he said.

The judge said he believes photographs "are the best evidence the public can
have of what occurred" at the prison.

He scheduled arguments on the question of whether the photographs and videos
should be released for Aug. 30, saying a speedy decision is important so the
public's right to know isn't compromised.

The ACLU has also called for an independent counsel with subpoena power to
investigate the torture scandal, including the role of senior policymakers,
and has filed a separate lawsuit to hold Defence Secretary Donald Rumsfeld
and high-ranking military officers accountable.

Reed Brody, head of international programmes for Human Rights Watch (HRW),
told IPS, "The problem is not the photos but the policy of abuse. The
release of the first photos last year led us to the revelations that senior
U.S. officials had secretly sidelined the Geneva Conventions, re-defined
'torture', and approved illegal coercive interrogation methods."

"The release of new photos showing crimes perpetrated on detainees could
create new impetus to expose and prosecute those ultimately responsible and
hopefully prevent these practices from being repeated."

Michael Ratner, president of the Centre for Constitutional Rights, noted
that, "The administration's response to the release of the photos is to kill
the messenger, rather then to investigate and prosecute the real culprits:
Secretary of Defence Rumsfeld, Attorney-General Alberto Gonzales, Generals
Miller and Sanchez, and others."

He agreed that "the photos will be upsetting to anyone who cares about
humane treatment and particularly to those in the Muslim world, but the
photos reflect the reality of the type of treatment detainees were subjected
to."

"Rather than suppress the best evidence of widespread torture of Muslim
detainees, the Administration ought to launch a fully independent
investigation and ought to see that an independent prosecutor is appointed,"
Ratner told IPS.

He added, "Ensuring accountability for the torture conspiracy is the best
way of demonstrating to the Muslim world that this outrage has come to an
end and will not be repeated."

The government initially objected to the release of the images on the
grounds that it would violate the Geneva Conventions rights of the detainees
depicted in the images. That concern was addressed by court order on Jun. 1
directing the government to redact any personally identifying
characteristics from the images. The ACLU did not object to those
redactions.

The ACLU said the government has repeatedly taken the position that the
detainees themselves cannot rely on the Geneva Conventions in legal
proceedings to challenge their mistreatment by U.S. personnel.