Afghans Detail a Secret Prison Still Operating on a U.S. Base

[IndianaGreen]

Stories like these will continue to crop up for as long as we remain in Afghanistan. Whether he has knowledge of this or not, the President has command responsibility for what happens in war zones under his watch.

Afghans Detail a Secret Prison Still Operating on a U.S. Base

By ALISSA J. RUBIN
Published: November 28, 2009

KABUL, Afghanistan — An American military detention camp in Afghanistan is still holding inmates for sometimes weeks at a time and without access to the International Committee of the Red Cross, according to human rights researchers and former detainees held at the site on the Bagram Air Base.

The site, known to detainees as the black jail, consists of individual windowless concrete cells, each illuminated by a single light bulb glowing 24 hours a day. Detainees said that their only human contact was at twice-daily interrogation sessions.

“The black jail was the most dangerous and fearful place,” said Hamidullah, a spare-parts dealer in Kandahar who was detained there in June. “They don’t let the I.C.R.C. officials or any other civilians see or communicate with the people they keep there. Because I did not know what time it was, I did not know when to pray.”

The jail’s operation highlights a tension between President Obama’s goal to improve detention conditions that had drawn condemnation under the Bush administration and his stated desire to give military commanders leeway to operate. While Mr. Obama signed an order to eliminate so-called black sites run by the Central Intelligence Agency in January, that order did not apply to this jail, which is run by military Special Operations forces.

Military officials said as recently as this summer that the secret Afghanistan jail and another like it at the Balad Air Base in Iraq were being used to interrogate high-value detainees in isolation. And officials said recently that there were no plans to close the detention centers.

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/11/29/world/asia/29bagram.html?_r=1

[AllentownJake]

1. I'm going to give the President a slight pass on this till June 2010

God knows how many secret prisons Cheney set up and he's probably learning about them shortly before we are.

[IndianaGreen]

2. If he reads the NY Times, he found out about it today

assuming this is news to him.

[AllentownJake]

3. He probably knows of the prison and it's location

not the conditions of the prison.

Like I said, if he was handed a list of prisons Cheney had operating through out the world when he took office. Figuring out what the hell was going on in each of them, whose being held, who can be released, etc is going to take some time.

[IndianaGreen]

4. When deception begins to rear its ugly head, we should all become concerned

There are several stories hinting that we are still pursuing neocon policies, which considering how many of Bush's hanger-ons remain at Pentagon (not to mention the many Schedule-Cs that burrowed into civil service jobs), it doesn't surprise me one bit. At some point we must stop blaming things on Cheney and expect changes in policies.

Here is one that involves Latin America, that is quite troubling to those of us interested in thar region. Pay particular attention to the phrase full spectrum military operations and its context:

Washington Alters U.S. Air Force Document to Hide Intentions Behind Military Accord with Colombia

November 27th 2009, by Eva Golinger

In an explicit attempt to hide Washington’s military objectives in South America, a U.S. Air Force document submitted to Congress in May 2009 that provoked deep concerns in the region has been modified and re-published on November 16, 2009. The official U.S. Air Force document, revealed and denounced by this author on November 4th, explained the justification for a $46 million request to improve the military installations in one of the seven bases Washington will occupy under the military accord signed on October 30th between Colombia and the United States. The modified document has eliminated all mention of war and military operations in the region, as well as offensive language directed at Colombia’s neighbors, Venezuela and Ecuador. Nevertheless, Washington’s intentions remain the same.

The original Air Force document dated May 2009 outlined the importance of the military base in Palanquero, Colombia to enable “full spectrum military operations” in South America. The original military document also detailed the necessity of investing $46 million to improve the airfield, ramps and other essential installations on the base, converting it into a Cooperative Security Location (CSL) for U.S. military missions in the region.

http://www.venezuelanalysis.com/analysis/4958