perhaps the world should cut off the u.s. until they comply

UN torture expert wants access to secret U.S. prisons in Europe
March 30, 2006

GENEVA (AP) - The United Nations' special investigator of torture said Thursday he is certain there are secret U.S. prisons in Europe and he wants access to them.

Manfred Nowak said he has proof secret U.S. prisons continue to operate in Europe. "I am 100 per cent sure. I have evidence," Nowak said in an interview.

He cited a U.S. refusal to provide details or records of interrogations later used in terrorism trials in Germany. He did not explain how that is proof of the existence of U.S. prisons in Europe and did not offer other examples.

Allegations of clandestine U.S. detention centres in Europe have sparked separate investigations by the European Parliament and the Council of Europe, the continent's leading human rights watchdog.

"It is totally unacceptable, even in the fight against terrorism, that a highly democratic country such as the United States of America is keeping secret places of detention," said Nowak, an Austrian law professor who reports on torture allegations to UN rights bodies and the General Assembly.

U.S. officials in Geneva were not immediately available to comment.

The United States neither confirms nor denies the allegations of secret prisons, because it refuses to comment on intelligence matters. It has noted the Council of Europe's report found no specific evidence to support claims of the existence of detention camps in Europe like the one in Guantanamo Bay, Cuba.

In a report released last month, Nowak and four other UN experts called on the U.S. government to close down Guantanamo Bay and "refrain from any practice amounting to torture or cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment."

The United States slammed the UN report, noting the UN experts declined an invitation to visit the camp because they would not be given full access to the detainees.

As with Guantanamo, Nowak said he would only visit the secret prisons if he was granted full access to prisoners. He noted China allowed him to interview prisoners during a visit last year and before that trip Washington put pressure on the Chinese to permit the interviews.

He said he hopes Washington will reconsider its policy on terror suspects and allow him to investigate allegations of torture in detention centres outside the United States.

"How can I assess whether torture or ill-treatment is practised in any prison in the world if the only people with whom I can talk are the prison guards and the doctors but not the detainees?" he asked.

The United States is holding about 490 men at the military detention centre; some have been there for more than four years. They are accused of links to Afghanistan's ousted Taliban regime or al-Qaida but only a handful have been charged.

Nowak also said he would go to Chechnya this year because Russia accepted his condition of direct access to prisoners. He declined to speculate on how widespread the use of torture by Russian security forces might be in the volatile southern province and said he is still negotiating with Moscow on which detention centres to visit.