The “V word” has finally been uttered by George Bush.
Category: Blog
BBC poll: One third support torture
A BBC survey in 25 countries on the usage of torture showed some depressing results. One third of those surveyed insisted torture could be used in prison on circumstances.
More than 27,000 people in 25 countries were asked if torture was acceptable if it could provide information to save innocent lives.
In Egypt, according to the poll, 65% voted against employing all sorts of torture, while 25% saw it legitimate under “some circumstances.”
And surprise, surprise:
Israel has the largest percentage of those polled endorsing the use of a degree of torture on prisoners, with 43% saying they agreed that some degree of torture should be allowed.
Canadian judge rules against sending detainee back to Egypt
From Xinhua…
A Canadian federal court judge ruled on Monday not to deport a man accused of being a national security threat to his native Egypt for he could be tortured there.
Judge Andrew MacKay made the ruling despite acknowledging that Mahmoud Jaballah made a series of questionable phone calls from Toronto to what were most likely terrorist cells around the world, on the day that the U.S. embassies in Kenya and Tanzania were bombed.
“A reasonable observer would find grounds to believe that he was, or is, a member of a terrorist group,” MacKay stated in his ruling.
Jaballah has been detained since 2001 under one of the Canadian federal government’s controversial security certificates, which allow authorities to detain terrorism suspects indefinitely without charge.
If Canada wants to deport Jaballah, it must find a country free of torture that will take him, the judge ruled.
The Canadian government has been arguing that, the 44-year-old father of six, is a threat to national security, for the past seven years.
He was first arrested in 1999 on allegations that he was linked to the Egyptian group Al-Jihad, which has worked in cohorts with Al-Qaeda. Months later, these accusations were trashed, but he was again arrested in 2001, and this time, held under a security certificate, after the Canadian Security and Intelligence Service (CSIS) said there was fresh evidence linking him to the group.
The government has also accused Jaballah of fighting alongside Muslim extremists, in wars in Afghanistan and Chechnya.
Jaballah’s legal team have refused these accusations, claiming that the information CSIS had received was unreliable.
A federal court judge, earlier this year, upheld a decision not to grant Jaballah asylum, as a person in need of protection from torture.