Monday, May 16, 2005
The Gold Standard
I'm told that the reason the Newsweek story was so important, even though scads of other stories reporting Koran desecration by US interrogators and others had been published over the years, was that the Newsweek story was verified by a Pentagon source -- who has now apparently decided to screw the magazine. Anyway, the gold standard is US military personnel (or any non-detainee -- apparently because Those Evil Dark-Skinned Heathens can't be trusted) caught talking about Korans being thrown into toilets. So here you go:
Newsweek Got Gitmo Right May 16, 2005 Contrary to White House spin, the allegations of religious desecration at Guantanamo published by Newsweek on May 9, 2005, are common among ex-prisoners and have been widely reported outside the United States. Several former detainees at the Guantanamo and Bagram prisons have reported instances of their handlers sitting or standing on the Koran, throwing or kicking it in toilets, and urinating on it. Prior to the Newsweek article, the New York Times reported a Guantanamo insider asserting that the commander of the facility was compelled by prisoner protests to address the problem and issue an apology. One such incident (during which the Koran was allegedly thrown in a pile and stepped on) prompted a hunger strike among Guantanamo detainees in March 2002. Regarding this, the New York Times in a May 1, 2005, article interviewed a former detainee, Nasser Nijer Naser al-Mutairi, who said the protest ended with a senior officer delivering an apology to the entire camp. And the Times reports: "A former interrogator at Guantanamo, in an interview with the Times, confirmed the accounts of the hunger strikes, including the public expression of regret over the treatment of the Korans." (Neil A. Lewis and Eric Schmitt, "Inquiry Finds Abuses at Guantanamo Bay," New York Times, May 1, 2005.)Okay, reporters -- here's your gold standard. And it's only two weeks old. When will the mainstream press stop cowering in front of Bush like a bunch of incontinent Cocker spaniels?
More blogs about politics.
