Prisoners. By Hugh Sykes.
"Guantanamo Bay: 245 prisoners.
US camps in Iraq: 8,305 prisoners.
They're in two relatively small camps near Baghdad. The third - and most used - Camp Bucca, in the southern desert, has just closed.
Here's a taste of it:
Standard detainee 'issue'. And here they are wearing it. I've blanked out identifiable faces, as required by the Geneva Convention:
They walk round
and round
and round
and round
in the fierce desert sun. 48 deg in the shade the day I visited. No shade.
Guards
Internment. Not my word. Theirs: they call it a Theater Internment Facility.
General David Quantock: "We know for a fact, for a FACT that these men are highly dangerous". Not enough facts to use in court yet, however. Some of the men in yellow have been walking round their exercise pens for three years.
Oh, and ever wondered how hacks like me get to these 'facilities' in the desert?:
Crammed into the back of a Hercules C130. No cabin service, but free earplugs:
One consolation - the General flies cattle class too:"
Listen to PM
© MMIX~RS~q~RS~~RS~z~RS~34~RS~)
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I assume it looks dofferent now that the French police closed the camp
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Hugh that was an amazing insight - thank you for taking the trouble of showing us what it is like. Very sobering. I look forward to your report and to hearing some probing questions put to the Americans about this.
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Conflict. People shouting at each other. Disagreement. Being forced to answer questions under bright lights. Sleep Deprivation. Cruel and unusual stress techniques.
So the question I would like to ask Hugh Sykes is 'Does being at the Lib Dem conference breach the Geneva Convention ?'
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I notice the guards seem to have found some shade.
It's appalling.
How simple it would be for some shelter to be erected!
Thank you, Hugh, for shedding light on the plight of these prisoners. However dangerous (if indeed they are), their treatment cannot be justified.
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Big Sis (4) The guards also seem to be standing alongside some air-conditioning units. I wonder if the serve the guard or the prisoner quarters?
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Preston, if I had to put money on it, I'd guess they served the guard quarters.
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#3. lordBeddGelert
Good one, made me smile anyway.
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LordLibGeldert (3): BIF: Bournemouth Internment Facility?
Strange that there are so many 'facilities'. A kind of euphemism?
One of the troops at Bucca described the internees as 'our guests'. He wasn't pleased when I asked, "Is that satire?"
When I was embedded with US units in Iraq (to get safely polling stations etc) I ate in DFACs.
Dining Facilities.
I shed unwanted fluids in TFACs. Toilet Facilities.
Actually I made that one up. They just call them PortaPotties.
LadySue (2): Sorry but it was on Today, at 6.45 am ish, on September 21st. When I am in Iraq, I am Anybodys. (I played the role of Officer Krupke once, long ago, but that's another cliche...in case you are mystified by this, Anybodys and Krupke are characters in West Side Story.)
PrestonFirmlie (5): The huts the internees slept in were air-conditioned.
The guards would probably get rather hot standing next to aircon units in that way.
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"We know for a fact, for a FACT that these men are highly dangerous".
Just the one fact then, General Quantock!
How about the detainee deaths attributed to "natural causes" at Camp Bucca? Any 'facts' surrounding those deaths?
When did the 'Geneva Convention' signs go up? They look very clean. Was it just before the journo's visit? And they face outwards. Can the detainees see the signs?
Well done, Hugh!
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I've got an idea. Why don't the authorities let them all out straight away? The authorities could then ask the local Police (who have nothing better else to do) to secretly monitor them, you know, just in case the local Police could catch them attempting to make a roadside bomb or maybe kill other people by blowing themselves up on a plane or driving a car into the front of an airport with a bomb in the boot?. The authorities could call it a 'control order'. The authorities couldn't overtly monitor them of course - that would be against their human rights - and just because the local people are so afraid of dying they can't go to a public court to give evidence even though the authorities know their evidence is true and overwhelming, so what? We could always ask the troublecausers to live somewhere out of the area. If these people got fed up of living without local taxpayers handouts and came to the UK to do exactly those same things under the guise of asylum seekers - we wouldn't want to send back to that hot, dry and lawless place would we? After all, there's too many dangerous people walking about there...isn't there? Its against your human rights to live somewhere where you haven't got a right to life. Hang on a minute, I've forgotten where I'm actually living myself - the UK or Iraq?
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#9 Richard_SM
You missed off the "Not enough facts to use in court yet, however".
How are they obtaining the necessary "facts".
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PMHugh - Thanks for that and I'm glad to hear that the internees' sleeping quarters had air-con. And yes, if those air-con cassette units are active, then I'd prefer to stand somewhere else!
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Ref 8. PMHugh
Acronyms and initials
"I shed unwanted fluids in TFACs. Toilet Facilities.
Actually I made that one up. They just call them PortaPotties."
They'll be called PP's!
You should look at the glossary in General McChrystal's 'Unclassified' Report on Afghanistan. Eddie Mair posted it yesterday. It will help you understand US military garbo-talk - and give you a laugh. Here you go:
http://www.bbc.co.uk/blogs/pm/2009/09/general_mcchrystals_report_on.shtml
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Ref 11. Looternite,
"We know for a fact, for a FACT that these men are highly dangerous".
Just the one fact - shared amongst 8305 detainees!
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#14. Richard_SM
Yes, and the one fact, as far as the US military are concerned is the fact that they are GUILTY. No need for a trial.
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Hugh, I'd have loved to see you as Officer Krupke. Now, here's a game. Casting for West Side Story. Bags first go.
Tony to be played by Rupert Altman and Maria by Marth Kearney (wearing a dark wig, of course).
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I wished I hadn't read through and looked at all those pics now. Very powerful images of human suffering.
And I was having a moan about my lot yesterday!
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Thanks Hugh. I'll see if I can 'Listen Again'.
Keep up the brilliant work!
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They're in two relatively small camps near Baghdad. The third - and most used - Camp Bucca, in the southern desert, has just closed.
Here's a taste of it:
We're being thrown dead meat?
The blog can't handle the contention of a camp sill open?
Well, it can.
You take too much notice of the bluvvies and not enough of those of R-SM mettle.
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