How the US war in Afghanistan has protected a torturer

A stunning investigation by the Washington Post on what the American war in Afghanistan has supported; one of the most brutal thugs in the country: In Afghanistan, his presence was enough to cause prisoners to tremble. Hundreds in his organization’s custody were beaten, shocked with electrical currents or subjected to other abuses documented in human…

David Hicks deserves justice, an apology and compensation

My weekly Guardian column is published today: It’s hard to think of an Australian individual since 9/11 who has experienced more humiliation and abandonment by the federal government than… David Hicks. Julian Assange, who declared he felt abandoned by the Australian government, perhaps… comes close. As they both found out, an Australian passport is no guarantee of…

Why Orwell's Nineteen Eighty Four is my favourite work of fiction

I was asked to write a short column… on Australian novelist Annabel’s Smith’s website: ”¦in which I invite someone bookish to share one of their all-time favourite works of fiction and what it means to them. This week’s Friday Fave comes from journalist and political writer Antony Loewenstein. I remember first reading Orwell’s masterpiece many years…

The daily inhumanity of Guantanamo Bay

Devastating article by writer John Grisham in the New York Times: About two months ago I learned that some of my books had been banned at Guantánamo Bay. Apparently detainees were requesting them, and their lawyers were delivering them to the prison, but they were not being allowed in because of “impermissible content.” I became…

The naked love affair between the CIA and #ZeroDarkThirty

The pro-torture, pro-US and pro-war on terror film… is given deeper meaning with the release, via Gawker, of a document that confirms what many of us suspected; the CIA wanted a propaganda film and the film-makers were apparently happy to comply: Kathryn Bigelow’s Osama bin Laden revenge-porn flick Zero Dark Thirty was the biggest publicity coup…

What torture at Guantanamo Bay feels like

Powerful statement by the campaigning British group Reprieve: Younous Chekkouri, a detainee who has been cleared for release but remains held in Guantanamo, has given the first inside account of… the raid carried out by prison authorities on Saturday 13 April. Speaking to a lawyer from human rights charity… Reprieve… via an unclassified phone call, Mr Chekkouri has…

When will the NYT call torture by its rightful name, torture?

Cracking writing by Andrew Sullivan on the gutlessness of the supposed paper of record: There was something almost poignant about a… post yesterday… by former NYT executive editor Bill Keller. It’s his way of explaining why he decided the Times could not use the plain word ”˜torture’ to describe torture – when it was conducted by the…

It’s beyond official: America was a torturing nation post 9/11

Comprehensive report that offers yet more evidence that the US instituted a comprehensive program of violence, torture and pain after 9/11. None of the key advocates have faced justice, thanks to Barack Obama (via New York Times): A nonpartisan, independent review of interrogation and detention programs in the years after the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist…

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