Iraq's Child Prisoners

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http://www.sundayherald.com/43796

 

Iraq's Child Prisoners

 

 

A Sunday Herald investigation has discovered that

coalition forces are holding more than 100 children in

jails such as Abu Ghraib. Witnesses claim that the

detainees – some as young as 10 – are also being

subjected to rape and torture

By Neil Mackay

 

 

It was early last October that Kasim Mehaddi Hilas

says he witnessed the rape of a boy prisoner aged

about 15 in the notorious Abu Ghraib prison in Iraq.

“The kid was hurting very bad and they covered all the

doors with sheets,” he said in a statement given to

investigators probing prisoner abuse in Abu Ghraib.

“Then, when I heard the screaming I climbed the door …

and I saw [the soldier’s name is deleted] who was

wearing a military uniform.” Hilas, who was himself

threatened with being sexually assaulted in Abu Graib,

then describes in horrific detail how the soldier

raped “the little kid”.

 

In another witness statement, passed to the Sunday

Herald, former prisoner Thaar Salman Dawod said: “[i

saw] two boys naked and they were cuffed together face

to face and [a US soldier] was beating them and a

group of guards were watching and taking pictures and

there was three female soldiers laughing at the

prisoners. The prisoners, two of them, were young.”

 

It’s not certain exactly how many children are being

held by coalition forces in Iraq, but a Sunday Herald

investigation suggests there are up to 107. Their

names are not known, nor is where they are being kept,

how long they will be held or what has happened to

them during their detention.

 

Proof of the widespread arrest and detention of

children in Iraq by US and UK forces is contained in

an internal Unicef report written in June. The report

has – surprisingly – not been made public. A key

section on child protection, headed “Children in

Conflict with the Law or with Coalition Forces”,

reads: “In July and August 2003, several meetings were

conducted with CPA (Coalition Provisional Authority) …

and Ministry of Justice to address issues related to

juvenile justice and the situation of children

detained by the coalition forces … Unicef is working

through a variety of channels to try and learn more

about conditions for children who are imprisoned or

detained, and to ensure that their rights are

respected.”

 

Another section reads: “Information on the number,

age, gender and conditions of incarceration is

limited. In Basra and Karbala children arrested for

alleged activities targeting the occupying forces are

reported to be routinely transferred to an internee

facility in Um Qasr. The categorisation of these

children as ‘internees’ is worrying since it implies

indefinite holding without contact with family,

expectation of trial or due process.”

 

The report also states: “A detention centre for

children was established in Baghdad, where according

to ICRC (International Committee of the Red Cross) a

significant number of children were detained. Unicef

was informed that the coalition forces were planning

to transfer all children in adult facilities to this

‘specialised’ child detention centre. In July 2003,

Unicef requested a visit to the centre but access was

denied. Poor security in the area of the detention

centre has prevented visits by independent observers

like the ICRC since last December.

 

“The perceived unjust detention of Iraqi males,

including youths, for suspected activities against the

occupying forces has become one of the leading causes

for the mounting frustration among Iraqi youths and

the potential for radicalisation of this population

group.”

 

Journalists in Germany have also been investigating

the detention and abuse of children in Iraq. One

reporter, Thomas Reutter of the TV programme Report

Mainz, interviewed a US army sergeant called Samuel

Provance, who is banned from speaking about his six

months stationed in Abu Ghraib but told Reutter of how

one 16-year-old Iraqi boy was arrested.

 

“He was terribly afraid,” Provance said. “He had the

skinniest arms I’ve ever seen. He was trembling all

over. His wrists were so thin we couldn’t even put

handcuffs on him. Right when I saw him for the first

time, and took him for interrogation, I felt sorry for

him.

 

“The interrogation specialists poured water over him

and put him into a car. Then they drove with him

through the night, and at that time it was very, very

cold. Then they smeared him with mud and showed him to

his father, who was also in custody. They had tried

out other interrogation methods on him, but he wasn’t

to be brought to talk. The interrogation specialists

told me, after the father had seen his son in this

state, his heart broke. He wept and promised to tell

them everything they wanted to know.”

 

An Iraqi TV reporter Suhaib Badr-Addin al-Baz saw the

Abu Ghraib children’s wing when he was arrested by

Americans while making a documentary. He spent 74 days

in Abu Ghraib.

 

“I saw a camp for children there,” he said. “Boys,

under the age of puberty. There were certainly

hundreds of children in this camp.” Al-Baz said he

heard a 12-year-old girl crying. Her brother was also

held in the jail. One night guards came into her cell.

“She was beaten,” said al-Baz. “I heard her call out,

‘They have undressed me. They have poured water over

me.’”

 

He says he heard her cries and whimpering daily –

this, in turn, caused other prisoners to cry as they

listened to her. Al-Baz also told of an ill

15-year-old boy who was soaked repeatedly with hoses

until he collapsed. Guards then brought in the child’s

father with a hood over his head. The boy collapsed

again.

 

Although most of the children are held in US custody,

the Sunday Herald has established that some are held

by the British Army. British soldiers tend to arrest

children in towns like Basra, which are under UK

control, then hand the youngsters over to the

Americans who interrogate them and detain them.

 

Between January and May this year the Red Cross

registered a total of 107 juveniles in detention

during 19 visits to six coalition prisons. The aid

organisation’s Rana Sidani said they had no complete

information about the ages of those detained, or how

they had been treated. The deteriorating security

situation has prevented the Red Cross visiting all

detention centres.

 

Amnesty International is outraged by the detention of

children. It is aware of “numerous human rights

violations against Iraqi juveniles, including

detentions, torture and ill-treatment, and killings”.

Amnesty has interviewed former detainees who say

they’ve seen boys as young as 10 in Abu Ghraib.

 

The organisation’s leaders have called on the

coalition governments to give concrete information on

how old the children are, how many are detained, why

and where they are being held, and in what

circumstances they are being detained. They also want

to know if the children have been tortured.

 

Alistair Hodgett, media director of Amnesty

International USA, said the coalition forces needed to

be “transparent” about their policy of child

detentions, adding: “Secrecy is one thing that rings

alarm bells.” Amnesty was given brief access to one

jail in Mosul, he said, but has been repeatedly turned

away from all others. He pointed out that even

countries “which don’t have good records”, such as

Libya, gave Amnesty access to prisons. “Denying access

just fuels the rumour mill,” he said.

 

Hodgett added that British and US troops should not be

detaining any Iraqis – let alone children – following

the recent handover of power. “They should all be held

by Iraqi authorities,” he said. “When the coalition

handed over Saddam they should have handed over the

other 3000 detainees.”

 

The British Ministry of Defence confirmed UK forces

had handed over prisoners to US troops, but a spokes

man said he did not know the ages of any detainees

given to the Americans.

 

The MoD also admitted it was currently holding one

prisoner aged under 18 at Shaibah prison near Um Qasr.

Since the invasion Britain has detained, and later

released, 65 under-18s. The MoD claimed the ICRC had

access to British jails and detainee lists.

 

High-placed officials in the Pentagon and Centcom told

the Sunday Herald that children as young as 14 were

being held by US forces. “We do have juveniles

detained,” a source said. “They have been detained as

they are deemed to be a threat or because they have

acted against the coalition or Iraqis.”

 

Officially, the Pentagon says it is holding “around 60

juvenile detainees primarily aged 16 and 17”, although

when it was pointed out that the Red Cross estimate is

substantially higher, a source admitted “numbers may

have gone up, we might have detained more kids”.

 

Officials would not comment about children under the

age of 16 being held prisoner. Sources said: ‘‘It’s a

real challenge ascertaining their ages. Unlike the UK

or the US, they don’t have IDs or birth certificates.”

The Sunday Herald has been told, however, that at

least five children aged under 16 are being kept at

Abu Ghraib and Camp Bucca.

 

A highly placed source in the Pentagon said: “We have

done investigations into accusations of juveniles

being abused and raped and can’t find anything that

resembles that.”

 

The Pentagon’s official policy is to segregate

juvenile prisoners from the rest of the prison

population, and allow young inmates to join family

members also being detained. “Our main concern is that

they are not abused or harassed by older detainees. We

know they need special treatment,” an official said.

 

Pentagon sources said they were unaware how long child

prisoners were kept in jail but said their cases were

reviewed every 90 days. The last review was early last

month. The sources confirmed the children had been

questioned and interrogated when initially detained,

but could not say whether this was “an adult-style

interrogation”.

 

The Norwegian government, which is part of the

“coalition of the willing”, has already said it will

tell the US that the alleged torture of children is

intolerable. Odd Jostein Sæter, parliamentary

secretary at the Norwegian prime minister’s office,

said: “Such assaults are unacceptable. It is against

international laws and it is also unacceptable from a

moral point of view. This is why we react strongly …

We are addressing this in a very severe and direct way

and present concrete demands. This is damaging the

struggle for democracy and human rights in Iraq.”

 

In Denmark, which is also in the coalition, Save the

Children called on its government to tell the

occupying forces to order the immediate release of

child detainees. Neals Hurdal, head of the Danish Save

the Children, said the y had heard rumours of children

in Basra being maltreated in custody since May.

 

Human Rights Watch (HRW) said it was “extremely

disturbed” that the coalition was holding children for

long periods in jails notorious for torture. HRW also

criticised the policy of categorising children as

“security detainees”, saying this did not give carte

blanche for them to be held indefinitely. HRW said if

there was evidence the children had committed crimes

then they should be tried in Iraqi courts, otherwise

they should be returned to their families.

 

Unicef is “profoundly disturbed” by reports of

children being abused in coalition jails. Alexandra

Yuster, Unicef’s senior adviser on child detention,

said that under international law children should be

detained only as a last resort and only then for the

shortest possible time.

 

They should have access to lawyers and their families,

be kept safe, healthy, educated, well-fed and not be

subjected to any form of mental or physical

punishment, she added. Unicef is now “desperately”

trying to get more information on the fate of the

children currently detained in coalition jails.

 

01 August 2004