Torture
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Torture is the act of inflicting severe pain (whether physical or psychological) as a means of punishment, revenge, forcing information or a confession, or simply as an act of cruelty. Throughout history, torture has taken on a wide variety of forms, and has often been used as a method of political re-education, interrogation, punishment, and coercion. In addition to state-sponsored torture, individuals or groups may be motivated to inflict torture on others for similar reasons to those of a state; however, the motive for torture can also be for the sadistic gratification of the torturer.

Torture is prohibited under international law and the domestic laws of most countries in the 21st century. It is considered to be a violation of human rights, and is declared to be unacceptable by Article 5 of the UN Universal Declaration of Human Rights. Signatories of the Third Geneva Convention and Fourth Geneva Convention officially agree not to torture prisoners in armed conflicts. Torture is also prohibited by the United Nations Convention Against Torture, which has been ratified by 147 countries.

National and international legal prohibitions on torture derive from a consensus that torture and similar ill-treatment are immoral, as well as impractical. Despite these international conventions, organizations that monitor abuses of human rights (e.g. Amnesty International, the International Rehabilitation Council for Torture Victims) report widespread use condoned by states in many regions of the world. Amnesty International estimates that at least 81 world governments currently practice torture, some of them openly. Read more here

Guantanamo Bay detention camp
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

The Guantanamo Bay detention camp is an extrajudicial detainment and interrogation facility of the United States located within Guantanamo Bay Naval Base, Cuba. The facility was established in 2002 by the Bush Administration to hold detainees from the war in Afghanistan and later Iraq. It is operated by the Joint Task Force Guantanamo (JTF-GTMO) of the United States government in Guantanamo Bay Naval Base, which is on the shore of Guantánamo Bay. The detainment areas consist of three camps: Camp Delta (which includes Camp Echo), Camp Iguana, and Camp X-Ray, the last of which has been closed. The facility is often referred to as Guantánamo, G-Bay or Gitmo, after the military abbreviation GTMO for the Guantanamo Bay Naval Base. Read more here

Read What Torture Your Government is Dishing Out….IN YOUR NAME
Matt Weidner

Fighting With The American People
January 13, 2012

We all need to own what has happened for ten years in Cuba, and what continues even today.  Ironically, we think we have the moral authority to criticize Fidel Castro for what he did on this very same island?

(just take a look here for some real examples)

GOD HELP US ALL is all I have to say. And damn us all for ignoring all this for 10 years, focused on football and shopping and all the nonsense that occupies our meaningless daily lives. Shame on every one of us for sending children into schools to talk about the lies and the propaganda that is in our textbooks. Shame on reporters and frankly the entire press corps in this country for being corrupt cogs in a very evil machine. Read more here

Amnesty International is a global movement of more than 3 million supporters, members and activists in more than 150 countries and territories who campaign to end grave abuses of human rights.

Our vision is for every person to enjoy all the rights enshrined in the Universal Declaration of Human Rights and other international human rights standards.

We are independent of any government, political ideology, economic interest or religion and are funded mainly by our membership and public donations. Read more here

The cell in which David Hicks, an Australian Guantanamo Bay prisoner, was detained. Inset is the prisoners' reading room, without any books

My Guantánamo Nightmare
The New York Times
by LAKHDAR BOUMEDIENE
January 7, 2012

Nice, France

ON Wednesday, America’s detention camp at Guantánamo Bay will have been open for 10 years. For seven of them, I was held there without explanation or charge. During that time my daughters grew up without me. They were toddlers when I was imprisoned, and were never allowed to visit or speak to me by phone. Most of their letters were returned as "undeliverable," and the few that I received were so thoroughly and thoughtlessly censored that their messages of love and support were lost.

Some American politicians say that people at Guantánamo are terrorists, but I have never been a terrorist. Had I been brought before a court when I was seized, my children’s lives would not have been torn apart, and my family would not have been thrown into poverty. It was only after the United States Supreme Court ordered the government to defend its actions before a federal judge that I was finally able to clear my name and be with them again.

I left Algeria in 1990 to work abroad. In 1997 my family and I moved to Bosnia and Herzegovina at the request of my employer, the Red Crescent Society of the United Arab Emirates. I served in the Sarajevo office as director of humanitarian aid for children who had lost relatives to violence during the Balkan conflicts. In 1998, I became a Bosnian citizen. We had a good life, but all of that changed after 9/11.

When I arrived at work on the morning of Oct. 19, 2001, an intelligence officer was waiting for me. He asked me to accompany him to answer questions. I did so, voluntarily — but afterward I was told that I could not go home. The United States had demanded that local authorities arrest me and five other men. News reports at the time said the United States believed that I was plotting to blow up its embassy in Sarajevo. I had never — for a second — considered this.

The fact that the United States had made a mistake was clear from the beginning. Bosnia’s highest court investigated the American claim, found that there was no evidence against me and ordered my release. But instead, the moment I was released American agents seized me and the five others. We were tied up like animals and flown to Guantánamo, the American naval base in Cuba. I arrived on Jan. 20, 2002.

I still had faith in American justice. I believed my captors would quickly realize their mistake and let me go. But when I would not give the interrogators the answers they wanted — how could I, when I had done nothing wrong? — they became more and more brutal. I was kept awake for many days straight. I was forced to remain in painful positions for hours at a time. These are things I do not want to write about; I want only to forget.

I went on a hunger strike for two years because no one would tell me why I was being imprisoned. Twice each day my captors would shove a tube up my nose, down my throat and into my stomach so they could pour food into me. It was excruciating, but I was innocent and so I kept up my protest.

In 2008, my demand for a fair legal process went all the way to America’s highest court. In a decision that bears my name, the Supreme Court declared that "the laws and Constitution are designed to survive, and remain in force, in extraordinary times." It ruled that prisoners like me, no matter how serious the accusations, have a right to a day in court. The Supreme Court recognized a basic truth: the government makes mistakes. And the court said that because "the consequence of error may be detention of persons for the duration of hostilities that may last a generation or more, this is a risk too significant to ignore."

Five months later, Judge Richard J. Leon, of the Federal District Court in Washington, reviewed all of the reasons offered to justify my imprisonment, including secret information I never saw or heard. The government abandoned its claim of an embassy bomb plot just before the judge could hear it. After the hearing, he ordered the government to free me and four other men who had been arrested in Bosnia.

I will never forget sitting with the four other men in a squalid room at Guantánamo, listening over a fuzzy speaker as Judge Leon read his decision in a Washington courtroom. He implored the government not to appeal his ruling, because "seven years of waiting for our legal system to give them an answer to a question so important is, in my judgment, more than plenty." I was freed, at last, on May 15, 2009.

Today, I live in Provence with my wife and children. France has given us a home, and a new start. I have experienced the pleasure of reacquainting myself with my daughters and, in August 2010, the joy of welcoming a new son, Yousef. I am learning to drive, attending vocational training and rebuilding my life. I hope to work again serving others, but so far the fact that I spent seven and a half years as a Guantánamo prisoner has meant that only a few human rights organizations have seriously considered hiring me. I do not like to think of Guantánamo. The memories are filled with pain. But I share my story because 171 men remain there. Among them is Belkacem Bensayah, who was seized in Bosnia and sent to Guantánamo with me.

About 90 prisoners have been cleared for transfer out of Guantánamo. Some of them are from countries like Syria or China — where they would face torture if sent home — or Yemen, which the United States considers unstable. And so they sit as captives, with no end in sight — not because they are dangerous, not because they attacked America, but because the stigma of Guantánamo means they have no place to go, and America will not give a home to even one of them.

I’m told that my Supreme Court case is now read in law schools. Perhaps one day that will give me satisfaction, but so long as Guantánamo stays open and innocent men remain there, my thoughts will be with those left behind in that place of suffering and injustice.

Lakhdar Boumediene was the lead plaintiff in Boumediene v. Bush. He was in military custody at Guantánamo Bay from 2002 to 2009. This essay was translated by Felice Bezri from the Arabic. Read more here

Boumediene v. Bush
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Boumediene v. Bush, 553 U.S. 723 (2008), was a writ of habeas corpus submission made in a civilian court of the United States on behalf of Lakhdar Boumediene, a naturalized citizen of Bosnia and Herzegovina, held in military detention by the United States at the Guantanamo Bay detention camps in Cuba. Guantanamo Bay is not formally part of the United States, and under the terms of the 1903 lease between the United States and Cuba, Cuba retained ultimate sovereignty over the territory, while the United States exercises complete jurisdiction and control. The case was consolidated with habeas petition Al Odah v. United States and challenged the legality of Boumediene's detention at the United States Naval Station military base in Guantanamo Bay, Cuba as well as the constitutionality of the Military Commissions Act (MCA) of 2006. Oral arguments on the combined case were heard by the Supreme Court on December 5, 2007.

On June 12, 2008, Justice Kennedy delivered the opinion for the 5-4 majority holding that the prisoners had a right to the habeas corpus under the United States Constitution and that the MCA was an unconstitutional suspension of that right. The Court applied the Insular Cases, by the fact that the United States, by virtue of its complete jurisdiction and control, maintains "de facto" sovereignty over this territory, while Cuba retained ultimate sovereignty over the territory, to hold that the aliens detained as enemy combatants on that territory were entitled to the writ of habeas corpus protected in Article I, Section 9 of the U.S. Constitution. The lower court had expressly indicated that no constitutional rights (not merely the right to habeas) extend to the Guantanamo detainees, rejecting petitioners' arguments, but the Supreme Court held that fundamental rights afforded by the Constitution extend to the Guantanamo detainees as well. Along with Rasul v. Bush, Hamdi v. Rumsfeld, and Hamdan v. Rumsfeld, this is a major case in the Court's controversial detainee jurisprudence.

Read more here

Hard Measures: Ex-CIA head defends post-9/11 tactics
60 Minutes CBS News
Lesley Stahl Reporting
April 29, 2012

After the attacks of 9/11, the CIA sought and was granted unprecedented authority to capture al Qaeda suspects, whisk them off to secret sites and interrogate them with harsh techniques, including waterboarding.

The man who ran the interrogation program was Jose Rodriguez, a CIA spy in Latin America, who rose to become head of the Clandestine Service, the CIA's dark side.

When the agency's secret program was revealed, it was widely criticized but the blunt-spoken, Puerto Rican-born Rodriguez is fighting back. He's written a book, a defense of the interrogations, called "Hard Measures" -- and tonight you will hear his side of the story.

It's the first time someone this close to the program, this accountable has gone public explaining why techniques that had long been condemned by the U.S. as torture were employed.

Jose Rodriguez: For the first time in our history, we had an enemy come into our homeland and kill 3,000 people. I mean, that was a huge deal. People jumping from the towers to their death. The people running away from the cloud of dust, terrified out of their mind. This was a threat. And we had to throw everything at it. Read more here

The CIA "torture memo"
60 Minutes Overtime

Whether you approve of former CIA officer Jose Rodriguez or not, there's no denying his confidence and his complete faith that what he did was the right thing. And, whether you call them "enhanced interrogation techniques" or torture, it's important to remember when this all came about: in the immediate aftermath of the 9/11 terror attacks on the United States.

Lesley Stahl's two-part piece on Rodriguez provides fascinating insight into the mindset of a high-ranking CIA officer. At Overtime, we wanted to explore in greater detail the specifics of the interrogation methods that the CIA used on the suspected al Qaeda detainees. Waterboarding had certainly been in the news when the August 1, 2002 Justice Department memo first was released. But, what about the nine other methods? We sat down with the producer of the piece, Rich Bonin and his associate producer Kathy Liu to go over the details, at once fascinating and a little macabre. Read more here

Who would Jesus Torture?
Huffington Post
by Phil Zuckerman
May 5, 2009

You might think that after all those tens of millions of Evangelical Christians watched The Last Temptation of Christ, they perhaps developed at least a mild disdain for governments that hire soldiers to inflict violent brutality upon their prisoners.

Guess not.

A new national survey just released by the Pew Forum on Religion and Public Life reveals that it is precisely those folks who ate up Mel Gibson's blockbuster -- church-going Evangelical Christians -- who are far more likely to support the use of torture than non-religious Americans. And of several groups representing various religious orientations, it is secular Americans that are actually the group most opposed to the use of torture.

What's the deal? I thought Christians were into things like mercy, love, and forgiveness. Not water-boarding. Maybe I missed it, but of the thirty or forty times that I've read the New Testament -- particularly the Sermon on the Mount -- I just don't recall the "Thou Shalt Torture" passages. It is fascinating that on this clear question of morality, church-going Christians seem to be the most, well, challenged. Read more here

Who would Jesus Torture? Washington Monthly, by Steve Benen, May 1, 2009

Who would Jesus Torture? Town Hall.com, by Doug Giles, May 30, 2009

Who would Jesus Torture? Democratic Underground, by Christian Dewar, July 17, 2004

Abu Ghraib torture and prisoner abuse
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Beginning in 2004, human rights violations in the form of physical, psychological, and sexual abuse, including torture, reports of rape, sodomy, and homicide of prisoners held in the Abu Ghraib prison in Iraq (also known as Baghdad Correctional Facility) came to public attention. These acts were committed by military police personnel of the United States Army together with additional US governmental agencies. Read more here

The Abu Ghraib Whistleblower (video)
60 Minutes II, CBS News
Anderson Cooper reporting
June 25, 2007

You may not remember the name Joe Darby, but you remember the impact of what he did. Darby turned in the pictures of prisoner abuse at Abu Ghraib in Iraq – pictures he had discovered purely by accident. Unfortunately for Darby, exposing the truth has changed his life forever, and for the worse.

60 Minutes first broadcast this story last December, the story of an ordinary Joe who grew up in Appalachia and signed up to be an MP in the Army Reserves. As CNN's Anderson Cooper reports, Darby's local unit was sent to Abu Ghraib where he worked in the office while others guarded the prisoners.

And then one day, when Joe Darby wanted scenic pictures to send home, he spotted the unit's camera buff, prison guard Charles Graner. Watch the full video here

The Death of an Iraqi Prisoner
NPR National Public Radio
by John McChesney
October 27, 2005

Photographs of grinning GIs crouched over the iced-down, battered corpse of Manadel al-Jamadi were among the most horrific images of the 2003 Abu Ghraib prison scandal. The photos became one of the most powerful symbols for those who opposed to the American invasion of Iraq.

The Iraqi insurgent died within hours of his capture, while being interrogated by the CIA. A military autopsy ruled Jamadi's death a homicide, but no one has been held accountable for his death.

An NPR special report recounts the final hours of Jamadi's life, compiled from a review of thousands of CIA and military documents. Interviews with those present the night he died reveal the techniques used to extract information from Jamadi, and also show a discrepancy between military police and CIA agents about what happened just before his death.

Sgt. Charles Graner poses over the body of Manadel al-Jamadi in Abu Ghraib prison

Jamadi's Capture

The assignment was clear: kill or capture Jamadi. The CIA had identified the Iraqi as a former officer in Saddam Hussein's army and a key leader of a terrorist cell. He was also considered a suspect in an attack on the al-Rashid Hotel during a visit by Deputy Secretary of Defense Paul Wolfowitz in October 2003.

At 2 a.m. on Nov. 4, 2003, a convoy of humvees and blacked-out CIA Chevy Suburbans entered a deserted street in a hostile Baghdad suburb. The humvees stopped in front of a three-story apartment building, and a platoon of Navy SEALs tumbled out of the humvees and raced up the stairs.

SEAL Dan Cerrillo described the capture to CIA investigators six months later. As Cerrillo placed a charge on the apartment, the door opened. Cerrillo rushed the door, striking Jamadi with it.

Then, according to the report, Cerrillo hit Jamadi "in the face with two fists and attempted to wrestle the subject to the ground, but Jamadi resisted and they engaged in hand-to-hand combat." After a considerable struggle, Jamadi was eventually subdued and cuffed by Cerrillo, a hood was placed over his head, and he was taken first to an Army base, then to the SEALS field base, known as Camp Jenny Pozzi.

Jamadi was interrogated there for nearly an hour and a half. Eyewitnesses interviewed by CIA investigators say Jamadi was seated and stripped, and cold water was poured over him. A Navy SEAL said at one point, the interrogator leaned into a pressure point on Jamadi's chest with his foreman.

Jamadi was then moved to Abu Ghraib for further interrogation. At the prison, MPs stretched Jamadi's arms directly behind him and shackled his wrists to window bars. If the arms bear the full weight of the body, the position can be extremely painful. But MPs later told CIA investigators that Jamadi had been given enough slack to kneel or stand.

During this new round of questioning by CIA agents, Jamadi slumped forward, with his weight on his shackled wrists. MPs, while trying to reposition Jamadi, discovered he was dead. His death occurred within five-and-a-half hours of his capture. Read more here

Death shed light on CIA ‘Salt Pit’ near Kabul
MSNBC/Associated Press
by Adam Goldman

and Kathy Gannon
March 28, 2010

Handling of terror suspect led to inquiry by agency's inspector general

WASHINGTON — More than seven years ago, a suspected Afghan militant was brought to a dimly lit CIA compound northeast of the airport in Kabul, Afghanistan. The CIA called it the Salt Pit. Inmates knew it as the dark prison.

Inside a chilly cell, the man was shackled and left half-naked. He was found dead, exposed to the cold, in the early hours of Nov. 20, 2002.

The Salt Pit death was the only fatality known to have occurred inside the secret prison network the CIA operated abroad after the Sept. 11 attacks. The death had strong repercussions inside the CIA. It helped lead to a review that uncovered abuses in detention and interrogation procedures, and forced the agency to change those procedures.

The CIA's program of waterboarding and other harsh treatment of suspected terrorists has been debated since it ended in 2006. The Salt Pit case stands as a cautionary tale about the unfettered use of such practices. The Obama administration shut the CIA's prisons last year.

Little has emerged about the Afghan's death, which the Justice Department is investigating. The Associated Press has learned the dead man's name, as well as new details about his capture in Pakistan and his Afghan imprisonment.

The man was Gul Rahman, a suspected militant captured on Oct. 29, 2002, a U.S. official familiar with the case confirmed. The official said Rahman was taken during an operation against Hezb-e-Islami Gulbuddin, an insurgent group headed by Afghan warlord Gulbuddin Hekmatyar and allied with al-Qaida.

A reference to Rahman's death also turned up in a recently declassified government document.

This account of the case was assembled from documents and interviews with both militants and officials in Afghanistan and Pakistan, and with more than two dozen current and former U.S. officials. The Americans spoke on condition of anonymity because the details of the case remain classified. Read more here

U.S. Widens Inquiries Into 2 Jail Deaths
The New York Times
by ERIC LICHTBLAU and

ERIC SCHMITT
June 30, 2011

WASHINGTON — The Justice Department announced Thursday that it was opening a full criminal investigation into the deaths of two terrorism suspects in C.I.A. custody overseas, but it was closing inquiries into the treatment of nearly 100 other detainees over the last decade.

Attorney General Eric H. Holder Jr. said that a two-year review by a specially appointed prosecutor, John H. Durham, had determined that any further investigation into that large group of cases "is not warranted." The inquiry into the two deaths, though, could result in criminal charges against Central Intelligence Agency officers or contractors.

Intelligence officials saw the announcement as a vindication of sorts.

"I welcome the news that the broader inquiries are behind us," Leon E. Panetta, director of the C.I.A., said in his last day in office before being sworn in Friday as defense secretary. "We are now finally about to close this chapter of our agency’s history." Read more here

Department of Justice
June 30, 2011

"On January 2, 2008, Attorney General Michael Mukasey appointed Assistant United States Attorney John Durham of the District of Connecticut to conduct a criminal investigation into the destruction of interrogation videotapes by the Central Intelligence Agency.  On August 24, 2009, based on information the Department received pertaining to alleged CIA mistreatment of detainees, I announced that I had expanded Mr. Durham’s mandate to conduct a preliminary review into whether federal laws were violated in connection with the interrogation of specific detainees at overseas locations.  I made clear at that time that the Department would not prosecute anyone who acted in good faith and within the scope of the legal guidance given by the Office of Legal Counsel regarding the interrogation of detainees.  Accordingly, Mr. Durham’s review examined primarily whether any unauthorized interrogation techniques were used by CIA interrogators, and if so, whether such techniques could constitute violations of the torture statute or any other applicable statute. Read more here

Deaths of 2 CIA Detainees Probed; Freezing Temperatures and Blunt Force May Be Cause
ABA Journal Law News Now
by Debra Cassens Weiss
July 1, 2011

The U.S. Justice Department has launched a full-scale criminal investigation into the deaths of two detainees who died in CIA custody overseas.

Attorney General Eric Holder authorized the investigation based on the recommendation of special prosecutor John Durham, report the New York Times and The BLT: The Blog of Legal Times. At the same time, Holder said, he is closing an investigation into nearly 100 other cases based on Durham’s conclusions.

Holder said in a statement that Durham’s probe considered whether interrogators used techniques that had not been authorized by the Justice Department’s Office of Legal Counsel, and whether those methods violated the torture statute or other laws.

Holder did not identify the detainees whose deaths spurred the investigation, but the Times learned their identity from anonymous government officials. They are Manadel al-Jamadi, who died at Abu Ghraib prison in Iraq in 2003, and Gul Rahman, who died in 2002 in a secret CIA prison in Afghanistan.

Al-Jamadi became known as the Iceman after his body was photographed packed in ice and wrapped in plastic, the story says. Smiling servicemen posed next to the corpse, NPR reported at the time. A military autopsy determined the death was a homicide caused by "blunt force trauma to the torso complicated by compromised respiration," NPR said. Al-Jamadi had been a suspected leader of a terrorist cell.

The New Yorker and the Associated Press have stories on the death of Rahman, a suspected Afghan militant who may have died from freezing temperatures while in custody. Read more here

Who Killed Gul Rahman?
The New Yorker
by Jane Mayer
March 31, 2010

Last week, in a review of Marc A. Thiessen’s "Courting Disaster," I questioned many of Thiessen’s assertions about the use of torture during the Bush years, including his claim that no detainee "deaths in custody took place in the C.I.A. interrogation program." Now, underscoring that point, the Associated Press has published a remarkable account detailing the death of one detainee held by the C.I.A.

The story, by Adam Goldman and Kathy Gannon, revealed for the first time the name of a suspected Afghan militant who died of exposure in C.I.A. custody on November 20, 2002, in a secret prison, known as the "Salt Pit," run by the Agency. The suspect, Gul Rahman, reportedly died after having been stripped naked from the waist down and shackled in a cell in which the temperature dipped to approximately thirty-six degrees Fahrenheit. Subsequent forensic examinations determined that he had frozen to death. Rahman was believed to have been in his early thirties, and was suspected of having served as a guard to the Afghan warlord, Gulbuddin Hekmatyar, who was then an ally of Al Qaeda leaders in Afghanistan but who is currently engaged in possible peace negotiations with the Karzai government.

Read more here

Human Rights Watch is one of the world’s leading independent organizations dedicated to defending and protecting human rights. By focusing international attention where human rights are violated, we give voice to the oppressed and hold oppressors accountable for their crimes. Our rigorous, objective investigations and strategic, targeted advocacy build intense pressure for action and raise the cost of human rights abuse. For 30 years, Human Rights Watch has worked tenaciously to lay the legal and moral groundwork for deep-rooted change and has fought to bring greater justice and security to people around the world. Read more here

David Bardes of South Carolina was subject to Cold Cell Torture while incarcerated for child support arrears not owed. When his ex-wife moved their children to another state, Bardes followed. Since the children lived in three states over a short period of time, all three states charged him child support, resulting in mistaken arrears. Bardes says he never willfully withheld child support. Read more here

Tortured For Child Support He Did Not Owe
Examiner.com
By Teri Stoddard
September 4, 2009

David Bardes was left in a hypothermic jail cell for 32.5
hours, 31.5 more hours than Bush's torture memo allows
Hypothermic Torture Chamber Hypothermic Torture Chamber

Hypothermic Torture Chamber

While pundits around the country discuss the United States' torture of suspected terrorists, one U.S. torture victim has gone unnoticed.   United States child support collection problems are common, and in David A. Bardes' case, almost deadly.

Part One

Bardes, who lost 126 friends in the World Trade Center attack on September 11, wanted nothing more than to be a good dad and equal parent to his son and daughter.  He didn't ask his wife to have an affair with the nanny's husband.  And when his ex-wife moved their children to another state after the divorce, Bardes followed, twice. Due to the children living in three states over a short period of time (PA, NC, SC) Bardes had all three states charging him child support, resulting in mistaken arrears.  Bardes says he never willfully withheld child support, and documents related to his Federal court case (#02:08-487-PMD-RSC) support his claim. Read more below.

The doctors found a bullet in my hip
by David Bardes
December 10, 2011

You can add being shot with a gun by those thugs in South Carolina too.  I was rear ended and shattered  my hip today, that is not the problem.  The doctor called me over to the image machine and asked me if I have ever been shot with a gun. I said no, not that I knew of, I think I would know that.  He said there is a bullet in your other hip bone.  You can see for yourself.  You can see the left hip ball shattered, but on the right hip you will see the bullet…

It is not a good day for South Carolina either, I guess.  On April 5, 2006, at 10:32am, when the guards were beating me to kill me, after coming back to life from the first time they killed me, and then the tazor’s, one of them must have pulled out a gun and shot me.   My body was 88 degrees, I was still half dead, there was no way I could feel a bullet. That would explain the blood up in the 4th floor hospital though.  It was not just the gash over my left eye, using a bloody finger, I wrote a letter on a piece of lunch bag, and folded it up into a small wad, and shoved it deep into the electrical conduit, of the ripped out electrical outlet near the concrete floor, where they left me to die without any medical care. I wanted to leave some DNA evidence, in case anyone ever figured out I was murdered. And now shot with a gun. Read more here

They shot me with a 9mm gun on April 4, 2006
by David Bardes
December 21, 2011

After they killed me with hypothermia, during the 24 hour period I was temporarily dead, they shot me with a gun. I did not bleed out as my heart was not beating, dead bodies don’t bleed and don’t feel pain. I had no idea for six years, and they were not about to tell me, either. Read more here

U.S. Admits to "Cold Cell" Torture
By David A. Bardes
June 2011

It ends up that something called "Cold Cell" torture was the most widely used torture technique used by the United States in the fight against terrorism. Government operatives "praised" hypothermic torture as the most effective of all the techniques they employed. When the less redacted previously released torture documents were made available to the public, the new revelations revealed how wide spread hypothermic torture was utilized, in many facilities it was used every night, all night long, and all year round.

Apparently, hypothermic torture produced the largest amount of actionable intelligence, it produced it "consistently," and it worked in the shortest amount of time. Water boarding it ends up, was the least used. The eeriest was something called the "box." With the "box" a captive would be folded up and locked into a box the size of a foot locker. No air or light could get in. After two days of sheer panic in the box, what emerged was a psychological vegetable. Read more in the PDF below.

David Bardes sustained Hypothermic Cold Cell Torture, and a gunshot, while in jail over a family court/child support matter. David wrote a free Pro Se Guide to Family Court in an effort to help others benefit from his experience.

In the guide David Bardes acknowledged his own mental illness, beginning on page 20, and described how this matter got out of control:

"My depression, that started when my wife ran off with the nannies husband, took two years and lots of medication to crawl out from, came back with a furious roar when I was wiped out. I was broke and disabled with mental illness."

"Another problem I had was that three states were charging me with child support and I had no money for any of them. Federal law only allows one state to charge child support at any given time, but states don’t like the federal government and have no interest in following their laws."

"Pennsylvania, North Carolina, and South Carolina all had me in arrears and that triggered five trials in three states, as well as all the order to show cause hearings, pretrial hearings, pretrial conferences, and contempt hearings. I had to drive back and forth between all three states to attend their trials and hearings."

United Nations Human Rights
Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights

The Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights (OHCHR) represents the world's commitment to universal ideals of human dignity. We have a unique mandate from the international community to promote and protect all human rights.

The High Commissioner for Human Rights is the principal human rights official of the United Nations. The High Commissioner heads OHCHR and spearheads the United Nations' human rights efforts. We offer leadership, work objectively, educate and take action to empower individuals and assist States in upholding human rights. We are a part of the United Nations Secretariat with our headquarters in Geneva.

The Office's priorities are set out in two key strategic documents: the OHCHR Plan of Action and its Strategic Management Plan 2010-2011. These priorities include greater country engagement, working closely with our partners at the country and local levels, in order to ensure that international human rights standards are implemented on the ground; a stronger leadership role for the High Commissioner; and closer partnerships with civil society and United Nations agencies. Read more here

David Bardes went to the United Nations (UN) Committee against Torture (CAT) for help as the U.S. Department of Justice (DOJ) would not even listen to him, see the undated rejection letter from H. Christopher Coates of DOJ. The U.S. did not agree to join the UN ban on torture, the U.S. claims it's citizens have the Constitution to protect them.

The UN notified David Bardes by email May 10, 2011 that the Committee against Torture cannot examine petitions alleging violations of the Convention against Torture (CAT) unless the State has made the declaration under article 22 recognizing the Committee's competence to receive and consider petitions. The United States of America has not made the declaration.

Thomas Ball

Thomas James Ball self-immolated, could not pay child support

Thomas James Ball reached his breaking point. Driven to desperation by a system that bankrupted him and destroyed his family, Ball walked up to the main door of the Keene County, New Hampshire courthouse, doused himself with gasoline, and lit himself ablaze. Hardly anyone seems to have noticed. Read more here

Free Keene.com

"I have 21 years of Army service going back to the Vietnam War. My loyalty to the government should be a given. It is gone. I am certain it will never return regardless of how long I might have lived." -Thomas James Ball in his "last statement" before he self-immolated in front of the courthouse that was integral in destroying his life. Read more here

Incarceration in the United States
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Incarceration in the United States is one of the main forms of punishment and/or rehabilitation for the commission of felony and other offenses. The United States has the highest documented incarceration rate in the world. At year-end 2009 it was 743 adults incarcerated per 100,000 population.

According to the U.S. Bureau of Justice Statistics (BJS) 2,266,800 adults were incarcerated in U.S. federal and state prisons, and county jails at year-end 2010 — about .7% of adults in the U.S. resident population. Additionally, 4,933,667 adults at year-end 2009 were on probation or on parole. In total, 7,225,800 adults were under correctional supervision (probation, parole, jail, or prison) in 2009 — about 3.1% of adults in the U.S. resident population.

In addition, there were 86,927 juveniles in juvenile detention in 2007. Read more here

United States incarceration rate
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

The incarceration rate in the United States of America (the percentage of the national population in jail or prison) is the highest in the world. As of 2009, the incarceration rate is 743 per 100,000 of national population (0.743%). In comparison, Russia has the second highest 577 per 100,000, Canada is 123rd in the world with 117 per 100,000, and China has 120 per 100,000. While Americans only represent about 5 percent of the world's population, one-quarter of the entire world's inmates are incarcerated in the United States. Read more here

California student jailed five days without water drinks own urine
Reuters
By Marty Graham
May 3, 2012

(Reuters) - A California university student who was mistakenly left handcuffed in a cell without food or water for five days and survived by drinking his own urine is planning to sue, his lawyer said on Wednesday.

Daniel Chong, an engineering student at the University of California at San Diego, ended up hospitalized for five days after being left unattended in one of three cells at a Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA) office in San Diego last month, his lawyer, Julia Yoo, said.

Chong, 23, was taken to the DEA office after he was rounded up with several other people in a drug raid on April 21 at the home of a friend where he had spent the night, Yoo said.

She said her client was cleared of any wrongdoing and agents told him they would put him in a holding cell for just a minute before driving him home.

When he was found in the cell by DEA staff after five days, he was still conscious, but dazed and hallucinating. Yoo said Chong had became so desperately thirsty he drank his own urine, and doctors are concerned about possible kidney damage. Read more here

Related story ABA Journal Law News Now

Related story New York Post

Related story Los Angeles Times, L.A. Now blog

Related story The Seattle Times/AP 

Attorney Eugene Iredale

Abandoned DEA detainee seeks $20 million
U-T San Diego
by Jeff McDonald
May 2, 2012

The UC San Diego student mistakenly locked up by federal drug officials for five days with no food or water filed a $20 million claim Wednesday that referred to his ordeal as torture.

Attorney Eugene Iredale sent the five-page demand notice on behalf of engineering student Daniel Chong, 23, to the Drug Enforcement Administration’s general counsel in suburban Washington D.C. by mail.

"The deprivation of food and water for four and one-half days while the person is handcuffed the entire time constitutes torture under both international and domestic law," the claim says.

Read more here

Catherine Austin Fitts

Mapping the Real Deal: Where Would Jesus Bank?
by Catherine Austin Fitts
July 4th, 2004

I think of Jesus as a real deal, straight up kind of guy who always cared deeply about his fellow man. That's why we often ask "What would Jesus do?" when looking for the action of highest integrity.

Jesus and the Bankers

Jesus acted with ferocious and bold integrity when he threw the money changers out of the temple. Needless to say, he hiccuped their cash flows on what otherwise would have been a big grossing day. Their business model threatened, the priests who managed the money changers insisted that the Romans crucify Jesus. The Romans tried to pawn the problem off on the local king, Herod, who ducked and sent Jesus back to the Romans. The Romans, still looking for a way out, tried a flogging. That did not work. The priests meanwhile had succeeded in persuading the crowd to support them and scapegoat Jesus. Thirsting for a crucifixion, the crowd voted to set the criminal Barabbas free instead of Jesus.

Jesus died because the crowd voted for the criminal enterprise. The crowd voted for the priests and their rich endowments and their alliance with the money changers. The crowd did not ask "Cui Bono?" which is Latin for "who benefits?" If they had, they would have seen the real deal on who was making money on the death of Jesus and voted with their conscience, and for their own best interests instead.

It's 2000 Years Later and We're Still Voting for the Criminals.

Looking around today, it would appear that more than two thousand years later our popular vote is still backing an unholy alliance of "priests" and their rich endowments, "money changers" (now called central bankers), criminal enterprises and the continuous growth of dirty money, market manipulation and warfare. Read more here

Neil Gillespie, for the Justice Network

Crony capitalism and unbridled consumerism are driven by unsustainable levels of debt. Add the corruption of politics and banking, aided by corrupt courts and corporate lawyers, and financial Armageddon may result.

We live in a corrupt country. Those who cannot accept that blame others for speaking an inconvenient truth.

I am not an expert or authority on the bible, but....

Brief History of Christianity and Capitalism

Exodus 22: 24-25, "If you lend money to one of your poor neighbors among my people, you shall not act like an extortioner toward him by demanding interest from him." This prohibition is repeated 22 times in the Old Testament. Proverbs 28:8 says, "He who increases his wealth by interest and overcharge amasses it for someone else who will bestow it on the poor." Read more here

Andrew Schmidt of the Briefing writes...February 1, 2011…

We also must not forget that the ban on charging interest was never an isolated negative stipulation. Rather, the flipside of the ban is a positive duty to help (Lev 25:35-37). Thus, every instance of another person's need or desire presents me with a choice, either to help or to take advantage. If we have wealth that we do not need, God wants us to use it to help others, like the Lord Jesus, who used his riches for our sakes (2 Cor 8:9). Read more here

Islamic banking is well-known in the financial world and is becoming popular as an investment alternative even outside the sphere of Islam. The prohibition of usury or charging interest on any lending is described in the literature of every Islamic school of jurisprudence. In justification of the prohibition Ali (1988, 141a) quotes Qur'an 2:275 `Those who swallow interest will not (be able to) stand (in resur­rection) except as standeth one whom Satan hath confounded with his touch.' Read more here

Islamic banking
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Islamic banking (or participant banking) is banking or banking activity that is consistent with the principles of Islamic law (Sharia) and its practical application through the development of Islamic economics. Sharia prohibits the fixed or floating payment or acceptance of specific interest or fees (known as Riba or usury) for loans of money. Investing in businesses that provide goods or services considered contrary to Islamic principles is also Haraam (forbidden). While these principles may have been applied to historical Islamic economies, it is only in the late 20th century that a number of Islamic banks were formed to apply these principles to private or semi-private commercial institutions within the Muslim community. Read more here

OCCUPIED and Lessons Learn From The World’s Most Successful Lawyer
Matt Weidner

Fighting With The American People
October 31, 2011

We live in a time of extraordinary fraud, corruption and tyranny and those who stand up against fraud, corruption and tyranny are subjected to the most grave persecutions and abuses.  But this is far from the first time in the history of modern humankind that this has happened.  In fact, we keep doing it again and again.

1. OCCUPIED CHRISTIANITY- THROWING THE MONEY CHANGERS FROM THE TEMPLE

2. OCCUPIED- THE PROTESTANT REFORMATION

3. OCCUPIED- THE WORLDWIDE WAR ON DEBT AND CORRUPTION

Persecutions of Occupied leaders are found in every movement.  The persecutions are most grievously visited upon those who dare speak the loudest and whose voice and words reach the widest audience.  Journalists, protesters and especially attorneys during this Occupied Movement, feeling the prick of the sharp end of the spear.

My favorite OCCUPIED movement was the Protestant Reformation and my favorite Occupied hero was Martin Luther.  Ignore all the religious implications and focus just on the secular impact of his movement.  Luther was a catholic monk.  His father sacrificed everything he had so that his eldest son could go to school and become a lawyer, but Luther was struck by lightning, he claims he saw God, turned his back on the law and joined  the church.  His father largely disowned him. His father could not know that Luther’s legal training was a large part of his extraordinary success.  Arguably Luther is the most powerful and successful (almost) lawyer the world has ever known.  Devoted to principle. Devoted to speaking out.  One of the greatest revolutionaries of all time.

fter leaving the law, and joining the church by all accounts Luther was a most obsessed little monk, dedicated and committed like no other.  Early on in his monk career he had problems with the leadership and the teachings of the church.  Bottom line is he began to see the catholic church as an abjectly corrupt institution that was abusing the poor and directionless followers who were convinced that blind loyalty to the church was their only hope for eternal salvation.

Rome was the New York City of the Occupied/Reform movement.  Money from all across Europe was being stolen or ripped out of the hands of the poor and used to fill the vaults of the church in Rome.  The most egregious example of the frauds and abuses being visited upon the people was the selling of indulgences.  Illiterate followers were told they could buy their way out of purgatory (and they could buy they way out for their long deceased family members) if they would simply buy the indulgences.

When Luther could stand it no more he wrote, in quite simple and plain language, a list of 95 complaints or errors in the way the church was advocating the Christian faith, then nailed those 95 complaints on the door of the Cathedral in Wittenburg, Gemany.  Luther’s 95 Thesis were the start of the Protestant Reformation, a movement that changed not just the church but the entire world. Said Martin,

"I would never have thought that such a storm would rise from Rome over one simple scrap of paper."

Luther spoke the truth. A universal truth. He preached self will and the power of the people.  His fight, like the fight of all who seek justice today, was a fight to tear down the walls of corruption that enslaved his world.

But Luther might very well have remained an obscure monk who could be diminished and disregarded….were it not for the Press.  Just like today, Luther’s revolution was entirely depended upon The Press.  The Printing Press, Gutenberg’s to be precise.  Without The Press, Luther’s original 95 Thesis might have remained tacked on a door….and would not have spread round the world.

In much the same way, today’s Occupied leaders face the very persecutions and struggles Luther faced.  And like Luther, the arc of today’s Occupied movement is dependent upon the press and their ability to spread the message of those who dare to speak out against the abuses of the 1%.

With the exception of Christ himself, there are indeed few very real figures in the history of the world who stood singularly and had such a profound change on the world….it’s a change so profound that we are all impacted by it even today.

Click here for an exceptional video on Martin Luther and draw your own comparisons between today’s Occupied and one of the other great Occupied Movements…..Read more here

Martin Luther on PBS

Martin Luther on Wikipedia

Martin Luther (10 November 1483 – 18 February 1546) was a German priest, professor of theology and iconic figure of the Protestant Reformation. He strongly disputed the claim that freedom from God's punishment for sin could be purchased with money. He confronted indulgence salesman Johann Tetzel with his Ninety-Five Theses in 1517. His refusal to retract all of his writings at the demand of Pope Leo X in 1520 and the Holy Roman Emperor Charles V at the Diet of Worms in 1521 resulted in his excommunication by the pope and condemnation as an outlaw by the Emperor.

Luther taught that salvation is not earned by good deeds but received only as a free gift of God's grace through faith in Jesus Christ as redeemer from sin. His theology challenged the authority of the Pope of the Roman Catholic Church by teaching that the Bible is the only source of divinely revealed knowledge and opposed sacerdotalism by considering all baptized Christians to be a holy priesthood. Those who identify with Luther's teachings are called Lutherans.

His translation of the Bible into the language of the people (instead of Latin) made it more accessible, causing a tremendous impact on the church and on German culture. It fostered the development of a standard version of the German language, added several principles to the art of translation, and influenced the translation into English of the King James Bible. His hymns influenced the development of singing in churches. His marriage to Katharina von Bora set a model for the practice of clerical marriage, allowing Protestant priests to marry. Read more here

The Ninety-Five Theses
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

The Ninety-Five Theses on the Power and Efficacy of Indulgences (Latin: Disputatio pro declaratione virtutis indulgentiarum), commonly known as The Ninety-Five Theses, was written by Martin Luther, 1517 and is widely regarded as the primary catalyst for the Protestant Reformation. The disputation protests against clerical abuses, especially the sale of indulgences.

The background to Luther's Ninety-Five Theses centers on practices within the Catholic Church regarding baptism and absolution. Significantly, the Theses reject the validity of indulgences (remissions of temporal punishment due for sins which have already been forgiven). They also view with great cynicism the practice of indulgences being sold, and thus the penance for sin representing a financial transaction rather than genuine contrition. Luther's Theses argued that the sale of indulgences was a gross violation of the original intention of confession and penance, and that Christians were being falsely told that they could find absolution through the purchase of indulgences. Read more here

Sweetheart Deal: White House poised to let big banks off easy for foreclosure crimes
The New Bottom Line
Posted by Ian Pajer-Rogers
January 23, 2012

President Obama wants to point to a big bank foreclosure settlement in Tuesday’s State of the Union as a measure of progress towards more Wall Street accountability. But the deal on the table is appalling, especially when compared to 2011 big bank bonuses.

TAKE ACTION: Call the White House right now and tell the President to investigate Wall Street, not let them off the hook with a sweetheart deal.

According to The New Bottom Line's Pulling Back the Curtain report, big banks are set to award $144 billion in bonuses and compensation for 2011.

How much will those same big banks pay in restitution to the millions of Americans that were illegally foreclosed upon? Between $20-$25 billion. Read more here

Amy Goodman and Democracy Now

New reports by the ACLU and the Brennan Center for Justice have found a sharp rise in debtor prisons across the country. Poor defendants are being jailed for failing to pay legal debts. In Ohio, a man named Howard Webb, who earns $7 an hour as a dishwasher, has served two stints in jail totaling over 300 days for being unable to pay nearly $3,000 in fines and costs from various criminal and traffic cases. In Michigan, a twenty-five-year-old single mother named Kawana Young has been jailed five times for being unable to afford to pay a few minor traffic tickets. Eric Balaban of the ACLU said, "Incarcerating people simply because they cannot afford to pay their legal debts is not only unconstitutional but also has a devastating impact upon men and women, whose only crime is that they are poor."

"Speak up for those who cannot speak for themselves, for the rights of all who are destitute. Speak up and judge fairly; defend the rights of the poor and needy."

Proverbs 31.:8-9 (NIV)



The Hunger Strike.org

The Hunger Strike Challenge

Hunger
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Hunger is the most commonly used term to describe the social condition of people who frequently experience the physical sensation of desiring food.

On October 11, 2010, it was reported that the number of malnourished people in the world exceeded 1 billion people, about a sixth of the world's total population.

Six million children die of hunger every year. World Food Programme statistics presented through TeleSUR on 11 January 2012 indicated that approximately every 6 seconds one kid dies of hunger.

According to estimates by the FAO there were 925 million undernourished people in the world in 2010. This was a decrease from an estimate of 1,023 million undernourished people in 2009. The same organization reports that there were 923 million malnourished people in the world in 2007, which in turn represented an increase of 80 million since 1990. The FAO purports that the world already produces enough food to feed everyone — 6 billion people — and could feed double — 12 billion people.

Read more here

Hunger strikes have deep roots in Irish society and in the Irish psyche.

Hunger strike
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

A hunger strike is a method of non-violent resistance or pressure in which participants fast as an act of political protest, or to provoke feelings of guilt in others, usually with the objective to achieve a specific goal, such as a policy change. Most hunger strikers will take liquids but not solid food. A hunger strike cannot be effective if the fact that it is being undertaken is not publicized so as to be known by the people who are to be impressed, concerned or embarrassed by it.

In cases where an entity (usually the state) has or is able to obtain custody of the hunger striker (such as a prisoner), the hunger strike is often terminated by the custodial entity through the use of force-feeding. Read more here

Consistent life ethic
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

The consistent life ethic, or the consistent ethic of life, was a term coined in 1983 by Joseph Cardinal Bernardin to express an ethical, religious, and political ideology based on the premise that all human life was sacred and should be protected by law. The ideology opposes legal abortion, capital punishment, assisted suicide, economic injustice, and euthanasia. Adherents are opposed, at the very least, to unjust war, while some adherents also profess pacifism, or opposition to all war. Read more here

Essay: Coherent, Consistent & Livable by Wes Widner

Christianity is a worldview, a way of viewing the world we live in. This encompasses metaphysical beliefs such as the origin of the universe, meaning and purpose of life, and what happens to us after we die. It also encompasses things like how we view family, marriage, and careers. It even encompasses mundane decisions such as what we choose to wear, what entertainment we prefer, and how we spend our leisure time. Read more here

Patricia Heaton
Hollywood Politics

Reflecting her pro life advocacy, she was once quoted as saying that a woman who is experiencing unplanned pregnancy also deserves to experience unplanned joy. A consistent life ethicist and supporter of all pro life causes on the basis of feminism, Patricia Heaton is honorary chair of Feminists for Life and is an actress who is best remembered for playing the role of Debra Barone, the beleaguered wife of Ray Barone in the CBS TV sitcom "Everybody Loves Raymond."

Born as Patricia Helen Heaton on 4 March 1958 in Bay Village, Ohio, Patricia attended the Ohio State University where she graduated with a bachelor’s degree in drama. She later relocated to New York City to further hone her acting skills under renowned drama teacher William Esper. Read more here

Angela V. Woodhull: Democrats should stand for pro-life
The Gainesville Sun
by ANGELA V. WOODHULL
Special to The Sun
December 31, 2007

Ashley is what you might call a "typical teenager." She describes some of her interests on "myspace" as "music, family, friends, summer vacations, cooking, watching TV, shopping, sleeping, astronomy, Indian/Native American culture, Harry Potter, Halloween, history, mysteries, Precious Moments, politics, anti-Bush humor, anti-racism, and old musicals."

At 18, she also describes herself as "unequivocally pro-life." If you ask her to explain why, she simply takes you to various photos on her Web site; some which depict animal cruelty, some that show why she is anti-war and anti-death penalty, and others that depict those controversial pictures of aborted fetuses.

She writes, "Ugh. This is disgusting. How could someone do this?"

Like many of her generation, Ashley is part of a growing number of teenagers who reject abortion as an option. They are called "consistent life advocates," and they view the abortion issue like any other issue that involves the taking of human life; simply stated, that death as a solution to societal or personal problems is wrong in all circumstances across the board.

Now that the Republican Party is finally running a pro-choice candidate, Rudolph W. Giuliani, it is simply time for the Democrats to take back the pro-life issue into their own camp where it rightfully belongs. During the 1970s, about 40 percent of Democratic congressmen were pro-life and the party had a seemingly insurmountable hold on the House of Representatives. Today, less than 15 percent are pro-life, and they're in an ever-shrinking House minority.

Meanwhile, the big Democratic success stories in 2004 were the new representatives in Iowa, Missouri, and Michigan, as well as new Democratic governors in West Virginia and Louisiana. All of these victories were won by pro-life Democrats.

Democrats were historically the party of the underdog. The organization, Democrats for Life, point out that "abortion is actually another form of discrimination against the weakest members of our society: unborn children." As advocates for the underdog, Democrats are naturally the right party to be champions for the unborn.

An issue of growing consensus between Republicans and Democrats, global warming, gives further evidence that the Democrats will eventually take back the pro-life stance they once so strongly stated. At the present time, one out of every eight women of childbearing age is infertile. A warmer Earth exacerbates this problem. As fertility in men and women will decline even further due to climate changes, it will become rare for a woman to want to seek an abortion.

Technology will almost certainly make it possible for fetal transplants, rather than abortion, as a solution in the very near future. For example, within the next year, womb transplants are already scheduled to commence in the United States. It is therefore just a matter of time before science takes it one step further. A womb transplant will eventually lead to the possibility of a fetal transplant and infertile couples will gladly pay the exorbitant costs of adopting another woman's "unwanted" pregnancy.

Ashley, part of the "myspace" technology generation, is also a part of the growing number of young people who deviate from the previous couple of generations who held a pro-choice stance. Ashley, like other pro-lifers, may simply be ahead of her time. Or she may be a part of a growing number of citizens that embrace a consistent philosophy; a philosophy that considers the rights of all members of the human race. Read more here

The silent male victims of rape
Aljazeera
July 28, 2011

Hundreds of thousands of men have been raped by other men. Some of them have been gang-raped repeatedly and over a period of many years.

It is a sex crime that is so common the numbers almost equal that of female victims during times of war.

It is a double taboo with hidden victims. And it is a secret so well kept that even the UN has been accused of overlooking it.

So, why have the silent victims of this crime been ignored for so long? And what legal resources and support should they be given?

Inside Story discusses with guests: Louise Aubin, the deputy director of international protection at the UNHCR; Chris Dolan, the director of the Refugee Law Project; and Will Storr, contributing writer for the Guardian and the author of The Rape of Men.

Read more here