| LONDON, February 10 (IslamOnline.net & News Agencies) ? As a US military investigation indicated that sexually-oriented tactics were part of interrogation methods used against detainees in the Guantanamo Bay, a British TV channel is preparing a ?reality show? that seeks to test the effectiveness of the torture methods used against detainees in notorious US-administrated detention camps in Guantanamo, Iraq and Afghanistan. ?Guantanamo Guidebook?, set to be broadcast on Channel 4 by the end of February, films seven British volunteers -? three Muslims and four white Britons ?- locked up in a makeshift detention center at a warehouse in east London as they are subjected for over a period of 48 hours to a range of torture techniques known to be used at the Guantanamo Bay by US interrogation experts, Reuters said. The show, produced by the Production company Twenty, is seeking answers on whether the torture methods applied by US investigators at the US navy base in Cuba, Iraq and Afghanistan can be justified in efforts to combat terrorism. ?We want the viewers to watch techniques that we know are used at Guantanamo and really to raise questions about whether torture is justified and if it works and what does it say about our values as a western society,? a spokesman for the British station told Agence France Presse (AFP) Tuesday, on condition of anonymity. ?The information gained through torture has been justified as the center of the war against terrorism,? he added. Subject to Torture The torture techniques used in the show were based on information gained from declassified US government documents, a Channel Four spokesman said, declining to provide additional details, according to Reuters. He said the volunteers were rigorously screened prior to their participation and received intensive medical and psychological attention during and after the taping of the show. Over the brutal torture techniques, two of the seven volunteers failed to last the course, with one choosing to pull out and the other being forced to quit due to hypothermia, the spokesman said. Before embarking on the ordeal, the seven offered their opinions on torture and its justification, with some openly supporting the US methods used at Guantanamo, where over 500 detainees have been held for two-and-a-half years. ?At the end of it, we see what the volunteers now think about torture and the use of torture,? the spokesman told AFP. The International Committee of the Red Cross has accused the United States of committing ?war crimes? in Guantanamo. In August, Briton Martin Malaga unveiled the ill-treatment of prisoners at the infamous camp, accusing his US jailers of sexual assault and physical violence in his 8ft-by-6ft cell. In a July letter to Maj. Gen. Donald Ryder, the Army's provost marshal, FBI counterterrorism official Thomas Harrington confirmed that FBI agents saw military interrogators use abusive tactics on prisoners at Guantanamo. Inhumane Treatment The British show is designed to ?examine if torture is justified to combat the threat faced from terrorists such as Al-Qaeda,? the Channel 4 spokesman said. ?We also show photographs of men tortured to death in countries which supply information to the US and Britain,? said Dorothy Byrne, head of news and current affairs at Channel 4. Steve Crawshaw, director of Human Rights Watch?s London office said the show could be a useful way to show viewers that seemingly innocuous techniques like sleep deprivation can have a devastating effect. ?The US administration has defined torture very narrowly and avoided the other key phrase, which is ?cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment,?? he said. ?Without having seen it, my understanding of the Channel Four program is that it shows clearly that even a very small amount of these treatments can be seriously damaging.? Sexual Tactics In a separate related context, a wide-ranging Pentagon investigation, yet to be released, indicated that sexually oriented tactics may have been part of the fabric of interrogation methods in the Guantanamo detention camp, especially yin 2003, according to the Washington Post Thursday, February 10. ?A military investigation uncovered numerous instances in which female interrogators, using dye, pretended to spread menstrual blood on Muslim men, according to a senior Defense Department official familiar with the investigation.? The paper added that a number of Guantanamo detainees earlier told their lawyers that female interrogators in the detention camp repeatedly used sexually suggestive tactics to try to humiliate and pry information from devout Muslim men held at the US military prison. ?The prisoners have told their lawyers, who compiled the accounts, that female interrogators regularly violated Muslim taboos about sex and contact with women. The female interrogators used to rub their bodies against the men, wear skimpy clothes in front of them, make sexually explicit remarks and touch them provocatively, at least eight detainees said in documents or through their attorneys.? |
This is on Channel 4 tonight at 11:05.It should be interesting (though probably disturbing)viewing.It may well give an insight into why the "lovers of freedom"feel they can do whatever the Hell they like to People.