[SimpleLife]

British and American aid intended for Iraq's hard-pressed police service is being diverted to paramilitary commando units accused of widespread human rights abuses, including torture and extra-judicial killings, The Observer can reveal. 

Iraqi Police Service officers said that ammunition, weapons and vehicles earmarked for the IPS are being taken by shock troops at the forefront of Iraq's new dirty counter-insurgency war. 

The allegations follow a wide-ranging investigation by this paper into serious human rights abuses being conducted by anti-insurgency forces in Iraq. The Observer has seen photographic evidence of post-mortem and hospital examinations of alleged terror suspects from Baghdad and the Sunni Triangle which demonstrate serious abuse of suspects including burnings, strangulation, the breaking of limbs and - in one case - the apparent use of an electric drill to perform a knee-capping.

From this site.

If these allegations are true, one is to wonder what was the benefit of removing Saddam Hussein. Thoughts?

[altocumulus]

iraq is doing it. have they signed the geneva conventions?
do they have a legal term for unlawful combatants?

[tie]

You have to understand that the US condones torture in order to preserve freedom and prevent terrorism, and we don't torture US citizens nor torture on US soil, only overseas. Saddam Hussein condoned torture in his own country in order to stamp out the merest glimmerings of dissent from peaceful, freedom-loving citizens. Big difference.

[altocumulus]

I am sure that both the US and Saddam would react the same way if they found a terrorist with intents on assinating key goverment figures... condone torture to (try to) get key information about the plot. anyway, i don't agree with your moral relativism.

saddam may have some terrorized peaceful, freedom-living citizens, but i don't think that the citizen's of iraq are breathing easily just yet.

The poll, which covered more than 1200 people from Baghdad, also revealed that 57% have a terrible fear of the unknown future, while 14% believe that a civil war will soon break out. Some 30% believe Iraq will be another Palestine and that Iraqis will have to leave their country. Around 45% expressed fear that society will dissolve due to the policies of openness which accompanied the Occupation.

58% have terrible fear. big difference indeed. but the real victims are the iraqi citizens here. iraqi citizen's were part of saddam's in-house torture squads. now they may get a free trip to a foriegn country!

ot, the original post does not say who is doing it, just who is paying for it (inadvertantly). this is what happens when you throw cash at a problem without accountability.

so who's doing the torturing???

[Y3a]

"The Observer" Why would anybody believe THAT RAG??