Amnesty International Condemns U.S. for Human Rights Violations

Amnesty International is condemning the U.S. for human rights violations and torture in its detention of terrorist suspects in prisons in Guantanamo Bay and around the globe in its annual report out today (May 25th), according to the Associated Press. The report was also highly critical of other nations, especially in the Middle East and Africa, but was especially pointed about what it said was America's failure to live up to its human rights rhetoric and the example it sets for other countries.

The section on the report on the U.S. focuses on Guantanamo Bay, where over 500 prisoners from 40 countries are being held. Many have been imprisoned for three years without having been charged, and Amnesty asserts that the U.S. has been creatively subverting international human rights laws by changing the terms of the debate. The report said, "Attempts to dilute the absolute ban on torture through new policies and quasi-management speak, such as 'environmental manipulation, stress positions and sensory manipulation,' was one of the most damaging assaults on global values" in the last year. The report also says that the U.S. has avoided national anti-torture laws by sending prisoners to third-party countries where there are less stringent restrictions. Amnesty called for Guantanamo to be closed, and its Secretary, General Irene Khan called it, quote, "the gulag of our time."

The U.S. has claimed that torture and murder such as the infamous events as Abu Ghraib and recently in Afghanistan were isolated events, and Navy Lieutenant Commander Joe Carpenter, a spokesman for the Department of Defense, recently told AP that the U.S. continues to be a leader in human rights and investigates all claims of abuse, though he had not yet seen a copy of the report.

These clowns have no credibility at all. They stood by silently as Terri Schiavo was starved and dehydrated to death.