Former Dutch MP and Islam critic Ayaan Hirsi Ali has been awarded the Freedom of Expression prize by the Danish newspaper Jyllands-Posten. The jury said that Somali/Kenyan-born Ms Hirsi Ali deserved the prize because of "her unrelenting conviction that one's views are worth fighting for".
Ms Hirsi Ali now lives in the United States where she works for the rightwing American Enterprise Institute for Public Policy Research. She is known for her fierce criticism of conservative Islam and of the oppression of women by conservative Muslims. Together with Dutch director Theo van Gogh she made a short movie entitled Submission, which criticised the position of women in Islam. Mr Van Gogh was later killed by a radical Muslim.
Cartoons
Jyllands-Posten is the paper which in 2005 published a gallery of Mohammed cartoons by several artists which caused outrage in Muslim countries because the face of the prophet was visible and because the drawings associated Islam with terrorism. The newspaper instituted the prize after the protests in the Islamic world.
The creator of one of the cartoons, Kurt Westergaard, escaped unhurt earlier this year after an attempt on his life by a knife-wielding attacker.
© Radio Netherlands Worldwide
Thursday, April 29, 2010
Monday, April 26, 2010
UK 'involved' in regional tension
A senior Iranian lawmaker has condemned the provocative remarks made by Emirati officials, adding the US and Britain have always played a role in regional tensions.
"The voice of Britain is heard from the mouth of Emirate's foreign minister," Head of the National Security and Foreign Policy Committee of Iran's Parliament (Majlis) Alaeddin Boroujerdi told the Mehr News Agency on Monday.
In a futile attempt, the Emirati Foreign Minister Sheikh Abdullah bin Zayed al-Nahayan had tried to link the ownership of the three Persian Gulf islands of the Greater Tunb, the Lesser Tunb and Abu Musa to Israel's occupation of Palestinian territory.
Apart from a brief period of British rule in the 1800s, the three Persian Gulf islands are historically owned by Iran.
The islands were returned to Iran on November 30th, 1971 through a legal process long before the state of the United Arab Emirates was ever created.
"The United States and Britain exert pressure on Arab states which will occasionally lead to such remarks," Boroujerdi said.
He added that Iran's policy is based on promoting amicable relations with regional countries, particularly the Persian Gulf littoral states.
"Countries like the US and Britain have always attempted to portray a negative image of the Islamic Republic... since the victory of the Islamic Revolution (in 1979) to take advantage of good relations between Iran and Arab countries," the parliamentarian said.
He noted that Washington and London often plant security fears in the minds of weak-willed Arab statesmen in order to sell their most sophisticated weapons to these countries.
"The voice of Britain is heard from the mouth of Emirate's foreign minister," Head of the National Security and Foreign Policy Committee of Iran's Parliament (Majlis) Alaeddin Boroujerdi told the Mehr News Agency on Monday.
In a futile attempt, the Emirati Foreign Minister Sheikh Abdullah bin Zayed al-Nahayan had tried to link the ownership of the three Persian Gulf islands of the Greater Tunb, the Lesser Tunb and Abu Musa to Israel's occupation of Palestinian territory.
Apart from a brief period of British rule in the 1800s, the three Persian Gulf islands are historically owned by Iran.
The islands were returned to Iran on November 30th, 1971 through a legal process long before the state of the United Arab Emirates was ever created.
"The United States and Britain exert pressure on Arab states which will occasionally lead to such remarks," Boroujerdi said.
He added that Iran's policy is based on promoting amicable relations with regional countries, particularly the Persian Gulf littoral states.
"Countries like the US and Britain have always attempted to portray a negative image of the Islamic Republic... since the victory of the Islamic Revolution (in 1979) to take advantage of good relations between Iran and Arab countries," the parliamentarian said.
He noted that Washington and London often plant security fears in the minds of weak-willed Arab statesmen in order to sell their most sophisticated weapons to these countries.
Sunday, April 25, 2010
Kuwaitis disrupt Lankan event
A massive Sri Lankan celebration in Kuwait was interrupted after angry Kuwaitis claimed it violated Islamic rules. More than 5,000 Sri Lankans, including K.S.C. Dissanayake, Sri Lankan ambassador to Kuwait, had to leave the Jahra stadium after Kuwaiti Islamists invaded the field and pressed organisers to suspend the celebration and threatened to escalate the tense situation.
Negotiations between the event organisers, the police and the angry Kuwaitis failed to reach a compromise. The protesters said that the presence of men and women at the stadium and the playing of music on a Friday afternoon made the celebration “unacceptable” for not respecting Islamic values.
The ambassador, seeking to end the deadlock peacefully, urged his compatriots to cancel the celebrations two hours before schedule and to vacate the premises.
The police said that the Sri Lankans had all the necessary permits and did not break the law. Sri Lanka is organising on Monday a “Sri Lanka Culture Week” in Kuwait to help promote the country as a tourist and cultural destination. The event is hosted by Kuwait’s National Council for Culture, Arts and Letters and co-sponsored by the Sri Lanka Tourism Promotion Bureau and the Sri Lankan Airlines.
A28-member cultural troupe will perform 'Sri Lak Rangana', a fusion of historical and contemporary dance forms.
The week will also feature a handicraft exhibition of products, bronze items, masks, gems, jewellery and other ornaments while a food festival will introduce Sri Lankan cuisine to Kuwait residents.
Negotiations between the event organisers, the police and the angry Kuwaitis failed to reach a compromise. The protesters said that the presence of men and women at the stadium and the playing of music on a Friday afternoon made the celebration “unacceptable” for not respecting Islamic values.
The ambassador, seeking to end the deadlock peacefully, urged his compatriots to cancel the celebrations two hours before schedule and to vacate the premises.
The police said that the Sri Lankans had all the necessary permits and did not break the law. Sri Lanka is organising on Monday a “Sri Lanka Culture Week” in Kuwait to help promote the country as a tourist and cultural destination. The event is hosted by Kuwait’s National Council for Culture, Arts and Letters and co-sponsored by the Sri Lanka Tourism Promotion Bureau and the Sri Lankan Airlines.
A28-member cultural troupe will perform 'Sri Lak Rangana', a fusion of historical and contemporary dance forms.
The week will also feature a handicraft exhibition of products, bronze items, masks, gems, jewellery and other ornaments while a food festival will introduce Sri Lankan cuisine to Kuwait residents.
(Gulf News)
Saturday, April 24, 2010
Sarkozy defies legal advice and seeks ban on burkas in street
A BAN on full-face veils being worn in the street and other public places has been ordered by French president Nicolas Sarkozy.
In a surprise move, he defied the advice of experts brought in by the government who warned such a broad ban risked contravening France's constitution.
Government spokesman Luc Chatel said after yesterday's weekly cabinet meeting that the president had decided the
Government spokesman Luc Chatel said after yesterday's weekly cabinet meeting that the president had decided the
government should submit a bill to parliament next month on an overall ban on burka-like veils.
"The ban on veils covering the whole face should be general, in every public space, because the dignity of women cannot be put in doubt," Mr Chatel said.
It puts France on the same track as Belgium, which is also moving toward a complete ban in a similar reaction as Islamic culture has come into conflict with native European values. Mr Sarkozy has repeatedly said that such clothing oppresses women and is "not welcome" in France.
But Abdellatif Lemsibak, a member of the National Federation of Muslims of France, said he was shocked. "It's a transgression, an aggression even, on the level of personal liberty," he said. "The Muslims have the right to an orthodox expression of their religion."
The decision to seek a full ban, rather than a limited one, came as a surprise. After a cabinet meeting a week ago, a government spokesman said proposed legislation would take into account conclusions on the matter by the Council of State, France's highest administrative office.
The government had sought the council's opinion to ensure a law would pass constitutional muster, and it advised a full ban would be "legally very fragile."
A six-month parliamentary inquiry also concluded that a complete ban would raise constitutional issues, as well as enforcement problems.
France, a firmly secular country, has western Europe's largest Muslim population, estimated at five million.
People there worry about clashes in values as well as a spread of radical Islam. The authorities widely see the veil in light of gender equality and security issues.
In neighbouring Belgium, a similar initiative for a ban on full veils in public places, including in the streets, is expected to become law in July.
Muslim leaders in France say the face-covering veil is not a religious requirement of Islam but have cautioned against a ban.
The government spokesman said Mr Sarkozy considered burka-style veils that hide the face, such as niqabs, "do not pose a problem in a religious sense but threaten the dignity of women".
France outlawed Muslim headscarves and other "ostentatious" religious symbols from classrooms in 2004 after a marathon parliamentary debate.
Numerous girls wore headscarves in class, but only a tiny minority of women wear the all-covering veil. Nevertheless, debate on the question of whether a law is needed and how far it should reach has continued for nearly a year. Muslim leaders say the debate itself has stigmatised Muslims, as has a national debate on the French identity.
Mr Chatel said Mr Sarkozy had insisted that "everything should be done so that no-one feels stigmatised".
French Muslims torn over potential veil ban
PARIS — Muslims in the Arab world are incensed and Muslims in France are walking a delicate line after President Nicolas Sarkozy pushed for an all-out ban on full Islamic veils.
"Ridiculous" and "misplaced," said a Muslim vendor Thursday at an outdoor market in a working class, ethnically mixed Paris suburb. "Racist," said a Sunni Muslim cleric in Lebanon.
The rector of the Muslim Institute of the Paris Mosque, however, held off on harsh criticism, saying only that any ban should be properly explained, and noting that the Quran does not require women to cover their bodies and faces.
Sarkozy upped the stakes Wednesday in France's drive to abolish the all-encompassing veil, ordering a draft law banning them in all public places — defying France's highest administrative body, which says such a ban risks being declared unconstitutional.
Such a measure would put France on the same track as Belgium, which is also moving toward a complete ban amid fears of radicalism and growing Islamic populations in Europe. Sarkozy says such clothing oppresses women and is "not welcome" in France. French officials have also cited a concealed face as a security risk.
France's top government official for family issues, Nadine Morano, said the conservative government wants to "break this dynamic of invasion of burqas in our country."
While France has western Europe's largest Muslim population, only a tiny minority of Muslim women in France wear the burqa, which has only a mesh screen for the eyes, or niqab, which leaves a slit for the eyes.
"France is addressing a very strong message. It is a message on an international level to women. How can we explain that while women are fighting in Afghanistan for their freedom, for their dignity, in France we accept what they are fighting against?" Morano said on France-Info radio Thursday.
Abdel Halim Laeib, a market vendor in Livry-Gargan northeast of Paris, is worried that outlawing the veils would inflame tensions in a nation struggling to define its modern identity.
"I find it totally ridiculous," he said. "Every person has the right to practice their religion, in whatever way they want to. Personally, it doesn't bother me if someone wears the full veil, like a woman who can wear a miniskirt, or a low-cut top where we can see her breasts."
"I find it very misplaced," he said. "I am a Muslim and I think that unfortunately we have a very negative image."
Dalil Boubakeur, rector of the Paris Mosque, had a cautious response Thursday. "Muslims in France ... are respectful of national law," he said, but added that any law should allow "a reasonable period for education" about what it is for.
Key questions are how the bill will be phrased — whether it will contain exceptions for face-concealing costumes at a Carnival parade, for example — and how a ban would be enforced. The Justice Ministry said Thursday it will write the draft law in the coming weeks.
Muslim countries, too, have struggled to deal with the niqab. Egypt's top cleric recently decreed that Muslim women should not wear the niqab inside offices but he said they can wear it in public.
In Lebanon, Sheik Maher Hammoud, a Sunni Muslim cleric in the southern city of Sidon, called the French actions racist.
"Whenever Islamic thought and culture clashes with Western democracy, racism rears its head and under various names," he said. "Muslims do not need lessons from Sarkozy or anyone else to teach them about human rights or the rights of women."
In Damascus, Mohammed Habash, Syrian lawmaker and head of the Center for Islamic Studies, said "such decisions only serve to encourage Islamophobia." Given the small numbers of women in France who wear the niqab, he said, "I don't think this constitutes a security or cultural threat."
"This does not bode well for the relationship between Islamic countries and Western governments," he said.
France drew similar criticism when it outlawed Muslim headscarves and other "ostentatious" religious symbols from classrooms in 2004.
Associated Press writers Albert Aji in Damascus, Zeina Karam in Beirut and Salah Nasrawi in Cairo contributed to this report.
Kyrgyz Islamists eye chaos with eager eyes
Lazily fingering a string of prayer beads outside a mosque in southern Kyrgyzstan, Ayubkhan smiles when asked about the violence, which wracked his country earlier this month.
A member of Islamist group Hizb-ut-Tahrir, he said he had no doubt of what the violent images flashing across his television screen meant for him and for his group's vision of a pan-Central Asian Islamic caliphate.
"I thought to myself: so, it has begun," he said.
Amid the power vacuum, which has followed the violence Hizb ut-Tahrir, effectively banned in Kyrgyzstan and most Central Asian countries, is waiting to reap the long-term benefits the turbulence will bring to its cause.
Ayubkhan agreed to speak with AFP on condition the interview be conducted in a car to avoid police surveillance. He said he was confident that the interim government that took over from ousted President Kurmanbek Bakiyev would continue to alienate the Kyrgyz people and deliver him more converts.
"What is good for us is that (interim leader Roza Otunbayeva) and the interim government are going to repeat the mistakes of Bakiyev and break the hopes of the people and make them desperate," he said. "This will make them more receptive to our ideas."
Thousands of protestors took to the streets of this strategically vital ex-Soviet state earlier this month in bloody clashes that forced out Bakiyev, leaving at least 84 dead and nearly 2,000 injured.
No clear indication
While the interim government formed by former Foreign Minister Otunbayeva has restored order to the Russian-leaning north, it has so far struggled to assert its authority in the religiously conservative south.
"So far, there is no clear indication that (Hizb-ut-Tahrir) benefited from this revolution," said Alisher Khamidov, a Washington-based analyst and expert on the group. "However, it is clear that the disarray in the government structures, in particular in the security services, means that harsh treatment of religious dissent has slowed down and this can potentially provide (them) a breathing space," he added.
In the race to capture the hearts and minds of Muslims in Central Asia, which followed the collapse of the Soviet Union nearly two decades ago, perhaps no Islamist group has made further inroads than Hizb-ut-Tahrir.
Founded in the Middle East in 1953 by judge Taqiuddin al-Nabhani, the group's message of Muslim unity found strong resonance in the region's Fergana Valley, the scene of bloody ethnic clashes in the last days of the Soviet empire.
Although legal in the United States, Britain and other European countries, Hizb-ut-Tahrir is proscribed in Central Asia and Russia. Bakiyev took a hard line against the group, which does not advocate violence, portraying it as a violent terrorist organization.
"(Bakiyev) beat us. He imprisoned us. But Hizb ut-Tahrir didn't suffer at all. Now Roza Otunbayeva's people are following the steps of Bakiyev. They will make the same mistakes," Ayubkhan said.
Tuesday, April 20, 2010
Secret prison revealed in Baghdad
La times
Hundreds of Sunni men disappeared for months into a secret Baghdad prison under the jurisdiction of Prime Minister Nouri Maliki's military office, where many were routinely tortured until the country's Human Rights Ministry gained access to the facility, Iraqi officials say. The men were detained by the Iraqi army in October in sweeps targeting Sunni groups in Nineveh province, a stronghold of the group Al Qaeda in Iraq and other militants in the north. The provincial governor alleged at the time that ordinary citizens had been detained as well, often without a warrant.
Worried that courts would order the detainees' release, security forces obtained a court order and transferred them to Baghdad, where they were held in isolation. Human rights officials learned of the facility in March from family members searching for missing relatives.
Revelation of the secret prison could worsen tensions at a highly sensitive moment in Iraq. As U.S. troops are withdrawing, Maliki, a Shiite Muslim, and other political officials are negotiating the formation of a new government. Including minority Sunni Arabs is considered by many to be key to preventing a return of widespread sectarian violence. Already there has been an increase in attacks by Al Qaeda in Iraq, a Sunni extremist group.
The alleged brutal treatment of prisoners at the facility raised concerns that the country could drift back to its authoritarian past.
Commanders initially resisted efforts to inspect the prison but relented and allowed visits by two teams of inspectors, including Human Rights Minister Wijdan Salim. Inspectors said they found that the 431 prisoners had been subjected to appalling conditions and quoted prisoners as saying that one of them, a former colonel in President Saddam Hussein's army, had died in January as a result of torture.
"More than 100 were tortured. There were a lot of marks on their bodies," said an Iraqi official familiar with the inspections. "They beat people, they used electricity. They suffocated them with plastic bags, and different methods."
An internal U.S. Embassy report quotes Salim as saying that prisoners had told her they were handcuffed for three to four hours at a time in stress positions or sodomized.
"One prisoner told her that he had been raped on a daily basis, another showed her his undergarments, which were entirely bloodstained," the memo reads.
Some described guards extorting as much as $1,000 from prisoners who wanted to phone their families, the memo said.
Maliki vowed to shut down the prison and ordered the arrest of the officers working there after Salim presented him with a report this month. Since then, 75 detainees have been freed and an additional 275 transferred to regular jails, Iraqi officials said. Maliki said in an interview that he had been unaware of the abuses. He said the prisoners had been sent to Baghdad because of concerns about corruption in Mosul.
"The prime minister cannot be responsible for all the behavior of his soldiers and staff," said Salim, praising Maliki's willingness to root out abuses. Salim, a Chaldean Christian, ran for parliament in last month's elections on Maliki's Shiite-dominated list.
Maliki defended his use of special prisons and an elite military force that answers only to him; his supporters say he has had no choice because of Iraq's precarious security situation. Maliki told The Times that he was committed to stamping out torture -- which he blamed on his enemies.
"Our reforms continue, and we have the Human Rights Ministry to monitor this," he said. "We will hold accountable anybody who was proven involved in such acts."
But Maliki's critics say the network of special military units with their own investigative judges and interrogators are a threat to Iraq's fragile democracy. They question how Maliki could not have known what was going on at the facility, and say that regardless, he is responsible for what happened there.
"The prison is Maliki's becauseit's not under the Ministry of Defense, the Ministry of Justice or Ministry of Interior officially," said one Iraqi security official, who spoke on condition of anonymity because of the sensitivity of the topic.
The revelations echoed those at the beginning of Iraq's sectarian war. In late 2005, the U.S. military found a secret prison in an Interior Ministry bunker where Sunnis rounded up in police sweeps were held.
The latest episode, the U.S. Embassy report warns, could exacerbate tensions between Iraq's Shiite majority and Sunnis even with the facility closed.
U.S. troops already have pulled out of Iraq's cities, and Iraqi officials say U.S. influence is diminishing as the Americans focus on ending their military presence. The number of U.S. troops in Iraq is scheduled to drop by about half, to 50,000, by the end of August.
The embassy report cautions that "disclosure of a secret prison in which Sunni Arabs were systematically tortured would not only become an international embarrassment, but would also likely compromise the prime minister's ability to put together a viable government coalition with him at the helm."
Maliki's main political rival, Iyad Allawi, narrowly defeated him in parliamentary elections last month. Allawi, a secular Shiite, drew on dissatisfaction in Sunni regions around central Iraq. In the interview, Maliki invited Allawi to join him in forming a new government. But news of a secret prison that falls under the jurisdiction of the prime minister's military office could make it difficult for him to gain any Sunni partners.
The controversy over the secret prison, located at the Old Muthanna airport in west Baghdad, has also pushed Maliki to begin relinquishing control of two other detention facilities at Camp Honor, a base in Baghdad's Green Zone. The base belongs to the Baghdad Brigade and the Counter-Terrorism Force, elite units that report to the prime minister and are responsible for holding high-level suspects.
Families and lawyers say they find it nearly impossible to visit the Camp Honor facilities. The Justice Ministry is now assuming supervision of the Green Zone jails, although Maliki's offices will continue to command directly the military units.
The 431 detainees brought down from Nineveh were initially held at Camp Honor. Interrogations began after they were transferred to the prison at the Old Muthanna airport.
According to the U.S. Embassy report and interviews with Iraqi officials, two separate investigative committees questioned the detainees and abused them. During the day, there were interrogators from the Iraqi judiciary. In the late afternoon they came from the Baghdad Brigade.
The embassy report says that at least four of the investigators from the Baghdad Brigade are believed to have been indicted for torture in 2006. The charges against them at the time included selling Sunni Arab detainees held at a national police facility to Shiite militias to be killed.
In December, the Human Rights Ministry asked the judiciary to investigate Baghdad Brigade interrogators over allegations of torture at Camp Honor, but hasn't received an answer, Iraqi officials said.
With the secret facility at the old airport being shut down, and both Maliki and Salim, the human rights minister, hailing what they regard as progress, some Iraqis with knowledge of the security apparatus say they are worried that nothing will really change.
One former lawmaker with great knowledge of the prime minister's security offices called for radical change in the next government. "This is the beginning. We have to hold people accountable," the former lawmaker said. "It's a coverup of torture."
Hundreds of Sunni men disappeared for months into a secret Baghdad prison under the jurisdiction of Prime Minister Nouri Maliki's military office, where many were routinely tortured until the country's Human Rights Ministry gained access to the facility, Iraqi officials say. The men were detained by the Iraqi army in October in sweeps targeting Sunni groups in Nineveh province, a stronghold of the group Al Qaeda in Iraq and other militants in the north. The provincial governor alleged at the time that ordinary citizens had been detained as well, often without a warrant.
Worried that courts would order the detainees' release, security forces obtained a court order and transferred them to Baghdad, where they were held in isolation. Human rights officials learned of the facility in March from family members searching for missing relatives.
Revelation of the secret prison could worsen tensions at a highly sensitive moment in Iraq. As U.S. troops are withdrawing, Maliki, a Shiite Muslim, and other political officials are negotiating the formation of a new government. Including minority Sunni Arabs is considered by many to be key to preventing a return of widespread sectarian violence. Already there has been an increase in attacks by Al Qaeda in Iraq, a Sunni extremist group.
The alleged brutal treatment of prisoners at the facility raised concerns that the country could drift back to its authoritarian past.
Commanders initially resisted efforts to inspect the prison but relented and allowed visits by two teams of inspectors, including Human Rights Minister Wijdan Salim. Inspectors said they found that the 431 prisoners had been subjected to appalling conditions and quoted prisoners as saying that one of them, a former colonel in President Saddam Hussein's army, had died in January as a result of torture.
"More than 100 were tortured. There were a lot of marks on their bodies," said an Iraqi official familiar with the inspections. "They beat people, they used electricity. They suffocated them with plastic bags, and different methods."
An internal U.S. Embassy report quotes Salim as saying that prisoners had told her they were handcuffed for three to four hours at a time in stress positions or sodomized.
"One prisoner told her that he had been raped on a daily basis, another showed her his undergarments, which were entirely bloodstained," the memo reads.
Some described guards extorting as much as $1,000 from prisoners who wanted to phone their families, the memo said.
Maliki vowed to shut down the prison and ordered the arrest of the officers working there after Salim presented him with a report this month. Since then, 75 detainees have been freed and an additional 275 transferred to regular jails, Iraqi officials said. Maliki said in an interview that he had been unaware of the abuses. He said the prisoners had been sent to Baghdad because of concerns about corruption in Mosul.
"The prime minister cannot be responsible for all the behavior of his soldiers and staff," said Salim, praising Maliki's willingness to root out abuses. Salim, a Chaldean Christian, ran for parliament in last month's elections on Maliki's Shiite-dominated list.
Maliki defended his use of special prisons and an elite military force that answers only to him; his supporters say he has had no choice because of Iraq's precarious security situation. Maliki told The Times that he was committed to stamping out torture -- which he blamed on his enemies.
"Our reforms continue, and we have the Human Rights Ministry to monitor this," he said. "We will hold accountable anybody who was proven involved in such acts."
But Maliki's critics say the network of special military units with their own investigative judges and interrogators are a threat to Iraq's fragile democracy. They question how Maliki could not have known what was going on at the facility, and say that regardless, he is responsible for what happened there.
"The prison is Maliki's becauseit's not under the Ministry of Defense, the Ministry of Justice or Ministry of Interior officially," said one Iraqi security official, who spoke on condition of anonymity because of the sensitivity of the topic.
The revelations echoed those at the beginning of Iraq's sectarian war. In late 2005, the U.S. military found a secret prison in an Interior Ministry bunker where Sunnis rounded up in police sweeps were held.
The latest episode, the U.S. Embassy report warns, could exacerbate tensions between Iraq's Shiite majority and Sunnis even with the facility closed.
U.S. troops already have pulled out of Iraq's cities, and Iraqi officials say U.S. influence is diminishing as the Americans focus on ending their military presence. The number of U.S. troops in Iraq is scheduled to drop by about half, to 50,000, by the end of August.
The embassy report cautions that "disclosure of a secret prison in which Sunni Arabs were systematically tortured would not only become an international embarrassment, but would also likely compromise the prime minister's ability to put together a viable government coalition with him at the helm."
Maliki's main political rival, Iyad Allawi, narrowly defeated him in parliamentary elections last month. Allawi, a secular Shiite, drew on dissatisfaction in Sunni regions around central Iraq. In the interview, Maliki invited Allawi to join him in forming a new government. But news of a secret prison that falls under the jurisdiction of the prime minister's military office could make it difficult for him to gain any Sunni partners.
The controversy over the secret prison, located at the Old Muthanna airport in west Baghdad, has also pushed Maliki to begin relinquishing control of two other detention facilities at Camp Honor, a base in Baghdad's Green Zone. The base belongs to the Baghdad Brigade and the Counter-Terrorism Force, elite units that report to the prime minister and are responsible for holding high-level suspects.
Families and lawyers say they find it nearly impossible to visit the Camp Honor facilities. The Justice Ministry is now assuming supervision of the Green Zone jails, although Maliki's offices will continue to command directly the military units.
The 431 detainees brought down from Nineveh were initially held at Camp Honor. Interrogations began after they were transferred to the prison at the Old Muthanna airport.
According to the U.S. Embassy report and interviews with Iraqi officials, two separate investigative committees questioned the detainees and abused them. During the day, there were interrogators from the Iraqi judiciary. In the late afternoon they came from the Baghdad Brigade.
The embassy report says that at least four of the investigators from the Baghdad Brigade are believed to have been indicted for torture in 2006. The charges against them at the time included selling Sunni Arab detainees held at a national police facility to Shiite militias to be killed.
In December, the Human Rights Ministry asked the judiciary to investigate Baghdad Brigade interrogators over allegations of torture at Camp Honor, but hasn't received an answer, Iraqi officials said.
With the secret facility at the old airport being shut down, and both Maliki and Salim, the human rights minister, hailing what they regard as progress, some Iraqis with knowledge of the security apparatus say they are worried that nothing will really change.
One former lawmaker with great knowledge of the prime minister's security offices called for radical change in the next government. "This is the beginning. We have to hold people accountable," the former lawmaker said. "It's a coverup of torture."
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