Iraq: 30,000 Prisoners Held Without Due Process (Amnesty/Cole)
Tuesday, September 14, 2010 at 8:46
Every time there is an election in Iraq, as happened last March 7, the Neoconservatives come out to crow about how great the Iraq War was. Their implicit argument is that Iraq was a brutal dictatorship, is now a thriving democracy. This argument is typical of their warped ethics, since it maintains that the ends justifies the means, and we are not supposed to bring up the dead, the wounded, the damaged that the Neocons have inflicted on Iraq. Never mind that the elections have not so far produced a viable new government. Never mind that democratic institutions are weak or non-existent. Never mind that widespread abuses are committed against the public by the new state.
Amnesty International reports that the Iraqi government is holding some 30,000 prisoners without charges or due process. In some instances the prisoners have been abused or even tortured. About 10,000 of these prisoners were recently handed over to the Iraqis when the US combat mission in Iraq supposedly ended.