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KW: I actually have chills, and tears in my eyes from reading this article…
(excerpt from)The Washington Independent
So Is It Torture If Done To These Two Americans?
By Spencer Ackerman / 4-24-09
The North Korean regime will indict two American journalists from Current TV who had been reporting on North Korean refugees in China. After holding them for the past five weeks, they’ll be charged with “illegal entry” into North Korea and the perpetration of “hostile acts” against the paranoid Communist nation. What happens in North Korean jails? Why, the sort of things that the Bush administration said were legal to perform on detainees in U.S. custody. Is it torture then, Mr. Cheney?
Take a look at the most recent State Department human rights report on North Korea, updated in February. Under the section forthrightly titled “Torture and Other Cruel, Inhuman, or Degrading Treatment or Punishment,” it lists that among other tortures, the North Koreans prefer “prolonged periods of exposure to the elements”; “confinement for up to several weeks in small ‘punishment cells’ in which prisoners were unable to stand upright or lie down”; “being forced to kneel or sit immobilized for long periods”; and “being forced to stand up and sit down to the point of collapse.” If these aren’t exactly the “confinement box” or “stress positions” or the “cold cell,” they’re close cousins…
Has Kim Jong-Il written his thank-you note to Dick Cheney yet?
Filed under: international politics, News, politics, US Politics
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