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WAR WATCHDESPAIR AT GUANTÁNAMO BAYA U.S. military spokesperson reports 28 suicide attempts by 18 of the 680 prisoners the U.S. is holding at its Guantánamo Bay, Cuba detention center. Former prisoners report that uncertainty, fear and an overwhelming feeling of injustice drove them to despair. The head of the International Red Cross has appealed to President Bush to bring the detainees to trial and to initiate changes at the detention center. Thirty-five Afghans and Pakistanis recently released without charges told the NY Times stories of deprivation and desperation. They said that, for the first few months, they were kept in small wire-mesh cells (6-1/2 feet by 8 feet) with sides open to the elements. After their living conditions improved, detainees were allowed to leave their cells only for two 15-minute periods a week. AFGHAN MASSACREThe controversial film "Afghan Massacre: The Convoy of Death" alleges U.S. military involvement in a November 2001 massacre of thousands of Taliban prisoners in Afghanistan. The documentary was not shown in the U.S. until the public radio and television show Democracy Now! aired it in May 2003. The film includes testimony from witnesses who say that U.S. Special Forces shipped containers carrying thousands of prisoners into the desert and stood by as the U.S.'s Afghan allies shot survivors. Up to three thousand bodies lie buried in a mass grave. According to Dr. Sima Samar, chair of the Afghanistan Independent Human Rights Commission, the U.S. and the U.N. have refused to provide protection for witnesses of the massacre. Two of the witnesses interviewed in the film have already been killed. "Afghan Massacre" can be purchased from Atlantic Celtic Film Corporation at www.acftv.net. To obtain an audio or video copy of the Democracy Now! program, call (800) 881-2359. INSIDER CRITICIZES U.S. COUNTERTERRORISMRand Beers, a former top White House antiterrorism advisor, told the Boston Globe that the Bush administration "is making us less secure, not more secure." The administration, he says, has deprived domestic security of manpower, brainpower and money. Beers says the Iraq war has caused fractures in the country's counterterrorism alliances and could bring new recruits to al Qaeda. He also told the Globe that many government insiders thought the war was an "ill-conceived and poorly executed strategy." Beers now volunteers as a national security adviser to Sen. John F. Kerry (Mass.), a Democratic candidate for president. MILITARY AID TO COLUMBIAIn an amendment to the April 2003 supplemental military appropriations bill for the war in Iraq, Congress voted to increase military aid to Colombia from $500 million to $605 million. The U.S. is spending big to protect its oil interests and to defeat rebel groups who it simplistically considers "terrorist." The Colombia Support Network, CSN (www.colombiasupport.net) is spearheading a letter-writing and call-in campaign to Congress demanding a major reduction in military aid to Colombia. CSN supports and provides political space for organizations and individuals that work for a non-violent, just political solution to the conflict in Colombia. DEATH AND DESTRUCTION IN IRAQBased on a survey of 60 Iraqi hospitals from March 20 to April 20, the Associated Press says at least 3,240 Iraqi civilians died during the invasion of Iraq. This is more than the U.S. killed in the Gulf War of 1991. Iraq Body Count (www.iraqbodycount.org), a group of British and U.S. researchers, estimates the Iraqi civilian deaths at more than 5,570. Under international law, the U.S. is liable for injuries or damages in an unlawful combat operation, like that in Iraq. Meanwhile, Pentagon experts estimate that U.S. and British forces used 1,100-2,200 tons of depleted uranium (DU) in the recent war in Iraq. 375 tons were used in the 1991 Persian Gulf War. DU, the radioactive byproduct of uranium enrichment, is used in tank armor and armor-piercing weapons. DU has caused widespread cancer and potentially fatal kidney disease to Iraqis and U.S. soldiers, as well as environmental pollution. BORDER WARIn June the U.S. Border Patrol began "Operation Triple Strike" in Arizona, purportedly to thwart terrorists and smugglers by putting more border guards at more checkpoints. But "Triple Strike" will force migrants to travel through even more dangerous and remote desert and mountain terrain. According to the Public Policy Institute of California, the strategy of "prevention-through-deterrence," costing over $2 billion a year, has not prevented undocumented migration but has resulted in more deaths. In the last eight months, more than 60 migrants have died in the Arizona desert and 13 have been found murdered. Since 1994 there have been more than 2,400 migrant deaths recorded.
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