WAR CRIMES DOSSIER: As George Bush visits London, Reprieve tells Bush and Brown: Bring Binyam Back to Britain

Where: Trafalgar Square, in front of the National Gallery
When: 3 pm, Sunday 15 June
Who: Reprieve Director Clive Stafford Smith, former Guantánamo prisoners, Barney the Dinosaur and other special guests

On Sunday 15 June, US President George W. Bush is visiting London as part of his valedictory world tour, and will be having tea with the Queen and dinner with Prime Minister Gordon Brown.

Reprieve, the legal action charity that represents over 30 Guantánamo prisoners, is using this opportunity to highlight the suffering of Binyam Mohamed, the London resident who remains in Guantánamo Bay. The US military has announced that it wants to put him through its discredited military commission process, and a final decision will be made in the next two weeks. The commission system is so corrupt that Col. Morris Davis recently quit as the chief military prosecutor, because of the system’s many flaws, one being that evidence derived from torture was going to be used against the prisoners. 

Nothing could be more true of Binyam, who was taken to Morocco where his genitals were razor-bladed for 18 months. After that he was rendered to more abuse in the CIA-run “Dark Prison” in Kabul, where he was tortured psychologically, hung up and subjected to incredibly loud music for 20 days at a time. He has been imprisoned in Guantánamo Bay since September 2004.

The timing of President Bush’s visit to London is fortuitous but only if we can make sure that he gets the message. We are meeting at 3 pm outside the National Gallery in Trafalgar Square and are working towards a finale outside the Southbank Centre, where Massive Attack are hosting a series of Reprieve events as part of Meltdown 2008, at 4.30pm.

Throughout this initiative, Reprieve will dramatize the torture-by-music that Binyam and other prisoners have suffered. Barney the Purple Dinosaur will be making a personal appearance, as the theme tune to this popular children’s show has been one of the US torturers’ favourite pieces of torture music. We are also hoping to involve other creative “cartoon characters”: Katy the Kangaroo Court, and even Roger the Razor Blade. Cosmetics firm Lush, who have been supporting the work of Reprieve, have kindly agreed to bring along their massive “Fair Trial My Arse” orange underpants, to highlight the nature of the unjust process that Binyam is facing.

You don’t have to sing the Barney theme song with us (although you’d be welcome to!). Or you can dress up in any outfit you think dramatises Binyam’s torture over the past six years. We are also very keen for credible spokespeople to stand up for Binyam and demand that Gordon Brown place his immediate repatriation to Britain on the summit agenda.

Please join us!

As George Bush visits London, Reprieve tells Bush and Brown: Bring Binyam Back to Britain

Where: Trafalgar Square, in front of the National Gallery
When: 3 pm, Sunday 15 June
Who: Reprieve Director Clive Stafford Smith, former Guantánamo prisoners, Barney the Dinosaur and other special guests

On Sunday 15 June, US President George W. Bush is visiting London as part of his valedictory world tour, and will be having tea with the Queen and dinner with Prime Minister Gordon Brown.

Reprieve, the legal action charity that represents over 30 Guantánamo prisoners, is using this opportunity to highlight the suffering of Binyam Mohamed, the London resident who remains in Guantánamo Bay. The US military has announced that it wants to put him through its discredited military commission process, and a final decision will be made in the next two weeks. The commission system is so corrupt that Col. Morris Davis recently quit as the chief military prosecutor, because of the system’s many flaws, one being that evidence derived from torture was going to be used against the prisoners. 

Nothing could be more true of Binyam, who was taken to Morocco where his genitals were razor-bladed for 18 months. After that he was rendered to more abuse in the CIA-run “Dark Prison” in Kabul, where he was tortured psychologically, hung up and subjected to incredibly loud music for 20 days at a time. He has been imprisoned in Guantánamo Bay since September 2004.

The timing of President Bush’s visit to London is fortuitous but only if we can make sure that he gets the message. We are meeting at 3 pm outside the National Gallery in Trafalgar Square and are working towards a finale outside the Southbank Centre, where Massive Attack are hosting a series of Reprieve events as part of Meltdown 2008, at 4.30pm.

Throughout this initiative, Reprieve will dramatize the torture-by-music that Binyam and other prisoners have suffered. Barney the Purple Dinosaur will be making a personal appearance, as the theme tune to this popular children’s show has been one of the US torturers’ favourite pieces of torture music. We are also hoping to involve other creative “cartoon characters”: Katy the Kangaroo Court, and even Roger the Razor Blade. Cosmetics firm Lush, who have been supporting the work of Reprieve, have kindly agreed to bring along their massive “Fair Trial My Arse” orange underpants, to highlight the nature of the unjust process that Binyam is facing.

You don’t have to sing the Barney theme song with us (although you’d be welcome to!). Or you can dress up in any outfit you think dramatises Binyam’s torture over the past six years. We are also very keen for credible spokespeople to stand up for Binyam and demand that Gordon Brown place his immediate repatriation to Britain on the summit agenda.

Please join us!

WAR CRIMES DOSSIER: photographic evidence of torture

U.K. rights group: U.S. has photographic evidence of torture 11 Jun 2008 The U.S. government has photographic evidence that a Guantanamo Bay inmate was tortured with a knife after being taken to Morocco by U.S. forces, a British human rights group said Tuesday. Reprieve said their client, Binyam Mohamed, had his genitals slashed repeatedly with a doctor's scalpel while in custody in Morocco after he was flown there from Pakistan by American officials in 2002. It also said his U.S. captors later took pictures of the torture to show authorities that his wounds were healing.

Diego Garcia used as detainee facility: The Observer

British island 'used by US for rendition'

Indian Ocean atoll Diego Garcia was used to hold US suspects, human rights investigator claims

Jamie Doward, home affairs editor
Sunday March 2 2008
The Observer

Britain's denials that its territories have been used for 'extraordinary rendition' were dramatically undermined last night after the United Nations claimed that Diego Garcia has been used as a detention centre to hold US suspects.

Manfred Novak, the United Nations' special rapporteur on torture, who is charged with investigating human rights abuses, said he had received credible evidence from well-placed sources familiar with the situation on the island that detainees were held on Diego Garcia between 2002 and 2003.

Novak pledged he would consider a request by the UK government to share his information.

'I spoke to my sources on condition of anonymity and it would take time to trace them; I couldn't do it [brief the UK government] without the explicit authorisation of these people,'

Novak said.

'But under this caveat, I could share more information.'

Novak said he had spoken to people who had been held on the atoll, situated in the Indian Ocean and home to a large US naval base. They had been treated well in comparison with the regime some endured at places such as Guantnamo Bay. 'There were only a few of them and they were not held for a long time,' he said.

In 2004, the then Foreign Secretary, Jack Straw, confirmed to parliament that there was a detention centre on Diego Garcia. Planning documents show it was 'upgraded' in December 2001. Ships operating offshore have also been used as floating 'black sites' to hold detainees, according to human rights groups.

The revelations raise fresh questions about the island's role in the process of extraordinary rendition - moving suspects to interrogation centres in third-party countries where they are held outside the law - and why the UK government was apparently unaware that its ally was operating a prison on Diego Garcia to house so-called 'high-value detainees'.

Last month the Foreign Secretary, David Miliband, was forced to admit that two US planes carrying rendered suspects had landed in Diego Garcia in 2002, a major humiliation for Gordon Brown's administration, which had until then repeatedly denied the claims.

The British government continues to deny allegations that the island has been used to hold terrorist suspects, saying it has been given reassurances by the US authorities that this was not the case. 'As the Foreign Secretary set out in his statement to parliament on 21 February, the US have told us that no US detainees have ever been held on Diego Garcia,' a spokeswoman for the Foreign Office said.

But a former US military general, Barry McCaffrey, said in 2006 that Diego Garcia has been used to hold detainees, though he has subsequently retracted the claims. McCaffrey declined repeated requests for an interview.

Evidence has also emerged that the US has held prisoners on ships operating outside the three-mile zone around the island that defines Britain's territorial waters. It is believed that the ships are serviced by craft from the atoll. Novak said he was told that some detainees had in the past been held for up to four months.

'There is an obligation on member states to carry out extensive investigations into what happened,'

he said.

Human rights groups have long suspected that the seas around the island have been used to facilitate rendition. 'If it turns out any [rendition] boat is being supported by Diego Garcia, Britain would have a duty to investigate what is going on on those boats,' said Clara Gutteridge, an investigator with human rights group Reprieve.

Evidence supplied to Reprieve confirms that prisoners have been held on US-operated vessels serviced by Diego Garcia. The US authorities have admitted holding eight detainees, including John Walker Lindh, the American who was captured in Afghanistan fighting for the Taliban, on board the USS Bataan.

Another US naval vessel that has operated in the waters off Diego Garcia, the USNS Stockham, is also suspected of housing prisoners. 'We have heard from very reliable sources that this boat was used as a floating prison for high-profile prisoners while it was in the vicinity of Diego Garcia,' Gutteridge said.

A prisoner released from Guantnamo described to Reprieve a fellow prisoner's account of his detention on board a US ship. 'There were about 50 other people on the ship,' the detainee said the prisoner had told him. 'They were beaten even more severely than in Guantanamo.'

A spokesman for the US naval base in Diego Garcia, based in Japan, was not immediately available for comment.

Copyright Guardian Newspapers Limited 2008

Sordid Details on ‘Black Site’ at Diego Garcia Island Come to Light

By Dazeylin

Share This! Categories: C.I.A., Detainee Abuse, Disappeared, Extraordinary Rendition, Ghost, Lies of the U.S. Administration, Torture and Torture flights Tags: No Tags.

By Liliana Segura, AlterNet.

British Foreign Secretary David Miliband issued an embarrassing apology to members of Parliament last month. Despite “earlier explicit assurances” to the contrary, he admitted, two planes carrying prisoners of the U.S. “war on terror” had landed on the British-owned island of Diego Garcia in 2002 before flying to foreign territory as part of the American extraordinary rendition program.

One flight went on to Guantánamo, one to Morocco. The identities of the detainees remain classified, but one of them has since been set free. According to the CIA, neither was tortured. But — Miliband would have the public believe — the CIA didn’t bother to tell the British government that its territory was being used as a landing pad for American torture taxis.

Human rights attorneys and a handful of British MPs have long raised the possibility that Diego Garcia, a small island in the Indian Ocean that is home to a massive American military base, has played a role in extraordinary rendition — and that it is among the United States’ “black sites” — secret CIA-run prisons, the existence of which President Bush himself confirmed in 2006. Even loose-lipped American officials have acknowledged it. As London-based human rights attorney Clive Stafford Smith, director of the legal organization Reprieve (which, over a year ago, unearthed flight logs recording the arrival and departure of a CIA rendition plane at Diego Garcia), wrote in the Guardian last January:

British denials are difficult to square with the words of U.S. Army Gen. Barry McCaffrey … recently retired from running Southcom, the military command that oversees Guantánamo. He was asked in May 2004 where the thousands of ghost prisoners were being held. “You know, Bagram Air Field, Diego Garcia, Guantánamo, 16 camps throughout Iraq,” he replied.

Yet the Blair and Brown administrations continually denied it. Until now.

“We have just been informed by the United States of America about what has actually happened,” Prime Minister Gordon Brown told reporters lamely on Feb. 21. “The U.S. has expressed regret for us not knowing about this issue. We share the disappointment that everybody has about what’s actually happened.”

In the States, the controversy has gotten little press — in no small part because Americans have known for years that their elected officials are in the kidnap/torture business. But in Britain, where the government has denied any role in their ally’s unsavory program, officials are pleading ignorance, offering insipid excuses and, ultimately, trying to reduce proof of their complicity with the U.S. torture/detention machinery to a mere bureaucratic oversight. As Brown tells it, this was simply a case where an “error in the earlier U.S. records search meant that these cases did not come to light.”

Nevertheless, the Guardian reported on Monday, “Ministers are coming under growing pressure as officials made it clear they still could not be certain of the extent to which U.S. aircraft made use of British facilities when taking alleged terrorists to prisons where they were likely to be subjected to inhumane treatment.”

Regardless of what comes to light, the case of Diego Garcia is uniquely instructive in what it has revealed of American and British collusion in the past. Long before the “war on terror,” the story of Diego Garcia was a tragic symbol of imperial aggression.

As the British journalist John Pilger wrote in his book Freedom Next Time, “The story of Diego Garcia is shocking, almost incredible.”

A British colony lying midway between Africa and Asia in the Indian Ocean, the island is one of 64 unique coral islands that form the Chagos Archipelago, a phenomenon of natural beauty and once of peace. Newsreaders refer to it in passing: “American B-52 and stealth bombers last night took off from the uninhabited British island of Diego Garcia to bomb Iraq (or Afghanistan).” It is the word “uninhabited” that turns the key on the horror of what was done there. In the 1970s, the Ministry of Defense in London produced this epic lie: “There is nothing in our files about a population and an evacuation.”

Pilger tells the awful story of an island that, at the height of the Cold War, was seized by the British, and with the help of the American government, “swept” and “sanitized.” This involved taking a population of natives and, retroactively, reclassifying them as “short-term, temporary residents” that were “returned” to the island of Mauritius, about 1,000 miles away. “In fact,” writes Pilger, “many islanders traced their ancestry back five generations, as their cemeteries bore witness.”

Rendered disposable, the population of 2,000 was forcibly removed and eventually replaced by American troops: Diego Garcia was leased to the United States free of charge following a secret pact between British Prime Minister Harold Wilson and U.S. President Lyndon Johnson. They inhabit a military base that’s now one of the world’s largest. The name: “Camp Justice.”

Years later, the start of the “war on terror” coincided with a number of significant — and hideously overdue — developments for the people of Diego Garcia. In 2000, the British high court ruled the forced removal of the islanders illegal. But, reported Pilger, “within hours of the judgment, the Foreign Office announced that it would not be possible for them to return to Diego Garcia because of a ‘treaty’ with Washington — in truth, a deal concealed from Parliament and the U.S. Congress.”

In 2003, at the same time that extraordinary rendition flights were carrying detainees to be tortured, a second ruling denied compensation for the former residents of Diego Garcia. Adding brutal insult to injury, the Blair government invoked the “royal prerogative” — special executive powers that belong only to the king or queen — to dispense with the earlier ruling — and “a decree was issued that the islanders were banned forever from returning home.”

Today, with Diego Garcia in the spotlight, official reports have tried to continue the fiction that the island never belonged to anyone. “Once uninhabited, it was turned into an air base to protect oil supplies to the West during the Cold War,” wrote a reporter in the Gulf Times the day after Miliband’s apology.

For their part, U.S. officials are taking responsibility for failing to tell the British about the flights in and out of Diego Garcia. “That we found this mistake ourselves, and that we brought it to the attention of the British government, in no way changes or excuses the reality that we were in the wrong,” CIA Director Michael Hayden said. “An important part of intelligence work, inherently urgent, complex and uncertain, is to take responsibility for errors and to learn from them.”

Perhaps. But if Diego Garcia’s role in the war on terror is any indication, neither the U.S. nor the British government have learned from their mistakes. It is only the latest chapter in an epic story of imperial injustice.

Liliana Segura is an AlterNet staff writer.

© 2008 Independent Media Institute. All rights reserved.
View this story online at: http://www.alternet.org/story/79273/

Fresh questions on torture flights spark demands for inquiry

• Richard Norton-Taylor and Duncan Campbell
• The Guardian,
• Monday March 10 2008

About this article

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This article appeared in the Guardian on Monday March 10 2008 on p9 of the UK news section. It was last updated at 00:04 on March 10 2008.

MPs and human rights groups yesterday demanded an independent inquiry into the use of UK territory by CIA "torture flights" as fresh questions emerged over the government's handling of the issue.

Ministers are coming under growing pressure as officials made it clear they still could not be certain of the extent to which US aircraft made use of British facilities when taking alleged terrorists to prisons where they were likely to be subjected to inhumane treatment.

Last month, David Miliband, the foreign secretary, apologised to MPs, admitting that contrary to "earlier explicit assurances" two flights had landed at Diego Garcia, the British Indian Ocean territory where the US has a large airbase. He said the flights had refuelled there, and each had had a single detainee on board who did not leave the aircraft.

British and US officials have refused to give details about the two detainees other than that one was in Guantánamo Bay and the other had been released. Miliband said he had asked his officials for a list of all flights on which rendition had been alleged.

British officials said yesterday they were "working behind the scenes" in an attempt to get more information from the Americans. The Guardian has learned that Lord Malloch Brown, the Foreign Office minister, has spoken to Manfred Novak, the UN's special investigator on torture, about the alleged use of Diego Garcia as a detention centre to hold US suspects.

Novak said he had credible evidence from sources he could not reveal that detainees were held on the island between 2002 and 2003. British officials say they have no evidence of this. Some representatives of human rights groups who met FCO officials last week suggested records of the CIA flights may have been destroyed.

Flight plan records show that one of the aircraft, registered N379P, flew in September 2002 from Diego Garcia to Morocco. From there it flew to Portugal and then to Kabul. Passenger names have been blacked out. However, Reprieve, which represents prisoners faced with the death penalty and torture, said that in Kabul the aircraft picked up Al-Sharqawi and Hassan bin Attash, two suspects who were tortured in Jordan before being rendered to Afghanistan and flown to Guantánamo Bay. Those rendered through Diego Garcia remain unidentified. In a letter to Miliband, Clive Stafford Smith, Reprieve's legal director, said: "It is certainly not going to rebuild public confidence if we say that two people were illegally taken through British territory but then refuse to reveal the fates of these men."

His call for an independent inquiry was echoed by Shami Chakrabarti, director of Liberty, and Andrew Tyrie, Tory chairman of the parliamentary group on extraordinary rendition, pressed Miliband to seek more information from the US, including reports that detainees were held on the island or on US ships anchored nearby.

See also:

leged. British officials said yesterday they were "working ...

Ex-SAS man gagged for claims on UK involvement in rendition - report Indian Muslims, CA - 29 Feb 2008 By IRNA London : A former SAS soldier has been served with a High Court order after making claims about the UK's involvement in the rendition of hundreds of ...

Miliband admits US rendition flights stopped on UK soil Guardian Unlimited, UK - 21 Feb 2008 This article was first published on guardian.co.uk on Thursday February 21 2008. It was last updated at 14:14 on February 21 2008. David Miliband speaks to ...

Government admission on rendition a 'huge embarrassment', say critics Guardian Unlimited, UK - 21 Feb 2008 This article was first published on guardian.co.uk on Thursday February 21 2008. It was last updated at 14:35 on February 21 2008. ...

UK Red-faced Over Torture Flights Journal of Turkish Weekly, Turkey - 22 Feb 2008 The British paper had further published pictures of three planes linked to the CIA rendition program at Scottish airports, suggesting that the UK was a ...

Miliband isn't complicit in rendition Guardian Unlimited, UK - 22 Feb 2008 Michael White is an assistant editor of the Guardian and was its political editor from 1990-2006. I was relieved to see that today's newspapers didn't turn ...

CIA rendition flights taint UK The News - International, Pakistan - 22 Feb 2008 According to The Guardian, Miliband’s statement that he was ‘disappointed’ to have to make the admission was ‘surely an understatement. ...

Call the main Guardian and Observer switchboard: Guardian Unlimited, UK - 21 Feb 2008 He promised there would no future rendition flights without UK approval, and said there were no such requests pending. Gordon Brown, who was in Brussels ...

Extraordinary admissions Guardian Unlimited, UK - 21 Feb 2008 For more than two years, the Guardian and MPs from all political parties have made detailed allegations about Britain's complicity in CIA rendition ...

Call the main Guardian and Observer switchboard: Guardian Unlimited, UK - 21 Feb 2008 Then the foreign secretary revealed we had - if unwittingly - allowed CIA "extraordinary rendition" flights to refuel on UK territory. ...

Destruction of CIA Tapes: LAWSUITS TO FOLLOW

Terrorism

Dems Seek Probe re CIA Tapes; Destruction a Plus for Suspects’ Defense?

Posted Dec 7, 2007, 03:53 pm CST
By Martha Neil

Democratic legislators reacted angrily today to news that the U.S. Central Intelligence Agency had destroyed at least two videotapes of harsh interrogations of al-Qaida terrorist suspects in its custody, and called for an investigation. Meanwhile, observers predicted potential litigation and an adverse effect on the prosecution of suspected terrorists.

"Senator Edward M. Kennedy of Massachusetts accused the CIA of 'a cover-up,' while Senator Richard J. Durbin of Illinois said it was possible that people at the agency had engaged in obstruction of justice," reports the New York Times.

"Both called on Attorney General Michael Mukasey to investigate."

As detailed in an earlier ABAJournal.com post, the agency reportedly destroyed in 2005, in the midst of various investigations, videotapes of at least two 2002 interrogations of al-Qaida suspects. One reason for the destruction reportedly was to protect agents involved from potential legal repercussions.

However, in an e-mail to employees Thursday, Gen. Michael Hayden, the director of the CIA, said the tapes were destroyed to safeguard undercover officers and because they were no longer needed for intelligence purposes, according to the Times article.

Some legislators said they found such justifications dubious, including Kennedy. “Does the director believe the C.I.A.’s buildings are not secure?" he said today, according to the Times. "That excuse won't wash."

A Christian Science Monitor article predicted lawsuits over the CIA's destruction of the tapes, and Reuters reported that lawyers for defendants in terrorism cases say the destruction of the tapes could derail the prosecution.

"First, it's a criminal offense to destroy evidence,"

Clive Stafford Smith told the news agency. He heads Reprieve, a British-based human rights group that represents prisoners held by the U.S. at the Guantanamo Bay military prison.

"Second, if you do, the American case law is quite clear,

Smith says.

"The charges get dismissed against the individual if it's evidence that would have helped the defense."

Oh the bullshit and despair never stops: Guantanamo

sick Sick SICK!!

reminder:

Amnesty: Guantanamo Prisoners captured on cash reward

Amnesty International says a majority of U.S. prisoners in Guantanamo Bay were captured on a $5,000 reward.

The non-government organization said Friday that more than 85 detainees at the Cuba prison were captured by the Afghan Northern Alliance and in Pakistan when the cash rewards were offered for every unidentified terror suspect handed over to U.S. custody.

Gitmo Inmate Cuts Throat With Fingernail

By BEN FOX – 1 day ago

GUANTANAMO BAY NAVAL BASE, Cuba (AP) — A Guantanamo Bay prisoner slashed his throat with a sharpened fingernail last month, spilling a lot of blood but surviving, a U.S. military commander said Tuesday.

Guards administered first-aid and took the prisoner to the prison clinic, said Navy Cmdr. Andrew Haynes, the deputy commander in charge of the guard force.

"There was an impressive effusion of blood,"

Haynes told reporters visiting the base. He would not disclose the man's name or nationality. A medical officer, who could not be identified under military rules for journalists, said the prisoner received several stitches and spent a week under psychiatric observation.

Zachary Katznelson, of the British rights group Reprieve, said he was one of two lawyers representing the prisoner and identified him as an Algerian who has been held at Guantanamo without charges for nearly six years. The detainee was to meet with one of his lawyers for the first time this week.

Katznelson said he could not release the man's name without his consent.

There have been four suicides since the U.S. opened the military prison at Guantanamo in January 2002 for men suspected of involvement in terrorism or links to al-Qaida and the Taliban.

Haynes said he doubted the latest incident was a real suicide attempt, and characterized it instead as an act of "self-harm." (!!! ???? we've heard this before!!)

The incident occurred while the man was taking his daily five-minute shower in early November, around the time when more than two dozen journalists were visiting Guantanamo for a military court hearing.

Haynes said there have been up to half-dozen "self-harm incidents" in the two months he has been assigned to Guantanamo Bay. He described suicide as a "paramount tactic" used by prisoners to discredit U.S. forces. But defense lawyers and human rights groups say the suicides are a result of the prisoners' despair.

Many of the 305 men held at Guantanamo have been there for more than five years without charge. The military has said it plans to prosecute up to 80 of the prisoners. (out of all those? I mean do you think we cannot count? And the other 225? What's the DEAL!!!)

In other developments, a Guantanamo prison manual from 2004 that was posted anonymously on the Internet Tuesday indicated that some detainees were prevented from having any contact with representatives from the International Committee of the Red Cross. The military said it could not immediately confirm the document's authenticity.

The Center for Constitutional Rights, which represents many Guantanamo detainees, called on the military to make public its current operations manual following the appearance of the purported 2004 prison manual.

Restrictions about access to Red Cross officials were also described in a 2003 Guantanamo manual that was posted on the Internet last month, and which the military confirmed was authentic.

"After the release of the 2003 manual, the Pentagon claimed that the manual was replaced and the concerns raised were no longer valid," said Emi MacLean of the New York-based Center for Constitutional Rights. "What we see in the 2004 manual is more of the same."

A Guantanamo spokesman, Army Lt. Col. Edward Bush, said the military has not yet confirmed that the latest posting is a real copy of the detention center's rules but added that it would be irrelevant if it were real.

"It's a snapshot from almost four years ago," Bush said. "Conditions have changed immeasurably."

The Red Cross now has "unlimited access to all aspects of the camp," he added.

The manual, dated March 2004, also provided guards with detailed instructions for intelligence gathering, urging them to listen to detainees' conversations for personal details "that can be exploited by interrogators." Guards are also warned not to discuss current events within earshot of the detainees or teach them English phrases.

Another Guantanamo spokesman, Navy Cmdr. Rick Haupt, said the military would not discuss the contents of current procedures "for reasons of personnel safety and operational security."

Here is the leak
There's more on wikileaks

Wikileaks has released the 2004 Standard Operating Procedures (SOP) manual for Camp Delta, Guantánamo Bay, Cuba. The transparency group's disclosure follows its widely reported release of the 2003 SOP manual only a few weeks ago. A comparison between the two leaks reveals changes to official US detainee policy in exquisite detail. Wikileaks has also released another related sensitive US military manual entitled "Detainee Operations in a Joint Environment", which is a defense-wide instruction manual for detainee operations including rendition flights, which has yet to be analyzed — Wikileaks invites journalists and the public to persue it.

Wikileaks journalists and leading Habeas Corpus lawyers from the Center for Constitutional Rights examined the 2004 SOP manual. Among the key details found so far are:

1. Non-compliance with the Geneva Conventions remains official US Policy,

according to leading Habeas Corpus lawyers from the Center for Constitutional Rights. Systematic denial of Red Cross access to prisoners remains. The use of dogs remains. Segregation and isolation are still used routinely and systematically – including an initial period of at least 4 weeks "to enhance and exploit the disorientation and disorganization felt by a newly arrived detainee", only terminated at the behest of interrogators. Both manuals assert that detainees will be treated in accordance with the "spirit" of the Geneva conventions "to the degree consistent with military needs", but never assert that the conventions are actually being followed at Guantanamo. Put into practice, neither manual complies with the Geneva conventions.

2. Extraordinary increases in petty restrictions.

detail from the "Camp Delta Standard Operating Procedures" manual shows a camp layout at the Guantánamo Bay military detention facility.

No dictionaries or periodicals and no books about English or geography; guards are not permitted to discuss "current" affairs, even including the then year old 2003 space shuttle disaster; and no looking at 'distinguished visitors' – down to precise procedures for bodily averting detainee gaze.

3. Increased hostility towards chaplains and Red Cross.

Despite criticism from the Red Cross, the 2004 manual uses even more hostile and suspicious language towards the international humanitarian body – and is still barred from access to some detainees. Further, probably in response to the actions of James Yee, the prison chaplain who spoke out about conditions at Guantanamo Bay, new rules prevent the chaplain performing many duties without official authorization or accompaniment.

4. “Medium security” Camp 4 exposed as media sideshow.

A new chapter added rules for this separate prison, with personel required to have “excellent public relations (PR) skills”.

5. “Don't do that again!” changes provide evidence for abuses.

Many rule changes have little other explanation than as response to particular abuses, raising questions for the Pentagon. Did guards use Capsicum Spray on detainees merely for throwing water? Did guards eat portions of detainee meals? Were haircuts used as punishment? And more.

6. Changes reveal extent of suicide and self-harm attempts among detainees.

The extent and detail of these changes reveals the extent of problems among detainees – and also, the extent to which the military went to cover them up.

Page 135 of Detainee Operations in a Joint Environment one of many pages devoted to the detailed arrangements for the air-transportation, blindfolding, ear-muffing, gloving and shackling of US military detainees.

7. Pervasive spin via language control 'hunger strike' becomes VTF - 'voluntary total fasting'. The word “suicide” is virtually removed from the document. Even an attempted hanging requiring someone to cut down is categorized as “self-harm”, despite "self-harm" elsewhere being defined as actions that could not be fatal.

8. Some things change, but some things remain the same.

Much of the manual is unchanged. Military dogs are still used prevalently. New detainees are still placed in isolation for 4 weeks. Toilet paper is still regarded as a luxury “comfort item”. Styrofoam cups are still confiscated if written on.

See:

• Chaplain, Red Cross Muzzled at Gitmo in 2004 - article exploring the material
• A Cat May Look Upon a King, but Not at Gitmo - article exploring the material
• No WMDs, but plenty of MWDs at Gitmo in 2004‎ - article exploring the material
• Guantanamo Camp Delta 2003-2004 Standard Operating Procedure (SOP) forensic difference analysis - all the changes, side by side
• Camp Delta Standard Operating Procedure (2004) - the leak itself

• Camp Delta Standard Operating Procedure (2003) - the prior leak
• Guantanamo document confirms psychological torture - article and video exploring the prior leak

See also the unanalyzed document

• Detainee Operations in a Joint Environment - rush-released leak

Sample quote from this unanalyzed document:

(1) On-board the aircraft:

(a)Detainees will be shackled (cuffed) to leg and wrist irons connected to belly irons and the aircraft.

(b)Detainees will be blindfolded at all times.

(c)Detainee’s gloves will remain in place at all times.

(d)Detainees will have ear/hearing muffs on.

External links:

• Standard Operating Procedure changes at Camp Delta, Guantanamo Bay - from WikiNews
• Now Online, a Guide to Detainee Treatment - from the Washington Post

Thanks to Jen Nessel from the Center for Constitutional Rights for additional co-ordination and Christopher Findlay for additional research, but most of all we would like to acknowledge our source, Peryton.