Torture and Prisoner Abuse
At least two deaths have been verified in the last decade: captives are known to have been beaten to death by GIs manning the facility, in December 2002.
Captives who were confined to both Bagram and the Guantanamo Bay detention camp have recounted that, while in Bagram, they were warned that if they did not cooperate more fully, they would be sent to a worse site in Cuba. Captives who have compared the two camps have said that conditions were far worse in Bagram.
In May 2010, nine Afghan former detainees reported to the ICRC that they had been held in a separate facility (known as the black jail) where they had been subject to isolation in cold cells, sleep deprivation, and other forms of torture. The U.S. military denies there is a separate facility for detainees.
In early 2012, Afghan President Hamid Karzai ordered that control of the Parwan Detention Facility be handed over to Afghan authorities after some inmates complained of being strip searched and put in solitary confinement.
Read more about this topic: Parwan Detention Facility
Famous quotes containing the words torture and, torture, prisoner and/or abuse:
“Suffering is by no means a privilege, a sign of nobility, a reminder of God. Suffering is a fierce, bestial thing, commonplace, uncalled for, natural as air. It is intangible; no one can grasp it or fight against it; it dwells in time—is the same thing as time; if it comes in fits and starts, that is only so as to leave the sufferer more defenseless during the moments that follow, those long moments when one relives the last bout of torture and waits for the next.”
—Cesare Pavese (1908–1950)
“It is cruelty to children to keep five-year-olds sitting still, gazing into vacancy even for one hour at a time. We have little idea of the torture we thus inflict.”
—Ellen Henrietta Swallow Richards (1842–1911)
“That there is also freedom in captivity, only a prisoner can claim. Coming from a prison guard, this statement would be blasphemy.”
—Friedrich Dürrenmatt (1921–1990)
“And then, Sir, there is this consideration, that if the abuse be enormous, Nature will rise up, and claiming her original rights, overturn a corrupt political system.”
—Samuel Johnson (1709–1784)