Canadian boy held in Guantanamo from the age of 16

A quote designed to shock, but one that doesn't get us anywhere on the issue of sleep deprivation.


I suppose you would augur for Amnesty International to be the evaluators.

BTC, in your opinion, did the UK engage in torture in Northern Ireland?

You'll notice that the UN doesn't specify the "Iron Maiden" or "Thumb screws" or "the Rack" as intruments of torture either. Does that mean that they are fine to use? Of course not...

And you are actually trying to tell us that doing an all-nighter for an exam is just like being subjected to sleep deprivation for 3 straight weeks? Are you actually denying that sleep deprivation is not "inflicting mental suffering"? If you are, then you really are stupid.


Ah yes, you obviously didn't read it all, did you? Because the paragraph ended with:


Interrogation is legal, torturing people before, during and/or after an interrogation is not.

Sorry, how is 3 weeks of fucking with someones sleep to make them hallucinate not severe?

Out of curiousity, what would folks expect a 15 year old to know that would still be considered vital info a year, or even 5 years after the initial capture? (He was 15 when first captured.) Would a 15 year old be in the "inner circle" and privvy to secret plans, tactics and strategies? Or would he just have been indoctrinated with a basic idea of "them bad, us good"?

Wouldn't it be better to compare him with those "child soldiers" in Africa who are currently being rehabilitated?

edit:
America’s ambivalence to child soldiers

I am not stupid or arrogant enough to think I can interpret laws all by myself. One day you will learn that law is a matter of interpretation in almost every situation, and not simply what you, Hazza, say it is. In the case of sleep deprivation, the question as I see it is, how long can you keep someone from sleeping before it constitutes "intentional mental or physical suffering"?

As to your question about sleep deprivation for three weeks, perhaps you could have inferred an answer from what I posted above:

No one could be deprived of sleep for three weeks straight- they would be dead long before that unless they have some medical condition that keeps them from sleeping, so that's an extreme example which would obviously fit the definition of torture. Obviously no person would say being deprived of sleep for three weeks is the same as being deprived for 24 hours.

Hazza, as for the latter part of your post above, once again, it's a matter of interpretation whether you like it or not. There is not likely to be anything approaching a consensus on the exercept you quoted, thus it will depend on the individual circumstances of a case and the interpretation not only of those circumstances but the relevant law and, if it exists, relevant case law.

So you admit then that 3 weeks of fucking with someone's sleeping patterns (as happened here) is indeed torture then

Good.

End of thread

How about taking your own advice and learning to read, Hazza:



I don't know if it fits the legal definition of torture, as I was referring to a person being without sleep altogether (lots of people go without optimal sleep for periods of much longer than three weeks, so obviously that's not what I meant) and that's why I asked if there has ever been judicial interpretation of this, especially given that "changing someone's sleep patterns" is a very vague and broad statement.

Changing sleep patterns is not the same thing as depriving someone of sleep altogether.

Who cares whether sleep deprivation is torture? It doesn't make a damn bit of difference does it? It's been done to him already, and he won't be able to sue and collect.

The kid was either a translator for Al Queda or factions thereof (What his family says), or making bombs and land mines for same (captured video). Chances are he did throw the grenade that killed the first medic and half blinded the second. He was the only one left alive in the compound. The only mitigating circumstance is that he was a child at the time, but he will age, the medic who he allegedly killed is still dead.

He's not a child anymore. If he was making bombs then he was not innocent. If he was translating for bomb makers then he was not innocent. Bombs kill people. He might have been a child, but if he knew what he was doing, then in prison (somewhere) is unfortunately where he belongs.

OK then...the question is:

If it's not torture - and not done to inflict "severe mental suffering", then why do it at all?

Amnesty are a noble cause. I was making the point that they are probably not the best authority on this. I have an agenda and I am proud of it.


The interrogator's of course.

I nominate this for post of the year. Clearly being awoken and moved every three hours will be annoying as fucking Hell, but I wouldn't call it torture. As Sanwald sez, most mothers of newborns go through worse. Of course it depends on what else they were doing to him when they were moving him though. But seriously, most anyone who has been a soldier can remember going through far worse than simply moving cells every three hours. The notion that this guy couldn't get more than a few minutes sleep defies common sense.

Now wake a guy every three MINUTES and you'll break him in 72 hours. I actually saw that happen once but it was an American guy so no one here would care.

For all the woolly liberals on here - how else do you propose to get important information out of suspected terrorists? You expect them to just tell you? Remember that these people are facing life in prison (can they be sentenced to death?), not a 5 year stretch in an open nick.

it may have done. Stalker and others seem to think so. I do not even remotely condone that either since it achieved little more than to escalate the conflict and took years of the peace process to undo the damage.

Aren't you guys forgetting that we're talking about a boy who was 15 years old when he was captured?

The scourge of child soldiers

Waking every 3 hours sounds alot like basic training. I actually fell asleep road marching during basic, woke up in a ditch with the drill instructor screaming at me. Torture? No. Wake up call for making bad decisions in life. Yes. At least I wasn't beheaded, now that would be torture.

However, the USA has since then signed the Optional Protocol on the Involvement of Children in Armed Conflict. Under this protocol, it's required (!) of them to:
- "take all feasible measures to ensure that persons within their jurisdiction recruited or used in hostilities contrary to the present Protocol are demobilized or otherwise released from service"
- "when necessary, accord to such persons all appropriate assistance for their physical and psychological recovery and their social reintegration"

That is, they would technically have needed to "assist" him as of December 2002. Of course, then there's also the legal status of Guantanamo to consider, but as it's under US jurisdiction (even if outside the US!), that's a pretty clear issue.

What he did in the war is irrevelant, especially as he only killed soldiers. Soldiers die in war, and the US clearly accepted this war.

Captured subjects often don't wan't to talk. For good or for bad.
Those holding them want them to talk. For good or for bad.
Do they have a right to try?Apparently so. Within limits.
How do they make them talk?
Either carrot or stick.
The International Community and laws and conventions, don't rule out stick. They just rule out too big a stick, too sharp a stick, a stick that will damage permanently, a severe stick, but the stick itself, for good or for bad is not disallowed. QED.

The young man is still alive. If sleep deprivation was used on him, he'll probably get over it. Faster than he'll get over making bombs, or translating for murderers, or killing someone with a grenade, or having 500 Lbs bombs dropped on the bomb making compound where he was captured. Or losing his eye. He was playing in a adult game. The consequences are going to be hard for him.

As for human rights violations. The only rights we have from birth are life liberty and some would say the pursuit of happiness or property. He has been denied 2 (liberty, and pursuit of happiness) because he was (allegedly) denying all 3 to others (not only liberty and pursuit of happiness but also life). As long as he isn't dead, he's one up.

BTC, I did not bring up NI to condemn the UK, rather as a point of possible comparison on which perhaps some sort of judicial ruling or magistrate investigation had been made on the use of sleep deprivation (although a UK or EU-level judicial ruling or investigation findings are obviously not binding on the US).


Also available as a PDF:http://www.fas.org/sgp/crs/intel/RL32438.pdf

upwards of 48 hours you start to get problems. Some patients get heart problems which usually means they have to be withdrawn from the experiments. On the fourth day of sleep deprivation you start to get the first delusions, hallucinations and paranoia which will grow in extremity as time goes on. Now that was all derived from sleep deprivation experiments where subjects were volunteers who willingly participated. They would also have had ample time to prepare themselves. many slept for several days before commencing the experiment and would eat more and receive medical interventions while in the experiment. one would imagine that someone forced against their will to do the same in a prison setting would experience greater stress especially if already injured and with no opportunity to prepare.


Randy Gardner, the record holder stayed up for 11 days though there are reports that John Daley managed just over 20 days. Both recovered though were in acute neurotic and psychotic states of degradation during the experiment though.

No, none was made. That was my point. With internment the treatment of IRA prisoners went under the radar and was not subject to usual judicial and penal controls. Abuses almost certainly went on that would have been clearly illegal if tested in court. once the 50 year rule releases documentary evidence we will no for sure what most just suspect just now.

All the people in Gitmo are America hating actual or at least potential terrorist and if any are not when they go in, then Gitmo does it best to make sure they will be eventually.

I'd like to know what kind of useful information you expect to get from a child soldier. Especially after torturing him

Torture is also a notoriously unreliable tool. People won't tell you what you want to know - they'll tell you what they think you want to hear, even if it's completely made up.

Yes, I wonder if this guy has any brothers or cousins that respect America and it's values now...

Er... what values?

naughty Sin, though I grant you I am staggered by the attitudes of some of the responders to this thread at the moment.

You completely ignored the question, but I won't let that get in the way for the moment.

A child soldier will know something useful - location of training camps for example. Even the smallest detail can help save British/American etc. lives and catch the terrorists.

Torture doesn't work. I agree. But the statement can be misleading. Sleep Deprivation may be bad enough to create an 'anything they want response', it might not. We don't know, one way or another. And he was possibly a translator whose father has sent him all over Afghanistan to translate in the various networks because of his perfect English. So they could concievably learn quite a bit from this one individual.


Actually, they seem to be operating under the idea that they are going to get their Virgins. And they appear to just want him home, but they also do seem to want revenge especially for the injuries they sustained (because he wasn't the only one); which makes perfect sense, unfortunately. War. Huh. Good God.

Well not completely - you asked the question as if torture was actually a reliable way of getting information

Plus, I don't think you would have torture a child for 3 weeks. When I was 15, holding other kids down and farting in their face once or twice got whatever information you wanted out of them...

The boy was captured at 15. He's now 21 years old. He's been kept for around 6 years now. What sort of information held by a 15 year old would remain current and useful for all that length of time? How many lives over the last 5 years have been saved by keeping him locked up and interrogating him? How many lives do you think any further interrogations will save? Shall we just give up the charade and assume he should be imprisoned for life?

Hey boys... better build a lot more Guantanamos, since there are an estimated over 300,000 child soldiers under 18 currently fighting all over the world.
source: US Dept of State - The Facts About Child Soldiers

It also seems as though the US is no longer capturing and imprisoning child soldiers in Afghanistan. Double standard here?

actually, appropriate troop levels in Afghanistan at the Pakistani border would be more effective. Something that Obama wishes to pursue.

actually we do. It has been extensively researched. Beyond four days of sleep deprivation distorted sense of reality and psychotic symptoms will begin to proliferate. No psychologist would take as reliable anything from subjects from this point on as florid symptoms of paranoia, halucination and delusion are as likely as normal ideation. But seemingly US military intelligence have different standards . . .

No. This kid and some of his other brothers and father were deep into the Jihadi movement. He was either translating or building bombs or making bomb instructional videos. He is an exception to the rank and file child soldier who operates in an infantry capacity and points his gun and shoots. They probably wanted information on his family or family's contacts, and by then they probably felt that they couldn't let him go. It's not so simple. If it was that would be great. But it isn't. His father dragged him knee deep into this crap. His brothers as well.


Yes and then after rest those symptoms go away. And then the prisoner can sing sing sing. You hit them up for information while they are deprived and after they have had a rest and they are still willing to talk. Your position is a bit naive. They don't just listen to some drooling sleep zombie and take it all as Gospel. That's not how it works.

Again you haven't answered the question: how else do you propose getting information out of maniacs like this? Mental degredation is effective. Your premise that sleep deprivation is torture is, in my opinion, incorrect.

These kids you used to do whatever to were not captured in a warzone in a nasty country were they?

Who knows? Every little helps.


Again, who knows. If he had killed once, he would more than likely kill again.


Keeping the suspects in jail would save lives.


Whatever .

Some people have very, very short memories. When these Mujahideen kids were pestering the Soviet invaders I seem to recall they weren't called terrorists or militants, and as soon as the colour of the uniform of the invader changes, so does the terminology. Funny that. But... a 15-year old Mujahideen fighting an invader who is captured half-dead and then gets a charge pinned on him and then, as a juvenile, gets tortured, you'd expect from despotic regimes. I wouldn't have expected the United States of America to fall so low, but I guess my expectations must have been too high. Hope springs eternal of a new administration in Washington, and the bringing of the perpetrators of these events to justice. But, I won't be banking on it until the Reich falls.

What information is some 16-year-old kid with a vintage kalashnikov going to have?

Almost all of the lame terror alerts in the U.S. originated with bullshit made-up stories from torturing people. It's total crap.

If what the Pentagon is doing is so above-board, why did they have to base the thing in Cuba rather than Arkansas?

Do you seriously think military intelligence gave him the 48 hours rest he would need to recover before questioning him? The video I posted above was one of several interrogations that took place WHILE he was sleep deprived.


so, presumably you would also think it appropriate to inject them with Naltraxone so that they experience shooting pain from every single nerve for several hours since it is also reversible and that that would be a legitiomate form of non-torture to use on detainees?

If you have any evidence that anyone in US military custody has been completely deprived of sleep for anything as long as four days, let's have it. You express a lot of attitude, but where are the proof that complete sleep deprivation actually occurred for four days? I see no need to keep anyone awake for anywhere near that long at a time to get them to either talk or to move them along the path to where they will talk because they are trusting/dependent on the interrogator.


More than a bit over the top. I rebuke you for the disgusting misuse of the connotation of that word.

I wasn't alive then so I have only known them as terrorists.


Where training camps are, other members of his team, location of caves and ammo dumps in Tora Tora. Who knows what he knows?

I wouldn't be at all surprised if all al-Qaeda operatives are told that when captured they should make up or exaggerate stories about interrogation and torture in order to smear the USA and turn world opinion against them.

Wouldn't you consider that torture if done by an interrogator?


We know you think Obama is a magician who will magically solve all problems, but your lack of military knowledge really shows with that statement if you think putting a bunch of troops on the border (one that their rules of engagement would almost certainly tell them they cannot cross) is the be-all and end-all.

Al-Qaeda types are trained to allege that they have been tortured.

What? you're joking right? Do you believe that the only way to get information from people is through torture? or is it that you think any measure used to get information from someone is torture?

Honestly, I don't really know how you're going to get reliable information out of them. However, I doubt you're going to get a lot of useful info through torture either. People confess to anything if they're tortured enough - like witchcraft for example...

As for sleep deprivation not being torture, let's go back to the definition of torture as given by the UN:


Now, if you don't agree that 3 weeks of sleep deprivation is "severe mental suffering", give us an example of what kind of inflicted mental suffering you would consider to fit that description then, something that you would class as torture?


No, but there are ways of dealing with child soldiers - things that the US agreed to as well, as Bipa's pointed out. Torturing them is not one of them.

International Herald Tribune

Conqy, by getting them to change cells including moving everything in one cell into another is designed to take enough time and create enough diusruption to prevent sleep completely if carried out every three hours.

BTC, how long did that go on?

Hazza, why don't give some examples of sleep deprivation that in your opinion would not constitute torture?

and frankly I am astonished that people from civilised modern democratic nations could in any way defend torture in this way.

I know that when it is proved that torture was used against IRA prisoners in the UK I would never stoop so low as to defend it and would want to see the perpetrators brought to justice irrespective of the attrocities carried out by the IRA.

The reports I have read suggest this sixteen year old had experienced it for 21 days when the video I posted above was shot. He is quite clearly in a psychologically very poor state in the video

Ah... I love it when people actually profess their ignorance publicly.

The CIA's Intervention in Afghanistan
Interview with Zbigniew Brzezinski



The USA has managed to do that quite fine all on its own over the last 7 years. Got the photos from Abu Ghraib to prove it.

Oh I'm sure you'd consider it torture if they weree fed so much ice cream they got a headache from it.

I can defend this because it's not torture. It's not a picnic in the park, but it's not torture.

People are not seeing the big picture, the terrorist hate our freedoms and want to attack our values.

So the administration is making sure that those targets are removed for our own safety.