Wednesday, December 06, 2006
Good evening
during my work with Iraqi NGOs , dealing with human rights issues, I met this man, he was released recently from an Iraqi prison, and I asked him to write me his testimony
now, you all can read it, and recognize what a kind of new government we have in Iraq these days
Mr Bush trying always to support this government , and telling the world that this is unity government, doing its best to make iraqis more happy and celebrate democracy
this is the daily life story in Iraq, besides the kidnapping and bloodshed everywhere
may be the idea is : give it an iraqi face
means, let some of iraqis accomplish our mission
our mission is to stay in iraq for decades
so, we will terrify them , or kill them, to accomplish the mission
sorry , its a long testimony, but want you to see what is the alternative of Saddam Hussain , we gain
faiza
****************************************
On the 28th of August 2005, and after 10p.m. a combined force of American forces and national guards launched a raid on my brother's home; that force consisted of four American Humvees filled with American soldiers and twelve truck loaded with Iraqi soldiers, more than 15 American and Iraqi persons entered the house in a terrifying and irritating manner.
My nephews came crying for my help considering the absence of my brother that night; so I went to my brother's house and welcomed them and introduced my self as the chief engineer in the science and technology ministry, and told them that my brother is not available for the time being and that I'm ready for and questions. So they told my that they're searching the house for anything, and when not finding anything illegal in the house; their commander turned to a table in the living room that was used for studying by my nephews, some holy books was lying on that table, he began to search the table and asked : ( why so many holy books? It's just too many?), I told him that every one in the family has his own book, afterwards he began to look at papers in which was articles downloaded from the internet from various sites, some talks about the violence in Iraq and it's future and anti violence methods, some about the political situation in Iraq and talks about some well known political figures like Ahmed Al-Jalaby, so he asked : (What is this? ) and since I didn't know the contents of those papers; I took a quick look at them and told him what's in it, so he said : (I'll take them and show them to my superiors) he took them with five holy books and left the house, and the front door one of his force members whispered something in his ears so he came back and asked me : ( what kind of a car is your brother's ? And where is it now? ) so I told him that it is a Opel – Omega / station and it's in our father's garage, so he said : (I want to search it !!) so we moved with some of his force members to my father's house, they searched it and found nothing, ?( it was just out from the workshop), so he turned at me and asked ( what about that car in the back? ) and it was my car, he said: ( so you're coming with us for some question about your brother, so they took me and the two cars.
They hand-cuffed me and threw me in the back of a small lorry and I was transferred to Al-Muthanna brigade HQ. they blind folded my eyes before reaching the HQ, after stepping out of the vehicle, some one came to me and said (with a familiar voice which I couldn't recognize) that I'm not the one and that I'll be out by tomorrow and that it was just (routine work), afterwards I was transferred to a room and was questioned about my brother only in a friendly manner. In the end I was told that I will be released by tomorrow right after my papers was shown to the brigade commander probably by noon. He untied my hands from the back and cuffed my from the front and he also made the cuffs very flexible so I could move my hand however I wanted and he asked the guards at the rooms door to take good care of me, and I was left waiting for my release.
Next day's morning they brought me some good breakfast, water and tea; they untied me and told me: (you can take of the fold around your eyes while you're eating). I waited until the night came and nothing happened, then the situation changed completely, some guys came and talked to me in a vary harsh way and they started to kick me and hit me and spit on me and they took me to someone to investigate with me and they called him (Sir), he started to ask me questions about people I don't know, and every time I said I don't know I got hit. Afterwards I was asked to speak about the working terrorists in my neighborhood that I live in, my answer was that I know none of them, and the one that I got to see accidentally is unrecognizable. They asked me to talk about the terrorist attacks conducted in my neighborhood ( conducted against the American and National forces), and because I don't know anything except what I hear, I had nothing to tell them, so they started to kick me and hit me and then to electrify me more than once combined with threatening me that I will be shot, and they started to ask me about things and materials they claim was found in my brother's house, and my answer was I don't know anything about those things, and that I've never seen such thing in my brother's house when I got arrested, the Americans attended some of the investigations and watched my torture, not only that but once one of the American brought some beers to the investigator, I heard them talking about that beer because they didn't know I can speak English.
The Americans used to come to the jail and never spoke with us, and we were warned by the guards not to speak with any of them or even answer their questions. And the weirdest thing that happened, a force from Al-Muthanna brigade detained an Iraqi family living in Al-Hurria city in Baghdad, and they were questioned right in front of our eyes and they confessed to bombing two cars and a number of weapons and explosives was found in their house . The Americans came one day later and released this family.
Adding to all that, my cousin was detained with me three days after my capture and he was forced to sign a false testimony against me so they'll have a proving witness, and he was released 18 days later after a deal was made that he will be an information source to the Brigade.
In the tents right in front of my I saw how some detainees were manipulated to convince other detainees to speak and sometimes accuse them with very serious charges.
The investigation repeated four times during the first two days, each one took not less than three hours, after which I was left in a solitary prison for at least four weeks, and after each investigation and torture festival I was forced to sign and seal with my finger print on papers in which I don’t know the contents because at that time I'm almost passed out.
Four weeks later a force came to the brigade HQ, which turned out to be a Bader organization force which supervise Al-Jaderiah shelter, they took me and seven other detainees, they are :
1. Hameed Kameel Shared
2. Taha Hussain
3. Readh Mustafa
4. rabah mahmood
5. basim hammed khalaf
6. fauzi kareem
7. muhanned eesaa
We were transferred in twos, each couple in a deferent car, in the way they continuously spit and talk to us in bad language and beat us until we reached Al-Jaderiah shelter, when there, a man said : ( don't hit them cause the master (Saeed) doesn't except!! )
I was almost pleased to hear that but that only lasted five minutes, they made us sit fronting a wall with our eyes folded and hands cuffed behind our back and a new cycle of pain started.
This cycle started by: getting kicked by every one who pass that way saying: (kicking and torturing us will make them closer to god). And any one wants to put down his cigarette, our bodies were their favorite ash tray, and every (10-15) minutes a person will come out from a near by room, his name was (captain suhail ) he claimed he was from (Al-Zaobaee tribe) and he used to have this thick cudgel to hit us with on the head and shoulders many times.
This person lives in (Al-Dahab Al-Abead) village in (Abu-Ghareeb) and he's actually from (Al-Sadaa Al-Tewaal) tribe from Al-Dewaniah, and he works as an inelegance officer in Al-Muthana brigade, and represents the liaison officer in the minister of interior office, he is responsible of bringing any detained person how live in (Abu-Ghareeb) and put him in Al-Jaderiah shelter, he brought only from (Abu-Ghareeb) about 37 detainee, from a number of 168 detainee in Al-Jaderiah shelter when cracked by the American forces.
With all the hitting he threatens us to talk like he wants and like the prison's administration wants. As turned out he was well aware of the previous investigation in the past locations. And he had many human resources supporting him with information using mobile phones, paying them about 300 dollars a month and he knows every little thing about us and there's no use of what he called "denial" .
The first detainee entered the investigation room and immediately started to yell and squeal and we heard the beating and the torture and the swearing clearly, the investigation lasted almost 2 hours. Then he was dragged out of the room and thrown hand cuffed and blind folded and bloody. They lifted the eye folds from our eyes just to see him, and they told him to advice us! He asked us to sign whatever they want and warned us that our fate will be worst than his, the captain told us it's only the first round and there's still more to come, now it's my turn.
I was dragged into the room, and more than ten persons started to hit me with various hitting instruments like cables, thick wooden cudgels, metal pipes, and others, afterwards they lifted me and hung me to the wall (hand cuffed from behind) and started to hit me again, this time asking me about terrorists working in my neighborhood, and because I never heard of any of them, my answer always was that I don't know them, and their reaction was more hitting and torture for long hours, I was saved by losing conscious, I woke up getting kicked in the pathway and dragged again in the torture room ( after my torture session I don't know what happened to the group I'm with) so they started to torture me again by pinning me to the ground and hitting me with all the bats and cables by the hands of 10 or more persons, to get hit anywhere I like! and however I like!, this hitting caused several wounds in my body and covered the floor with blood, I knew that when their superior asks them to untie me and drag me on the floor to clean the blood with my cloths. This lasted many hours and I was saved again by loosing conscious. So I was dragged once again in the room and was left hanging from the wall with weights hanging from my penis!!! That made me lose the sense in that area and then losing conscious because of the pain, then get awaken by throwing cold water on me.
This scene was repeated thoroughly and more often, the torture consisted of:
1. hitting with various tools ( thick cudgels, cables, metal pipes, metal ribbons)
2. electric shocks in various parts of the body and especially the penis
3. forcing me to drink allot of water mixed with diuretic solution, and tie my penis with a rubber band to forbid me from urinating
4. Hanging me from the wall while hanging weights from my penis for long hours.
5. Threaten to sexually assault me.
6. play with my sexual organs
7. frightening me by shooting gun round near and above my head
8. Threaten to sexually abuse my women! After bringing them to the shelter
9. Cut off all food or drinks (except the water I was forced to drink with the diuretic solution) during the investigation period.
10. Finger nails extraction
11. hanging me to the wall for long hours until I fade out, knowing that the hanging method is by handcuffing my hands to the back and hang me by them so my shoulder get dislocated.
12. Hang me to the wall and hit me with several tools of torture until the cuffs breaks, and that happened many times.
In the end, and after six days of continues torture, I turned into a hallow body with nothing working except breathing! I was forced to sign on a testimony without reading or knowing what's in it, and then thrown in the pathway for long hours and then was moved to a small room ( 2.5m * 2.5m) which I found about 30 other detainees, then after three days I was moved to a near by room (7m * 3.5m) and there were about 70 detainees there ( the numbers increased afterwards and reached about 115 in that room), and I've seen many unbelievable things in that room and as follows :
1. There's no enough room for everybody, so the detainees were sitting and sleeping over each other and most of them suffered from burns and fractions and severe wounds, some of them was infected with contagious diseases like TB and scabies.
2. everybody used to urinate in plastic bottles near the room's door and there were more than 20 bottles there, visits to the water circle is made every 4 days, we were separated in groups, each group is 15 detainee they go and come under severe hitting and language, the detainee is allowed to only 1 minute in the WC and then he had to leave to let another one in. and in case any of them needed to go during these four days he would do it in a plastic bag (right in front of everybody) and put the bag near the plastic bottles. Those bottles and bags are empties every four days when going to the WC.
3. Seduce and convince some of the detainees to report about all what they know or hear or think and they sometimes make up stories about their fellow detainees so they will be dragged and questioned and forced to confess the new information.
4. yell at the detainees who's names are Sunni like ( Omar, Baker, marwan) and call them the worst names like ( sun of a b..ch, bastard, and much more).
5. no medical care was available at all, the detainee was left to die from his injuries caused by torture, knowing that the prison's environment is ideal for bacteria and viruses, a group of detainees died for these reasons, like :
a. Alaa Khareeb Hassan
b. Mohammed Khadim
c. Thameer Mansour Hammed
d. Husham Abaas
e. Omar Ali Mohammed
f. Khalid Younis Muhseen
g. Ali Farhan Mohammed
h. Waheed Mahmmod Abdulah
i. Haitham Radhi
6. Allot of contagious skin diseases was spread like scabies and lice, with no action taken by the management.
7. The unavailability of water, each group of five was given a 2ltr bottle to use in 2-3 days, some of the detainees drunk from the urine bottles in the room.
8. taking off the detainees shoes and underwear
9. Forcing some of the detainees to make sex with other inmates.
10. Convince some of the detainees to give them cigarettes in exchange for information.
11. Finger nails extraction
12. drilling
13. cutting pieces from the body using a grinding machine
14. Burning area from the body, especially the penis using melted nylon.
15. Inserting solid objects in the rectum, like thick wooden or metal pipes or a vacuum cleaner stick! Noticing the enjoyment of the person doing this action.
16. forcing the detainee to stand on his feet for long hours
17. Leaving the near dead detainees to die without any medical care! And kick their bodies after they die and spit on them.
18. Negotiate the release of some of the detainees in exchange for a big amount of money, then kill them outside the prison.
19. punish and hit the detainees on a daily basis inside the room, after 2-3 guards comes in and push every one to one corner and start hitting them.
On the 13th November 2005 an American force came to the shelter ( note that the Americans used to come to the shelter frequently, and they know about the detainees, they came more than once and we could hear the guards talking about them saying that the Americans are here), this force opened the building and all the doors and archived all the torture in photos and brought allot of food and moved some of the detainees to the hospital in a hurry. Then we were moved to Abu-Ghareeb prison, to stay only 19 days with proper medical care and good food. The Americans questioned every one of us alone for at least five times. The questioning involved writing personal information and asking about things that happened and asking about lost American soldiers in Iraq, usually the investigation is made by a team of three persons, one of them was an interpreter the other is just watching and the third is the one doing the questioning. The prison management brought a group of judges, which turned out to be from the central court to monitor and take an idea about the torture the detainees suffered, the judges was not welcomed by the detainees, and they even throw rocks at them, because one of the judges was the same judges who used to investigate with them in the shelter after the torture session end and always use to say : ( why do you bring him walking, care him with a blanket) that judge provoked the detainees by saying they were lying and there wasn't any torture.
The judges came again and the interview went naturally, the judges listened to the detainees and promised them good.
The judges came for the third time with the detainees case files and called each one alone, as it turned out that all the detainees were accused with suspicion of terrorism under subject 194, afterwards the detainees asked the prison management to arrange protection by the ministry of interior, and most of them asked for …. To the united states of America, and filed a written request.
Depending on which, the American officer responsible of running the prison came; and after listening to our demands and fears from going back under the control of the ministry of defense and avenge us, so he answered that he will take our demands to the US representative. Two days later the American officer came back to tell us that there is no problem with our ….. To the US but after finalizing our cases with the Iraqi courts. And didn't set any dates.
By the 4th of December 2005 we were moved to Al-Ressaffah jail compound near the ministry of defense, that compound is run by the ministry of justice, and all the guards and management are members in Al-Mahdi Army militia – so said the guards- . What is interesting here is that the Abu-Ghareb jail management ( the Americans) lied to the detainees by telling them that they are moving for their release in the next morning, they even told Al-Ressaffah prison compound management that those detainees are very dangerous Arab terrorists.
In this compound, they started to write down our statements and we were brought forward in front of the central court in groups and most of the cases were referred to a medical committee to prove the torture marks, this statement writing took about three weeks, going to the committee took about four months, and some of the detainees wasn't referred to the committee until now.
Everything stopped since and started to move in a very slow way, it's like the Al-Jadereah shelter detainees case were lost ? There's no answer from the American or the compound management.
An American named Mr. Apple used to come weekly, he was the supervisor and the follow-up person for the compound management performance , he promised us in his first and second visit with a glamorous and beautiful hopes, but it turned out to be all lies and deception, he even said : ( I know you know I'm lying but what can I do? It's not in my hands!). once an important person from the American foreign affairs came and we were told about his presence by the prison's management, we prepared a few demands regarding speeding up the process and to identify the one's responsible, we didn't mention how bad it was in the prison or anything from the side that we were suffering from, but when he came he didn't speak with any of the detainee, and when we wanted to talk to him we were stopped by his bodyguards. And more of that he refused to take our written demands, all what he did was taking a quick glance at the WC and went out without saying a word.
The prison's management belonged to Al-Mahdi army militia and they started the first day we were in to ask question about our cases and tried to recruit some of the detainees to be like informers especially the ones belongs to the same region they are (Shiaa) the relation between us and the management got a little tense, and they started to bother the detainees parents and visitors and they forbid anything from reaching the prisoners, they even killed two of one of the detainees brothers, and then it was the biggest crime, they killed one of the detainees his name was ( Ali Sulaiman) , they took him from the compound to an unknown location and his parents found him dead with torture marks on his body.
This situation lasted, and the prison's management started to rise the harassing, the detainee will now go to the solitary for the smallest thing, and they separated the brothers in deferent room, or the father and the son.
By the 29th of August 2006, all the detainees were moved to (Al-Baladyat prison) in Baghdad which is one of the central prison belongs to the ministry of justice, the detainees were surprised that the services in the prison is very bad, there is no medical care of any kind, the prison's management told us to ask our parents to bring medications!! This prison is in an area controlled by Al-Mahdi army militia, so all the detainees were worried about their lives.
On the 5th of September 2006 I was brought forward to court, and the judge decided to set me free for the lack of evidence.
I remained under the pressure and blackmail of the prison's management until I was released on the 2nd of October 2006 with three of my inmates, one of them was Syrian. At the prison's gate my brother was waiting for me in his car and he hired a group of police officers to secure me and to reach home safe, I asked my inmates to come with us but they refused, two car followed us, a BMW and a Toyota Crown both with black windows. But after running fast and ending the chase in a movie like way, we reached our home safe, three days later I found out that the inmates who were released with me were killed and buried in (Al-Najaf) symmetry and their parents took their bodies by paying a lot of money to move the bodies from Najaf to Baghdad.
I stayed about an hour in my house and moved to another house to stay for a few days and then left the country hoping to see it again.
during my work with Iraqi NGOs , dealing with human rights issues, I met this man, he was released recently from an Iraqi prison, and I asked him to write me his testimony
now, you all can read it, and recognize what a kind of new government we have in Iraq these days
Mr Bush trying always to support this government , and telling the world that this is unity government, doing its best to make iraqis more happy and celebrate democracy
this is the daily life story in Iraq, besides the kidnapping and bloodshed everywhere
may be the idea is : give it an iraqi face
means, let some of iraqis accomplish our mission
our mission is to stay in iraq for decades
so, we will terrify them , or kill them, to accomplish the mission
sorry , its a long testimony, but want you to see what is the alternative of Saddam Hussain , we gain
faiza
****************************************
On the 28th of August 2005, and after 10p.m. a combined force of American forces and national guards launched a raid on my brother's home; that force consisted of four American Humvees filled with American soldiers and twelve truck loaded with Iraqi soldiers, more than 15 American and Iraqi persons entered the house in a terrifying and irritating manner.
My nephews came crying for my help considering the absence of my brother that night; so I went to my brother's house and welcomed them and introduced my self as the chief engineer in the science and technology ministry, and told them that my brother is not available for the time being and that I'm ready for and questions. So they told my that they're searching the house for anything, and when not finding anything illegal in the house; their commander turned to a table in the living room that was used for studying by my nephews, some holy books was lying on that table, he began to search the table and asked : ( why so many holy books? It's just too many?), I told him that every one in the family has his own book, afterwards he began to look at papers in which was articles downloaded from the internet from various sites, some talks about the violence in Iraq and it's future and anti violence methods, some about the political situation in Iraq and talks about some well known political figures like Ahmed Al-Jalaby, so he asked : (What is this? ) and since I didn't know the contents of those papers; I took a quick look at them and told him what's in it, so he said : (I'll take them and show them to my superiors) he took them with five holy books and left the house, and the front door one of his force members whispered something in his ears so he came back and asked me : ( what kind of a car is your brother's ? And where is it now? ) so I told him that it is a Opel – Omega / station and it's in our father's garage, so he said : (I want to search it !!) so we moved with some of his force members to my father's house, they searched it and found nothing, ?( it was just out from the workshop), so he turned at me and asked ( what about that car in the back? ) and it was my car, he said: ( so you're coming with us for some question about your brother, so they took me and the two cars.
They hand-cuffed me and threw me in the back of a small lorry and I was transferred to Al-Muthanna brigade HQ. they blind folded my eyes before reaching the HQ, after stepping out of the vehicle, some one came to me and said (with a familiar voice which I couldn't recognize) that I'm not the one and that I'll be out by tomorrow and that it was just (routine work), afterwards I was transferred to a room and was questioned about my brother only in a friendly manner. In the end I was told that I will be released by tomorrow right after my papers was shown to the brigade commander probably by noon. He untied my hands from the back and cuffed my from the front and he also made the cuffs very flexible so I could move my hand however I wanted and he asked the guards at the rooms door to take good care of me, and I was left waiting for my release.
Next day's morning they brought me some good breakfast, water and tea; they untied me and told me: (you can take of the fold around your eyes while you're eating). I waited until the night came and nothing happened, then the situation changed completely, some guys came and talked to me in a vary harsh way and they started to kick me and hit me and spit on me and they took me to someone to investigate with me and they called him (Sir), he started to ask me questions about people I don't know, and every time I said I don't know I got hit. Afterwards I was asked to speak about the working terrorists in my neighborhood that I live in, my answer was that I know none of them, and the one that I got to see accidentally is unrecognizable. They asked me to talk about the terrorist attacks conducted in my neighborhood ( conducted against the American and National forces), and because I don't know anything except what I hear, I had nothing to tell them, so they started to kick me and hit me and then to electrify me more than once combined with threatening me that I will be shot, and they started to ask me about things and materials they claim was found in my brother's house, and my answer was I don't know anything about those things, and that I've never seen such thing in my brother's house when I got arrested, the Americans attended some of the investigations and watched my torture, not only that but once one of the American brought some beers to the investigator, I heard them talking about that beer because they didn't know I can speak English.
The Americans used to come to the jail and never spoke with us, and we were warned by the guards not to speak with any of them or even answer their questions. And the weirdest thing that happened, a force from Al-Muthanna brigade detained an Iraqi family living in Al-Hurria city in Baghdad, and they were questioned right in front of our eyes and they confessed to bombing two cars and a number of weapons and explosives was found in their house . The Americans came one day later and released this family.
Adding to all that, my cousin was detained with me three days after my capture and he was forced to sign a false testimony against me so they'll have a proving witness, and he was released 18 days later after a deal was made that he will be an information source to the Brigade.
In the tents right in front of my I saw how some detainees were manipulated to convince other detainees to speak and sometimes accuse them with very serious charges.
The investigation repeated four times during the first two days, each one took not less than three hours, after which I was left in a solitary prison for at least four weeks, and after each investigation and torture festival I was forced to sign and seal with my finger print on papers in which I don’t know the contents because at that time I'm almost passed out.
Four weeks later a force came to the brigade HQ, which turned out to be a Bader organization force which supervise Al-Jaderiah shelter, they took me and seven other detainees, they are :
1. Hameed Kameel Shared
2. Taha Hussain
3. Readh Mustafa
4. rabah mahmood
5. basim hammed khalaf
6. fauzi kareem
7. muhanned eesaa
We were transferred in twos, each couple in a deferent car, in the way they continuously spit and talk to us in bad language and beat us until we reached Al-Jaderiah shelter, when there, a man said : ( don't hit them cause the master (Saeed) doesn't except!! )
I was almost pleased to hear that but that only lasted five minutes, they made us sit fronting a wall with our eyes folded and hands cuffed behind our back and a new cycle of pain started.
This cycle started by: getting kicked by every one who pass that way saying: (kicking and torturing us will make them closer to god). And any one wants to put down his cigarette, our bodies were their favorite ash tray, and every (10-15) minutes a person will come out from a near by room, his name was (captain suhail ) he claimed he was from (Al-Zaobaee tribe) and he used to have this thick cudgel to hit us with on the head and shoulders many times.
This person lives in (Al-Dahab Al-Abead) village in (Abu-Ghareeb) and he's actually from (Al-Sadaa Al-Tewaal) tribe from Al-Dewaniah, and he works as an inelegance officer in Al-Muthana brigade, and represents the liaison officer in the minister of interior office, he is responsible of bringing any detained person how live in (Abu-Ghareeb) and put him in Al-Jaderiah shelter, he brought only from (Abu-Ghareeb) about 37 detainee, from a number of 168 detainee in Al-Jaderiah shelter when cracked by the American forces.
With all the hitting he threatens us to talk like he wants and like the prison's administration wants. As turned out he was well aware of the previous investigation in the past locations. And he had many human resources supporting him with information using mobile phones, paying them about 300 dollars a month and he knows every little thing about us and there's no use of what he called "denial" .
The first detainee entered the investigation room and immediately started to yell and squeal and we heard the beating and the torture and the swearing clearly, the investigation lasted almost 2 hours. Then he was dragged out of the room and thrown hand cuffed and blind folded and bloody. They lifted the eye folds from our eyes just to see him, and they told him to advice us! He asked us to sign whatever they want and warned us that our fate will be worst than his, the captain told us it's only the first round and there's still more to come, now it's my turn.
I was dragged into the room, and more than ten persons started to hit me with various hitting instruments like cables, thick wooden cudgels, metal pipes, and others, afterwards they lifted me and hung me to the wall (hand cuffed from behind) and started to hit me again, this time asking me about terrorists working in my neighborhood, and because I never heard of any of them, my answer always was that I don't know them, and their reaction was more hitting and torture for long hours, I was saved by losing conscious, I woke up getting kicked in the pathway and dragged again in the torture room ( after my torture session I don't know what happened to the group I'm with) so they started to torture me again by pinning me to the ground and hitting me with all the bats and cables by the hands of 10 or more persons, to get hit anywhere I like! and however I like!, this hitting caused several wounds in my body and covered the floor with blood, I knew that when their superior asks them to untie me and drag me on the floor to clean the blood with my cloths. This lasted many hours and I was saved again by loosing conscious. So I was dragged once again in the room and was left hanging from the wall with weights hanging from my penis!!! That made me lose the sense in that area and then losing conscious because of the pain, then get awaken by throwing cold water on me.
This scene was repeated thoroughly and more often, the torture consisted of:
1. hitting with various tools ( thick cudgels, cables, metal pipes, metal ribbons)
2. electric shocks in various parts of the body and especially the penis
3. forcing me to drink allot of water mixed with diuretic solution, and tie my penis with a rubber band to forbid me from urinating
4. Hanging me from the wall while hanging weights from my penis for long hours.
5. Threaten to sexually assault me.
6. play with my sexual organs
7. frightening me by shooting gun round near and above my head
8. Threaten to sexually abuse my women! After bringing them to the shelter
9. Cut off all food or drinks (except the water I was forced to drink with the diuretic solution) during the investigation period.
10. Finger nails extraction
11. hanging me to the wall for long hours until I fade out, knowing that the hanging method is by handcuffing my hands to the back and hang me by them so my shoulder get dislocated.
12. Hang me to the wall and hit me with several tools of torture until the cuffs breaks, and that happened many times.
In the end, and after six days of continues torture, I turned into a hallow body with nothing working except breathing! I was forced to sign on a testimony without reading or knowing what's in it, and then thrown in the pathway for long hours and then was moved to a small room ( 2.5m * 2.5m) which I found about 30 other detainees, then after three days I was moved to a near by room (7m * 3.5m) and there were about 70 detainees there ( the numbers increased afterwards and reached about 115 in that room), and I've seen many unbelievable things in that room and as follows :
1. There's no enough room for everybody, so the detainees were sitting and sleeping over each other and most of them suffered from burns and fractions and severe wounds, some of them was infected with contagious diseases like TB and scabies.
2. everybody used to urinate in plastic bottles near the room's door and there were more than 20 bottles there, visits to the water circle is made every 4 days, we were separated in groups, each group is 15 detainee they go and come under severe hitting and language, the detainee is allowed to only 1 minute in the WC and then he had to leave to let another one in. and in case any of them needed to go during these four days he would do it in a plastic bag (right in front of everybody) and put the bag near the plastic bottles. Those bottles and bags are empties every four days when going to the WC.
3. Seduce and convince some of the detainees to report about all what they know or hear or think and they sometimes make up stories about their fellow detainees so they will be dragged and questioned and forced to confess the new information.
4. yell at the detainees who's names are Sunni like ( Omar, Baker, marwan) and call them the worst names like ( sun of a b..ch, bastard, and much more).
5. no medical care was available at all, the detainee was left to die from his injuries caused by torture, knowing that the prison's environment is ideal for bacteria and viruses, a group of detainees died for these reasons, like :
a. Alaa Khareeb Hassan
b. Mohammed Khadim
c. Thameer Mansour Hammed
d. Husham Abaas
e. Omar Ali Mohammed
f. Khalid Younis Muhseen
g. Ali Farhan Mohammed
h. Waheed Mahmmod Abdulah
i. Haitham Radhi
6. Allot of contagious skin diseases was spread like scabies and lice, with no action taken by the management.
7. The unavailability of water, each group of five was given a 2ltr bottle to use in 2-3 days, some of the detainees drunk from the urine bottles in the room.
8. taking off the detainees shoes and underwear
9. Forcing some of the detainees to make sex with other inmates.
10. Convince some of the detainees to give them cigarettes in exchange for information.
11. Finger nails extraction
12. drilling
13. cutting pieces from the body using a grinding machine
14. Burning area from the body, especially the penis using melted nylon.
15. Inserting solid objects in the rectum, like thick wooden or metal pipes or a vacuum cleaner stick! Noticing the enjoyment of the person doing this action.
16. forcing the detainee to stand on his feet for long hours
17. Leaving the near dead detainees to die without any medical care! And kick their bodies after they die and spit on them.
18. Negotiate the release of some of the detainees in exchange for a big amount of money, then kill them outside the prison.
19. punish and hit the detainees on a daily basis inside the room, after 2-3 guards comes in and push every one to one corner and start hitting them.
On the 13th November 2005 an American force came to the shelter ( note that the Americans used to come to the shelter frequently, and they know about the detainees, they came more than once and we could hear the guards talking about them saying that the Americans are here), this force opened the building and all the doors and archived all the torture in photos and brought allot of food and moved some of the detainees to the hospital in a hurry. Then we were moved to Abu-Ghareeb prison, to stay only 19 days with proper medical care and good food. The Americans questioned every one of us alone for at least five times. The questioning involved writing personal information and asking about things that happened and asking about lost American soldiers in Iraq, usually the investigation is made by a team of three persons, one of them was an interpreter the other is just watching and the third is the one doing the questioning. The prison management brought a group of judges, which turned out to be from the central court to monitor and take an idea about the torture the detainees suffered, the judges was not welcomed by the detainees, and they even throw rocks at them, because one of the judges was the same judges who used to investigate with them in the shelter after the torture session end and always use to say : ( why do you bring him walking, care him with a blanket) that judge provoked the detainees by saying they were lying and there wasn't any torture.
The judges came again and the interview went naturally, the judges listened to the detainees and promised them good.
The judges came for the third time with the detainees case files and called each one alone, as it turned out that all the detainees were accused with suspicion of terrorism under subject 194, afterwards the detainees asked the prison management to arrange protection by the ministry of interior, and most of them asked for …. To the united states of America, and filed a written request.
Depending on which, the American officer responsible of running the prison came; and after listening to our demands and fears from going back under the control of the ministry of defense and avenge us, so he answered that he will take our demands to the US representative. Two days later the American officer came back to tell us that there is no problem with our ….. To the US but after finalizing our cases with the Iraqi courts. And didn't set any dates.
By the 4th of December 2005 we were moved to Al-Ressaffah jail compound near the ministry of defense, that compound is run by the ministry of justice, and all the guards and management are members in Al-Mahdi Army militia – so said the guards- . What is interesting here is that the Abu-Ghareb jail management ( the Americans) lied to the detainees by telling them that they are moving for their release in the next morning, they even told Al-Ressaffah prison compound management that those detainees are very dangerous Arab terrorists.
In this compound, they started to write down our statements and we were brought forward in front of the central court in groups and most of the cases were referred to a medical committee to prove the torture marks, this statement writing took about three weeks, going to the committee took about four months, and some of the detainees wasn't referred to the committee until now.
Everything stopped since and started to move in a very slow way, it's like the Al-Jadereah shelter detainees case were lost ? There's no answer from the American or the compound management.
An American named Mr. Apple used to come weekly, he was the supervisor and the follow-up person for the compound management performance , he promised us in his first and second visit with a glamorous and beautiful hopes, but it turned out to be all lies and deception, he even said : ( I know you know I'm lying but what can I do? It's not in my hands!). once an important person from the American foreign affairs came and we were told about his presence by the prison's management, we prepared a few demands regarding speeding up the process and to identify the one's responsible, we didn't mention how bad it was in the prison or anything from the side that we were suffering from, but when he came he didn't speak with any of the detainee, and when we wanted to talk to him we were stopped by his bodyguards. And more of that he refused to take our written demands, all what he did was taking a quick glance at the WC and went out without saying a word.
The prison's management belonged to Al-Mahdi army militia and they started the first day we were in to ask question about our cases and tried to recruit some of the detainees to be like informers especially the ones belongs to the same region they are (Shiaa) the relation between us and the management got a little tense, and they started to bother the detainees parents and visitors and they forbid anything from reaching the prisoners, they even killed two of one of the detainees brothers, and then it was the biggest crime, they killed one of the detainees his name was ( Ali Sulaiman) , they took him from the compound to an unknown location and his parents found him dead with torture marks on his body.
This situation lasted, and the prison's management started to rise the harassing, the detainee will now go to the solitary for the smallest thing, and they separated the brothers in deferent room, or the father and the son.
By the 29th of August 2006, all the detainees were moved to (Al-Baladyat prison) in Baghdad which is one of the central prison belongs to the ministry of justice, the detainees were surprised that the services in the prison is very bad, there is no medical care of any kind, the prison's management told us to ask our parents to bring medications!! This prison is in an area controlled by Al-Mahdi army militia, so all the detainees were worried about their lives.
On the 5th of September 2006 I was brought forward to court, and the judge decided to set me free for the lack of evidence.
I remained under the pressure and blackmail of the prison's management until I was released on the 2nd of October 2006 with three of my inmates, one of them was Syrian. At the prison's gate my brother was waiting for me in his car and he hired a group of police officers to secure me and to reach home safe, I asked my inmates to come with us but they refused, two car followed us, a BMW and a Toyota Crown both with black windows. But after running fast and ending the chase in a movie like way, we reached our home safe, three days later I found out that the inmates who were released with me were killed and buried in (Al-Najaf) symmetry and their parents took their bodies by paying a lot of money to move the bodies from Najaf to Baghdad.
I stayed about an hour in my house and moved to another house to stay for a few days and then left the country hoping to see it again.
# posted by Faiza Al-Araji @ 9:57 pm 
