Det danske Fredsakademi
Kronologi over fredssagen og international politik 9. december 2004 / Time Line December 9, 2004
Version 3.58. December 2004, 10. December 2004
12/09/2004
"Contract Meals Disaster" for Iraqi Prisoners
by David Phinney, Special to CorpWatch
http://www.corpwatch.org/article.php?id=11744
[Go to weblink for accompanying editorial cartoon]
Rotten food crawling with bugs, traces of rats and dirt. Rancid
meats and spoiled food resulting in diarrhea and food
poisoning.
This is what detainees at the Abu Ghraib prison near Baghdad were
regularly given to eat by a private contractor in late 2003 and
early 2004, causing anger to swell to a furious boil between the
U.S. military guards and the prisoners.
Foul as the food was, there never was enough. The private
contractor, run by an American civilian who was subsequently
killed, routinely fell short by hundreds of meals for Abu Ghraib's
surging prison population. When the food did arrive, there were
often late and frequently contaminated.
So went another sad chapter in the story of the Abu Ghraib prison,
where U.S. military personnel and private contractors would make
headlines and ignite international outrage over allegations of
torture psychological abuse in May of this year.
Captured in photographs now infamous for portraying naked, hooded
prisoners and smiling guards, the behavior is believed to be one of
the most damning acts toward Iraqi civilians by coalition forces.
Other acts of violence toward the prisoners include physical abuse
and still unproved allegations of rape and murder.
The Abu Ghraib prison, already infamous under Saddam Hussein's
regime, for overcrowding, ill-treatment and torture, was opened up
by the over-extended military soon after the April 2003
occupation.
The inmates were a mix of petty and hardened Iraqi criminals,
suspected members of the resistance, and thousands of innocent
bystanders hauled out of their homes in midnight raids or off the
streets of Baghdad. Many say that they just happened to be in the
wrong place at the wrong time, but were held without charges by
coalition forces for months before being released.
Unable to run the prison themselves, the U.S. military hired
private translators from Titan, a California-based company,
interrogators from CACI, a Virginia-based company, two large and
well known military contractors. In addition, they hired a small,
virtually unknown contractor from Qatar, to provide food to the
inmates. A shocked Army Major, David Dinenna of the 320 Military
Police Battalion, was one of the first to recognize the food
problem. In a string of frantic e-mails to commanders during
October and November of 2003, he called for assistance from his
chain of command while working at the prison.
"Contract meals Disaster," he called it in an October 27 e-mail
last year. "That is the best way to describe this issue . As each
day goes by, the tension within the prisoner populations
increases," he continued. "For the past two days prisoners have
been vomiting after they eat."
The food was largely to blame for a November 24, 2003 prison riots
in which Army guards shot four detainees after the prisoners failed
to comply with commands to stop and disburse. A subsequent Pentagon
investigation found that prisoners were not attempting a "mass"
escape as first thought.
"All evidence indicates that the detainees were simply protesting
the deplorable food and living conditions," the report concludes,
which attributes the same reasons to a second prison riot on
December 24, 2003.
Dinenna's messages and the riot investigations are part of a
collection of documents from a classified report by Army Major
General Anthony Taguba that was leaked to the news media last
spring together with the now-famous photos of naked prisoners. The
documents were originally obtained by several news organizations,
including US News & World Report, Rolling Stone and the Center
for Public Integrity in October 2004.
12/09/2004
IRC Study Reveals 31,000 Die Monthly in Congo Conflict and 3.8
Million Died in Past Six Years. When Will the World Pay
Attention?
Amid a rapidly deteriorating security situation in the Democratic
Republic of Congo, the International Rescue Committee issued a
mortality survey today which finds that more than 3.8 million
people have died there since the start of the war in August, 1998
and more than 31,000 civilians continue to die monthly as a result
of the conflict.
"DR Congo remains by far the deadliest crisis in the world, but
year after year the conflict festers and the international
community fails to take effective action," says the IRC's Dr.
Richard Brennan, one of the study's authors. "In a matter of six
years, the world lost a population equivalent to the entire country
of Ireland or the city of Los Angeles. How many innocent Congolese
have to perish before the world starts paying attention?"
The latest mortality study, a joint effort by the IRC and
Australia's Burnet Institute, is among the most comprehensive ever
conducted in a conflict zone, covering 19,500 households. Mortality
data was collected for the period between January 2003 and April
2004.
. Teams of physicians and epidemiologists found that during this
time more than 1,000 people died every day in excess of normal
mortality, nearly 500,000 excess deaths in all, and almost half of
the casualties were among children under five. . As documented by
three previous IRC surveys in DR Congo, the vast majority (this
time 98%) were killed by disease and malnutrition, byproducts of a
war that destroyed much of the health care system and economy.
. Of particular importance is the finding that insecurity has a
powerful effect on death from both violent and non-violent causes.
In the eastern conflict-prone provinces where insecurity often
impedes access to humanitarian aid, death from infectious disease
and hunger is highest. If the effects of insecurity and violence in
Congo's eastern provinces were removed entirely, mortality would
reduce to almost normal levels. Such was the case in
Kisangani-Ville, where the arrival of peacekeepers helped quell
fighting, allowing the IRC and its partners to rehabilitate basic
health care, water and sanitation services. Crude mortality rates
subsequently declined by 79 percent and excess mortality was
eliminated.
In Iraq, where Sadaam Hussein's years of brutality, the effects of
sanctions and three wars have led to far fewer casualties than DR
Congo, the 2003 aid budget was $3.5 billion or $138 per person.
Precise aid figures for 2004 were unavailable. The desperate
situation in Darfur, Sudan, where an estimated 70,000 people have
died and some two million have been displaced, has led to more than
$530 million in foreign aid for 2004 or $89 for each person. In
spite of DR Congo's rank as the deadliest recorded conflict since
World War II, the world's humanitarian response in 2004 was a total
of $188 million in aid or a scant $3.23 per person.
"The international response to the humanitarian crisis in Congo has
been grossly inadequate in proportion to need," says Brennan. "Our
findings show that improving and maintaining security and
increasing simple, proven and cost-effective interventions such as
basic medical care, immunizations and clean water would save
hundreds of thousands of lives in Congo. There's no shortage of
evidence. It's sustained compassion and political will that's
lacking."
The peace accords of 2002 fueled hope that the years of slaughter,
displacement, sexual violence and desperation would come to an end.
The subsequent deployment of international peacekeeping troops
coincided with the withdrawal of foreign forces, leading to
increased stability and humanitarian access and a dramatic decline
in mortality. A new transitional government was established, tasked
with reunifying the country.
In spite of all these advances, DR Congo is now dangerously close
to sliding back into full-scale war. Political progress has
stalled, the reduction in mortality has plateaued and a series of
violent incidents threaten to undermine the peace process and
destabilize the region. At this time, Rwanda is threatening to
attack Hutu extremists in DR Congo, while numerous reports indicate
an incursion has already taken place. This follows an explosion of
violence in the eastern city of Bukavu in June and the brutal
August massacre of nearly 160 Congolese Tutsi refugees at a camp in
Burundi.
Urgent action is needed to restore stability, strengthen the peace
process and address the underlying causes of the conflict. The IRC
makes the following recommendations:
. Stop the Violence. The recent scaling up of the UN peacekeeping
mission, MONUC, falls short of what's required, as the current
force remains largely incapable of protecting civilians or Congo's
borders. It is crucial that all of the requested 23,000 forces be
deployed. However, more of the same will not help. From the start,
the troops have been poorly equipped and trained and lacking in
commitment or will to carry out their mandate. It is vital that
MONUC be given the training, equipment and resources necessary to
implement their mandate- to disarm and apprehend Rwandan Hutu
fighters, prevent cross-border incursions and arms flows, protect
vulnerable civilians and restore stability to eastern
provinces.
. Promote lasting peace. Donor governments must hold all parties
involved in the conflict more accountable, ensuring they abide by
and effectively implement the December 2002 Pretoria peace
agreement and subsequent accords. Peace in the east must be made a
priority. More pressure from the international community must be
exercised on foreign governments, forces and militias to cease
violent and destabilizing actions in DR Congo. Donor governments
must also insist on improved management of Congo's natural wealth
and support recommendations outlined by the UN panel on illegal
exploitation of natural resources in DR Congo. In addition, key
governments must work toward improved coordination and
implementation of the critical disarmament, demobilization and
reintegration process for foreign and Congolese combatants.
. Vastly increase humanitarian aid. Save Lives. The current level
of international humanitarian assistance for Congo is abysmal and
basic needs are not being met. While European donors slightly
increased funding in 2004, the US government reduced its support.
In general, global donors have fallen far short of the UN's funding
appeal for DR Congo. This appeal must be met. As suggested by the
IRC's survey, simple inexpensive aid interventions could revive the
health system and save hundreds of thousands of lives. The IRC
urges donor nations to scale-up aid to meet the region's immense
needs. Congolese civil society is vibrant and needs to be
empowered. With appropriate support, it will be able to regain
self-sufficiency and mitigate further conflicts in the region.
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