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The Red Cross must choose between confidentiality and effectivenessBy Paul J. Balles* Paul J. Balles considers the ICRC rule of confidentiality by which it discloses prisoner abuse only to the host government - in effect, the abuser. He says that, while Anglo-American abuse in Iraq came to light because of a leak to the media, in Israel worse atrocities are committed - and noted by the ICRC - but go unreported. He calls on the ICRC to replace absolute confidentiality with "reasonable grace periods" or admit "that their tilting at windmills is nothing more than a money-raising pretence". The International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) has recently revealed just how ineffective an organization with noble aims can be. This comes as particularly bad news for the millions of people who contribute generously to sustaining the ICRC. While the organization's representatives tend to boast of the services they provide to prisoners in detention, the success of these efforts amounts to little more than paying visits to detainees and delivering letters from the prisoners to their families. On the other hand, the major service that they should be performing, especially for ill-treated prisoners and those subjected to torture, has proven totally ineffective. A lot of useless paperwork has, in effect, wasted significant amounts of donors' contributions. Most governments have known the reality of this situation for many years; and the standard practice of the ICRC has been to cover up their ineffectiveness with promotional schemes that detract from what they should be accomplishing. The recent event that revealed to the entire international community just how ineffective the ICRC has been involved the exposure of the tortured prisoners in Iraq's Abu Ghraib prison by their American captors, jailers and Israeli intelligence contractors. One of the most incomprehensible aspects of the Abu Ghraib incident is the Reuters report (10 May 2004) "that the Red Cross saw US troops keeping Iraqi prisoners naked for days in darkness at the Abu Ghraib jail in October, and was told by the intelligence officer in charge it was 'part of the process...'" According to Reuters, "the International Committee of the Red Cross also described British troops forcing Iraqi detainees to kneel and stomping on their necks in an incident in which one prisoner died". What did the Red Cross do? They "repeatedly alerted" US-led occupation authorities to practices it described as "serious violations of international humanitarian law" and "in some cases tantamount to torture", Reuters reports. Why didn't they alert the world? The occupation forces knew very well what they were doing, and they weren't about to change their ways because of a report from the ICRC. On the other hand, the ICRC guarantees confidentiality to the offending government so they can gain entrance to the world's torture chambers. That, to any sane observer, makes the ICRC seem like an organization that enjoys vicarious sadism. If they're not getting their rocks off with repeated exposure to torture, why would they refuse to report it to anyone but the offenders? What good is guaranteeing confidentiality when nothing gets done as a result of their reports? That rationale is sick! It's almost as sociopathic as the behaviour the ICRC observes and lacks enough principle or decency to blow the lid off of it when its findings are ignored. Perhaps the ICRC is comforted by what Eric Margolis has referred to in his Toronto Sun article about sadism being an old war habit. Margolis says we "should not be surprised their soldiers and intelligence agents are using torture and sexual humiliations to break the will of Iraqis to resist American occupation. That is the nature of colonial warfare and so-called 'war of terror'." Margolis adds, "don't believe the torture and abuse in Iraq was solely the work of a few cretinous hillbillies and miscreants, as the Pentagon is claiming.
Notice especially Margolis's comment about torture based on Israeli techniques. Where did the Israelis perfect these techniques? On the Palestinians, of course. More importantly, Israeli torture of the Palestinians in the land Israelis have been occupying with illegal settlements has been going on for more than three decades. See the edifying article from Al Jazeera.net "Israeli lessons for the US in Iraq". How long has the ICRC been visiting Israeli prisons? How many reports have they sent to the Israeli government about torture in their prisons? There's been no dearth of reports of torture by the Palestinians who've suffered it. Yet more than three decades of torture have been swept under the carpet by a useless promise of confidentiality. For a recent report on what's been happening in Israeli prisons, click here, noting the futile efforts to solicit ICRC intervention. What differences distinguish the inhumane bestiality practised and exposed at Abu Ghraib and that inflicted on Palestinians by Israelis? I can think of only two significant disparities: (1) the Israelis have been getting away with it for three decades longer than their American apprentices, and (2) the Israelis have been smart enough to keep cameras out of their torture chambers. A telling fact about torture and its exposure: nothing about the practice of torturing disturbs most people until they see it on film. What changes, therefore, can we expect from America? No more cameras in prisons and detention centres! What changes can we expect from Israel? None! Ironically, a number of Zionists in America have been reported shedding crocodile tears over the callous depravity photographed at Abu Ghraib while ignoring the longer, equally brutal record of the practitioners of agonizing torment regularly meted out in Israeli prisons. What changes need to be instituted by the ICRC? They need to stop deceiving themselves, their sponsors and contributors into believing that their reports have any significant effect on inhumane sadists. Unless the ICRC takes steps to create reasonable grace periods for action based on their reports and to bring those periods to a justifiable end, they might as well admit to themselves that their tilting at windmills is nothing more than a money-raising pretence. Meanwhile, the sadists carry on brutalizing and torturing their captives who aren't the slightest bit masochistic enough to appreciate the suffering. *Paul Balles is a retired American university professor and freelance writer who has lived in the Middle East for 34 years. For more information, see http://www.pballes.com. Copyright © Redress Information & Analysis. All rights reserved. |
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