The Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) runs a top-secret interrogation facility in Jordan, where 11 detainees who are considered senior Al-Qaeda's members are being held, the Tel Aviv-based Haaretz reported Wednesday.
The news came one day after Human Rights Watch said in a report that at least 11 al-Qaeda suspects have “disappeared” in U.S. custody. U.S. officials are holding the detainees in undisclosed locations, where some have reportedly been tortured, the report added.
The 46-page report, The United States’ ‘Disappeared’: The CIA’s Long-Term ‘Ghost Detainees,’ described how the CIA is holding al-Qaeda suspects in “secret locations,” reportedly outside the United States, with no notification to their families, no access to the International Committee of the Red Cross or oversight of any sort of their treatment, and in some cases, no acknowledgement that they are even being held.
“‘Disappearances’ were a trademark abuse of Latin American military dictatorships in their ‘dirty war’ on alleged subversion,” said Reed Brody, special counsel with Human Rights Watch. “Now they have become a United States tactic in its conflict with al-Qaeda.”
Under international law, enforced disappearances occur when persons are deprived of their liberty and the detaining authority refuses to disclose their fate or whereabouts or refuses to acknowledge their detention, which places the detainees outside the protection of the law.
The report profiles 11 “disappeared” prisoners. They include Khalid Shaikh Muhammed, the alleged principal architect of the September 11 attacks; Abu Zubayda, reputedly a close aide of Osama bin Laden; Ramzi bin al-Shibh, who but for his failure to get a U.S. visa might have been one of the 9/11 hijackers; and Hambali, an alleged key al-Qaeda ally in Southeast Asia. Some, such as Khalid Shaikh Muhammed, are reported to have been tortured in custody. (albawaba.com)
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