North Americans seem to believe that torture has no history here. It happened in medieval Europe, at the command of dictators in far-off places, or as part of leftist insurgencies. For the United States, torture is anathema to our way of life, violative of our liberal-democratic commitments. From George Washington to George W. Bush, U.S. presidents have denounced torture unequivocally. Or so it was, as the story goes, before the September 11 attacks.
[Comments by Marvin and Betty Mandell and others are posted below the article.]
[This sign-on statement organized by the Campaign for Peace and Democracy, “End U.S. Support for Bahrain’s Repressive Government,” will be of interest to many NP readers. Please support the statement by adding your name to the signer list by clicking here.]
End U.S. Support for Bahrain’s Repressive Government
Statement by the Campaign for Peace and Democracy
May 2011
[The following appeal has been endorsed by New Politics as well as The Nation, The Progressive, and the Campaign to End the Death Penalty, among others.]
Six people in Zimbabwe are now imprisoned on charges of treason for organizing a meeting to discuss the mass movements in Tunisia and Egypt. For this “crime” they face a possible death sentence. They have been tortured and are now in solitary confinement.
A small and curious bulletin begins this note from the front lines: as of several hours ago, the head of the Wisconsin professional police association announced that its members would not eject demonstrators from the Capitol building, and suggested some would be spending the night with the demonstrators in order to protect them.
Mazin Qumsiyeh writes about Israel and the Middle East. What distinguishes his writing is his fusion of sharp political critique and acknowledgment of our common humanity. His most recent commentary, on events in Egypt, contains valuable information and links, as well as his typically thoughtful, moving analysis.
Uniformed agents of Mexico’s Federal Investigative Agency (AFI for its initials in Spanish) yanked three inmates out of their cells in the minimum-security state prison at Ixcotel, Oaxaca in November, 2008 and transported them to San Bartola Coyotepec, another Oaxaca state prison, for "interrogation." One of the three inmates, Victor Hugo Martínez, told activist friends that the federal investigators beat him and threatened to "make your family pay" if he didn’t confess in full to crimes of which he’
