Saturday, January 31, 2009

Extraordinary rendition

comment: Extraordinary rendition —Niloufer Siddiqui

While preventing possible future terrorist attacks is justifiably paramount among a state’s foreign policy concerns, to do so in a manner which comports with international laws and treaties is essential both to building global alliances necessary to combating terrorism and to ensuring that the rule of law is upheld

Recent news reports detailing the harrowing experience of Pakistani national Muhammad Saad Iqbal, released to his home in Lahore after six years in American captivity, provide further evidence — if more was needed — of the policies adopted by the Bush administration in the name of national security and in blatant disregard of international norms of human rights.

On January 7, the New York Times reported that Iqbal had been captured in Jakarta, Indonesia, transferred to Egypt, and then kept captive at the Bagram Air Base in Afghanistan. After a year of torture and interrogation, and having yet to be charged with any crime, he was transferred to the Guantanamo Bay detention facility, where he was to remain for five years.

Such cases are not rare and far between.

In late 2003, Khaled El Masri, a German citizen of Lebanese descent, was captured in Macedonia and taken to Afghanistan, where he was interrogated and tortured in a secret CIA-run detention and interrogation facility known as the “Salt Pit”. El Masri was released five months later, with no explanation provided to him for his detention.

A year earlier, Italian citizen Abou Elkassim Britel was apprehended in Lahore by Pakistani authorities, and was allegedly tortured and interrogated by Pakistani intelligence officials before being sent to a detention centre in Morocco. His repeated requests to speak with the Italian embassy were ignored in Pakistan, and he remains today imprisoned in Morocco, sentenced for his alleged involvement in terrorist activities in a local trial that failed to comport with internationally recognised trial standards.

The mysterious circumstances surrounding the disappearance of Aafia Siddiqui, now a well-publicised story, also point to her having been rendered from Karachi and held in  in solitary confinement for many years.

And these are just the better-known examples. With growing media coverage and increasing public outrage, causing more countries to seek accountability from their governments, it is likely that more information about these clandestine activities will soon be revealed.

Extraordinary rendition — the practice of abducting terrorism suspects and transferring them from one foreign state to another for interrogation, detention or arrest — is an example of a policy that has marked the post-9/11 era.

Effectively an extralegal system that denies suspects fundamental legal safeguards, including the opportunity to challenge their transfers, extraordinary rendition has come to be seen as synonymous with the ‘outsourcing of torture’. Because the countries to which the suspects are transferred are those which do not have functioning legal systems, or which do not conform to international legal standards, critics argue that rendition permits the use of harsh interrogation procedures not permitted under US laws.

Pakistan’s role in this clandestine policy has been made apparent partly through the accounts of persons who were rendered and subsequently released. In his account Enemy Combatant, former Guantanamo detainee Moazzem Begg outlines his experience of being abducted from his home in Islamabad. The investigative work of a handful of journalists has also successfully traced the flight logs of these so-called ‘ghost planes’, depicting the routes of the flights which transported terror suspects in complete secrecy from one interrogation centre to another.

Pakistan is just one of the many countries which has aided and abetted the United States in carrying out its extraordinary rendition programme. While speaking on NBC’s Meet the Press in 2005, Egyptian Prime Minister Ahmed Nazif confessed that the Egyptian government had assisted the CIA with between 60 and 70 renditions.

Additionally, a Council of Europe report released in 2006 implicated numerous European countries in being complicit in the CIA’s extraordinary rendition programme. The report claims that the CIA ran secret prisons in Poland and Romania between 2002 and 2005, where suspects could be interrogated free of legal restraints, and that other countries, including Britain, Italy and Germany, provided the CIA use of their airspace to enable the renditions. Dick Marty, Swiss Senator and author of the report, claimed that the “the highest state authorities were aware of the CIA’s illegal activities on their territories.”

International law is categorical about the inadmissibility of torture against any detainee. The International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights (ICCPR) and the Convention against Torture are two examples of international treaties which the US has ratified and which specifically prohibit torture.

While the ICCPR recognises that in times of emergency, states may take measures derogating from treaty obligations, it nonetheless limits this provision by ensuring that certain rights are fundamentally non-derogable — including the right to be free from torture and cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment or punishment. Article 3 of the Convention against Torture states, “No State Party shall expel, return (“refouler”) or extradite a person to another State where there are substantial grounds for believing that he would be in danger of being subjected to torture.”

To deny persons, even suspected terrorists, the right to due process and the right to redress is against the basic norms of inter-state conduct and an infringement of fundamental rights. Both the ICCPR and the Convention against Torture require that detainees be provided a right to seek redress for torture and an opportunity to challenge their detention in independent courts.

While preventing possible future terrorist attacks is justifiably paramount among a state’s foreign policy concerns, to do so in a manner which comports with international laws and treaties is essential both to building global alliances necessary to combating terrorism and to ensuring that the rule of law is upheld, even in the most challenging of circumstances.

As the world’s attention is focused on President-elect Barack Obama and his campaign promise for change, he is sure to face numerous challenges when he steps into office on January 20. Not least of these will be the need to reformulate a balance between national security, in a world arguably more unsafe today than it was eight years ago, and protection of human rights and regard for international opinion.

The writer is a graduate student at the Johns Hopkins University’s School of Advanced International Studies, and formerly worked on human rights issues at the American Civil Liberties Uni

THE COMPLAINT AND RESPONSE TO THE COMPLAINT

SHAKWA AND JAWAB-I SHAKWA
(THE COMPLAINT AND RESPONSE TO THE COMPLAINT)
BY DR. SIR MUHAMMAD IQBAL

Iqbal wrote the two poems, “Shakwa” and “Jawab-i Shakwa” (Complaint to God and its Response), in early twentieth century. It was the prime time of his poetic revelation, which is called his third period that began in 1908 and ended at his death in 1938. During that time Muslims in India had almost lost their entity as a nation.

In the first stage of this poem Iqbal counts the chivalrous deeds of the Muslims reminding them of their past glory when they happened to be the leaders and teachers of mankind. They implemented the rule of God on the earth and brought revolutionary reforms in the states under their control where justice prevailed.

The second part shows the state of decline of Muslim nation. But Iqbal has projected this aspect so beautifully that instead of creating a sense of despair and destitute in the mind it inspires a new vigour and courage to stand up and deal with rival forces.


Shikwah





Jawab-e-Shikwah





Monday, January 12, 2009

Video israel Doesn’t Want You to See

This video was not actually supposed to be aired. The arrangement is this, all the three Israeli networks agree that if the army doesn`t like what`s filmed, the footage is never broadcast. In this case, the army decided this video is too embarassing, too damaging so it ordered it shelfed. But israel`s Channel 2 decided to break the embargo and the army and the government and a lot of viewers did not like what they saw.

Sunday, January 11, 2009

This is a great interview,finally a jewish saying the truth.

This is a very interesting video. i m very surprised that fox would air something like this. Its interesting to note someone from the Jewish community would stand up with the truth.
I hope one day the rest of the world will realize this fact and understand that Islam is the last religion and the most perfect one because it sums both Christianity and Judaism..



مرحبا ... بس بدي اعلق على الموضوع شوي
هادا اليهودي لما حكى الكلام كان متقنو تمام التمام وكان يعني كل كلمة هو حكاها ... يعني كلامو صحيح انو مو لازم يكزن دولة يهودية او اسرائيلية او صهيونية (تعددت الاسامي والهدف واحد) بس مو هون المهم .

Thursday, January 8, 2009

Message from Mohammad in Gaza

Events in Gaza. Add By:Mohammed Fares El Majdalawi

this is the message i have recived from mohammed magdalawi, he live sin Jablia In Gaza, There are holocaust and killing Four hundred martyrs and about two thousandinjured by Israeli air raids.I want to write about suffering of my people and my family in these days In my house we can't get basic needs such as, No foods, No bread ,and Natural gasYesterday , my father went to bakery from 5 AM he waited 5 hours even get one Abundle of bread.This bread not can't enough for my family because consist of 11 members .But today Igo to all bakeries. I can't find any loaf of bread due to be closed. We and my family cannot communicate with our relatives and friends because of thelack of the connecting network also every hour we have a martyr or even more becauseof the raining missiles on our homes , mosques and even hospitals ,There is no safeplace we can go to.In the day our life concentrated in burial of the martyrs who were thousands inhospitals after a short farewell or even without a final look because of the timeshortage those martyrs are graved in groups imagine that a group of martyrs gravedin one grave.At night our camp like ghosts city no sound but the sound of the various militaryaircrafts in every attack our heats and the children hearts is shaking. There is a horror in every minute and it is clear especially on the children, forexample, there was four sisters in one family killed from the Israeli occupation,when stay in their home, and there is children in the south of Rafah.Also, A woman was going to the bakery to buy bread for her family when she waswalking in the street killed the Israeli occupation.I have two message to the world.My message to the lovers of peace and freedom in the world.The First message:Imagine your life is no electricity ,destroyed homes , voice missiles of the day andnight , and no food. Imagine your children and your family tell you we are afraid of the missiles cannot sleep from the Voice of the aircraft. Imagine you and keep the commentary.The second message:Make to end the siege and stop the killings and demolition of houses for ourchildren and to provide assistance to the people through rallies, sit-ins.Finally, I invite you to come to Gaza and see the Holocaust.

With Best Regards :Mohammed Fares Al Majdalawi
Film Maker and Social WorkerGaza strip
Palestine mobile :00972599497897

Monday, January 5, 2009

Gaza Is Calling You!



O
h The aggressors!

Oh The killers of the Innocent !

When the tide of time turns against you,

When 'mis' is added before your 'fortune',

When the trigger of the gun goes to your victims,

When you are pounded with the rain of bombs

Call me, my dear sisters ,brothers and sons!

I will come to sacrifice my life for your sake.

Today my faint voice for you is a mad man's cry,

You are inebriated with the power of air, land and sea,

Tomorrow when you are forlorn, with empty hands,

Weeping over the heaps of dead and wailing injured,

Call me, my dear sisters ,brothers and sons!

I will silence their revenge with the Triumph of Mecca

Today is the time for you to learn from the past,

The Biblical parables are enough to show you the path;

The aggressors have always met their ugly fate,

When the aggressed of today stand on your chest,

Call me, my dear sisters ,brothers and sons!

I will placate their fury with the verses of Holy Book.

When the pangs of conscience make you sleepless,

When you are left with nothing but regret and remorse,

When the images of today frighten you with every breath ,

When the memory of your vicious deeds makes you numb,

Call me, my dear sisters ,brothers and sons!

I will console you as I have a human heart.












Sunday, January 4, 2009

Gaza Needs Your Voice!

DO U STILL REMEMBER US?
We are still under siege
darkness ....
And hunger.....
Do you still remember us ?!
To get water we have to walk so far....
To fill a bottle or a jar......
Do you still remember us?
We still have No food.....
Or medicine to be fed...
Our kids.....
are dying every day.....
in their beds.....
And many have just tears toshed...
Do you still remember us?!
Death!
is everywhere.....
that sometimes we have No place
to make
Our pray ....
Do you Really still remember us?!
illness.....
And daily sadness..... .
to Share.....
So do you still remember us?!
Gaza children implore you! 1
They are dying
due to the blockade!
There is 'growinghumanitarian crisis,'
happening in Gaza.....
There is an EXTREMErestricted access,
to
food, water, and medicine!!


Signature made by :


HE DEMOCRATIC!
X-HOLOCAUST VICTIM?
PRESENT-HOLOCAUST MAKER!
EXTRA-HUMAN STATE OF ISRAEL!
Please!
Saad - burnt by an unconventional Israeli bomb.
.....don't forget us
Please do Remember us!


Gaza Needs Your Voice!