CHILDREN RAPED AT ABU GHRAIB ( reportedly there are videos )
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http://www.vonbluvens.org/
CHILDREN RAPED AT ABU GHRAIB
REPORTEDLY THERE ARE VIDEOS
"Some of the worst things that happened you don't know about, okay?
Videos, um, there are women there. Some of you may have read that they
were passing letters out, communications out to their men. This is at
Abu Ghraib ... The women were passing messages out saying 'Please come
and kill me, because of what's happened' and basically what happened
is that those women who were arrested with young boys, children in
cases that have been recorded. The boys were sodomized with the
cameras rolling. And the worst above all of that is the soundtrack of
the boys shrieking that your government has. They are in total terror.
It's going to come out"
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http://www.boingboing.net/2004/07/15/hersh_children_raped.html
2004 Happy Mutants LLC.
Thursday, July 15, 2004
Hersh: children raped at Abu Ghraib, Pentagon has videos
From Daily Kos' partial transcript of a video (link to REAL stream)
http://stream.realimpact.net/?file=clients/aclu/conf2004/20040707_aclu_AmericaAtACrossroads_300.rm
of Seymour Hersh http://www.newyorker.com/fact/content/?040510fa_fact
speaking at an ACLU event. He says the US government has videotapes of
children being raped at Abu Ghraib prison in Iraq. " Some of the worst
things that happened you don't know about, okay? Videos, um, there are
women there. Some of you may have read that they were passing letters
out, communications out to their men. This is at Abu Ghraib ... The
women were passing messages out saying 'Please come and kill me,
because of what's happened' and basically what happened is that those
women who were arrested with young boys, children in cases that have
been recorded. The boys were sodomized with the cameras rolling. And the
worst above all of that is the soundtrack of the boys shrieking that
your government has. They are in total terror. It's going to come out."
Link http://www.dailykos.com/story/2004/7/14/193750/666
(via Warren http://www.diepunyhumans.com/ ). There's also a piece
worth reading in this week's Newsweek about new allegations of rape
and sexual torture at Abu Ghraib. Feature includes details on the
identities of the Iraqi prisoners shown in those widely-circulated
photographs -- including Satar Jabar (charged with carjacking, not
terrorism), whose iconic hooded figure with wires attached is
derisively described by many Iraqis as the "Statue of Liberty."
Link http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/5412316/site/newsweek/
Update: Geraldine Sealey at Salon on Hersh's remarks:
After Donald Rumsfeld testified on the Hill about Abu Ghraib in May,
there was talk of more photos and video in the Pentagon's custody more
horrific than anything made public so far. "If these are released to
the public, obviously it's going to make matters worse," Rumsfeld
said. Since then, the Washington Post has disclosed some new details
and images of abuse at the prison. But if Seymour Hersh is right, it
all gets much worse. (...) Notes from a similar speech Hersh gave in
Chicago in June were posted on Brad DeLong's blog. Rick Pearlstein,
who watched the speech, wrote: "[Hersh] said that after he broke Abu
Ghraib people are coming out of the woodwork to tell him this stuff.
He said he had seen all the Abu Ghraib pictures. He said, 'You haven't
begun to see evil...' then trailed off. He said, 'horrible things done
to children of women prisoners, as the cameras run.' He looked
frightened."
There are several questions here: Has Hersh actually seen the video he
described to the ACLU, and why hasn't he written about it yet? Will he
be forced to elaborate in more public venues now that these two
speeches are getting so much attention, at least in the blogosphere?
And who else has seen the video, if it exists -- will journalists see
and report on it? did senators see these images when they had their
closed-door sessions with the Abu Ghraib evidence? -- and what is
being done about it?
Link to Salon item.
http://www.salon.com/politics/war_room/2004/07/15/hersh/
Update 2:
BB guestbar alum Russ Kick of Memory Hole http://www.thememoryblog.org/
reminds us of a post he made in May about the type of as-yet-unreleased
http://www.thememoryblog.org/archives/000155.html evidence Hersh is
presumably discussing. Here, Russ quotes Republican Senator Lindsay Graham:
"The American public needs to understand, we're talking about rape and
murder here. We're not just talking about giving people a humiliating
experience. We're talking about rape and murder and some very serious
charges."
Update 3: BoingBoing reader Lars has an update from Germany -- some
European media perspective on the allegations:
"Report Mainz" is a German TV show/magazine of the SWR
(Sudwest-Rundfunk = South-West broadcasting). "Report Mainz" reported
already on 5th July 2004 about the potential abuse of children in Abu
Ghraib. (http://www.swr.de/report/archiv/sendungen/040705/02/frames.html).
A video (in German) of the feature is available at the page (Link
http://www.swr.de/report/archiv/sendungen/040705/02/04070502.ram
to streaming Real file). You can see interviews with persons who
testify that they have seen children arrested in Abu Ghraib and who
have seen and have heard of a boy and a 12 year old girl terrified
(cold water and mud were spilled over them) by guards or military
personal. The boy and the girl were then used to terrify their also
arrested parents who were willing to cooperate after seeing their
children terrified by the guards/military personnel. Another TV
show/magazine covered the issue too: "Kulturzeit", of the
German-Austrian-Swiss broadcaster "3Sat" (Link
http://www.3sat.de/3sat.php?http://www.3sat.de/kulturzeit/themen/68032/).
The main theme in these features is the concern about the fact that
children are arrested and that they are used to apply pressure on
their parents."
UPDATE: Evidence to support Hersh's claims in the Taguba Report?
Link http://www.boingboing.net/2004/07/20/evidence_for_hershs_.html
posted by Xeni Jardin at 12:22:24 PM permalink