By Ben Turner
Impunity Watch Reporter, Middle East

AMMAN, Jordan – On April 8, Humans Rights Watch (HRW) released a report that said the CIA transferred at least 14 terror suspects to Jordan for interrogation after the September 11, attacks.

The 36-page report documents how Jordan’s General Intelligence Department (GID) served as a proxy jailer and interrogator for the US from 2001 until at least 2004.  The report alleges that the GID systematically tortured the prisoners, commonly using a torture method falaqa, a method by which the prisoners are given extended beatings on the bottoms of their feet.

“The Bush administration claims that it has not transferred people to foreign custody for abusive interrogation,” said Joanne Mariner, terrorism and counterterrorism director at Human Rights Watch. “But we’ve documented more than a dozen cases in which prisoners were sent to Jordan for torture.”

The report was based largely on firsthand information from Jordanian former prisoners who were detained with the non-Jordanian terrorism suspects and details eight previously unknown cases of rendition.  None are known to have been charged with a criminal offense.

One of the rendered prisoners, Ali al-Hajj al-Sharqawi, provided a handwritten note which he wrote while in Jordanian custody in 2002.  In the note, al-Sharqawi says that GID interrogators beat him “in a way that does not know any limits.”  The note continues, “They threatened me with electricity, with snakes and dogs …. [They said] we’ll make you see death . . . They threatened to rape me.”

The Jordanian government denied HRW’s allegations.  The Jordanian Minister of State for Information and Communications Nasser Joudeh said the report “was wrong, untrue and was based on individual allegations and conclusions based on non-objective grounds” Jordanian newspapers reported on April 9.

“Jordan is undergoing an intentional slander campaign by members of terrorism groups who were trained to provide rights groups with false information to undermine anti-terrorism efforts,” Joudeh said.

The CIA declined to comment on the report.  “The agency does not, as a rule, comment publicly on allegations of specific rendition activities,” spokesman Paul Gimigliano said.  Gimigliano did, however, defend renditions as a “lawful, valuable tool.”

“They have been used for years to take terrorists off the streets,” he said. “The United States does not transport individuals for the purpose of torture, and has no interest in any process that would produce bad intelligence.”

U.S. officials have acknowledged flying up to 150 of the most serious suspected terrorists secretly from one country to another, but have said they received diplomatic assurances from foreign authorities that they would not be tortured.

The HRW report said that at least five Yemenis, three Algerians, two Saudis, a Mauritanian, a Syrian, a Tunisian, and one or more Chechens from Russia were rendered to Jordan.  According to the report, five of them are now in U.S. custody in Guantanamo Bay, Cuba.

For more information, please see:
Associated Press – HRW: CIA Sent 14 Suspects to Jordan – 9 April 2008

Reuters – Jordan Denies Report on CIA Renditions – 9 April 2008

Human Rights Watch – US/Jordan: Stop Renditions to Torture – 8 April 2008

UPI – Report Alleges U.S. ‘Renditions’ to Jordan – 8 April 2008

ISTANBUL, Turkey – A new study, conducted by Istanbul Bilgi University and the Open Society Justice Initiative, concluded that less than 10 percent of criminal defendants in Turkey are represented by a lawyer.  The report is based on empirical data collected from over 600 case files opened in 2000-2001 and closed before 2005.  In addition, the researchers observed 173 court proceedings in Istanbul courts and interviewed over 75 criminal justice actors.

The report, Alone in the Courtroom: Accessibility and Impact of Criminal Legal Aid before Istanbul Courts, found that approximately 75 percent of criminal defendants sentenced to prison were never represented by a lawyer and that in less than 8 percent of the cases were lawyers present at the police interrogations.

Turkey’s Code of Criminal Procedure requires that free legal aid be provided to all criminal defendants, regardless of financial standing.  However, the report finds that only less than 2 percent of defendants exercise this right.  One of the likely causes is that there is a lack of awareness among defendant’s about their right to free legal aid.

For more information, please see:
Open Society Justice Initiative – New Report from Turkey Finds Accused Lack Legal Representation – 6 April 2008

Open Society Justice Initiative – Alone in the Courtroom: Accessibility and Impact of Criminal Legal Aid before Istanbul Courts – June 2007

By Ben Turner
Impunity Watch Reporter, Middle East

CAIRO, Egypt – Egypt’s largest opposition group, the Muslim Brotherhood, announced that they will boycott the country’s April 8 elections after being allowed to field candidates in only 20 out of 52,000 contested council seats.

The Brotherhood says that 800 of its members have been arrested in recent weeks and thousands more have been intimidated in an organized crackdown to prevent them from registering as candidates.  The boycott will have little effect on the results of the election, with 90 percent of the seats certain to go to President Hosni Mubarak’s National Democratic Party.  But the boycott will reinforce the idea that the Egyptian government is refusing to allow any opposition groups from participating in the election process.

The Brotherhood said the government has ignored “thousands” of court rulings supporting the Brotherhood’s right to field candidates for local offices.  The Brotherhood accused the ruling National Democratic Party has instead obstructed the registration of opposition candidates.

“It is to the extent that we feel we are not competing with a normal party but with a group of corrupt people who are willing to even resort to illegal and unethical means,” the group’s statement said. “The party of corruption and despotism is afraid of any contest.”

The Brotherhood is an Islamic political party.  The Egyptian constitution bans political parties based on religion and all of the group’s members run officially as independents.  While the group is officially banned, it is widely tolerated in the country.

The Brotherhood says it wants to promote peaceful and democratic reform to bring about an Islamic state and tackle corruption. But critics say it cannot be trusted and hint that its violent past has never been renounced.

Egypt’s election is being set against the backdrop of an economic crisis across the country.  Inflation has skyrocketed as the price of bread, rice and cooking oil have all nearly doubled since the beginning of the year.  All three products are staples of Egyptian cooking and the rising prices have left many Egyptians struggling as the wages have not kept pace with inflation.

The United States and international human rights groups have criticized the Egyptian government’s crackdown on the Brotherhood but Washington has exerted little pressure for reform on Mubarak, one its staunchest allies in the Middle East.

“We always encourage countries in the region and around the world to do everything that they possibly can. And is there more to do? Absolutely. There’s more to do in Egypt,” State Department spokesman Sean McCormack said. “But fundamentally, they’re going to have to arrive at their own decisions about the pace and the direction of this reform.”

For more information, please see:
Guardian – Muslim Brotherhood to Boycott Election – 8 April 2008

Wall Street Journal – Opposition Party in Egypt Plans to Boycott Municipal Elections – 8 April 2008

AFP – Clashes Erupt Anew in Egypt Strike City – 7 April 2008

Associated Press – Police, Protesters Clash in North Egypt – 7 April 2008

BBC – Egypt Opposition Boycotts Polls – 7 April 2008

International Herald Tribune – Egypt: Muslim Brotherhood Opposition Group Urges Boycott of Municipal Elections – 7 April 2008

BAGHDAD, Iraq – A group of 42 male university students abducted near the northern Iraqi city of Mosul have been freed, just few hours after their kidnapping. Another bus carrying female students had managed to escape, but three passengers were injured by gunfire.

The buses were taking the students to Mosul University, where classes were due to restart after a weekend break. The kidnappers had stopped the buses near an area called Jorum, on a highway near Mosul. The bus carrying female students fled, but the bus carrying male students were unable to escape. The captured male students were loaded into a trailer and were taken to the village of al-Jarradi, where they were eventually freed.

No group has claimed responsibility, but many speculate Al Qaeda in Mesopotamia to be responsible for the kidnapping. Al Qaeda has regrouped in the Northern Province after having been pushed out of western AnBar Province and Baghdad. The U.S. military says Mosul is Al Qaeda’s last major urban stronghold in the country.

Mosul police believes the kidnapping was a result of mistaken identity. The police said the kidnappers probably thought the male students to be policemen or police recruits. But when the kidnappers found out the hostages were students, they let the students go.

For more information, please see:

BBC News – Abducted Iraqi students are freed – 6 April 2008

International Herald Tribune – 42 university students abducted in Iraq – 6 April 2008

Al Jazeera – Abducted Iraqi students freed – 6 April 2008

The Associated Press – Gunmen seize 42 college students – 6 April 2008

By Laura Zuber
Impunity Watch Senior Desk Officer, Middle East

CAIRO, Egypt – Egypt’s Interior Minister declared that government “agencies will take the necessary and immediate firm measures against any attempt to demonstrate, block traffic, or hinder public services – or inciting any of these acts.”  Also, state-owned daily Al-Ahram warned that individuals inciting or participating in the strike could face prison.

Egypt’s largest state-owned textile factory, Mahalla al-Kobra, called for its workers to strike on April 6 to protest against low wages and increasing food prices.  A call for a general strike has been circulating for a week via the internet and cell phones.  For example, a group on the social network site Facebook, “April 6”, has attracted over 64,000 members.

Strike organizers urge people to stay home from work, avoid shopping, wear black clothes and hang the Egyptian flag from windows and balconies in a show of support for the strikers.

UN’s World Food Programme said that the average household expenditure has risen by 50 percent since the start of the year.  The price of food in Egypt has sky-rocketed since the start of the year.  As food prices increased, so has popular discontent.  Since the strike was announced last week, President Mubarak has lifted taxes on some foodstuffs in an effort to soften economic affects of the price increase.

The Interior Ministry stated that the government was not trying to prevent freedom of expression, but that “such actions must come through legitimate channels and the qualified unions and professional associations according to the law.”  Under Egypt’s emergency law, strikes and public demonstrations are illegal.

For more information, please see:
AFP – Egypt Rails Against General Strike Call – 5 April 2008

Al Jazeera – Egypt Issues Strike Warning – 5 April 2008

International Herald Tribune – Egypt’s Interior Ministry Warns Against Participating in a General Strike – 5 April 2008

AHN – Egyptian Opposition Groups Call for Sunday Strike – 3 April 2008