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Page 4 of 4 "Occupation forces arrested Ilham Hussein, whose husband, Yasser Ibrahim Hassan, had just been killed in front of her and her family on 6 May 2006 during a raid on their home in the university district in central Baghdad. The couple had just celebrated the birth of their first son five days ago." UNKNOWN JAILS: There are no exact figures on the number of jails and detention camps controlled by occupation authorities. According to a recent Amnesty International report, most "security detainees" are held in one of four American-run facilities: Camp Bukka outside Basra, Abu Ghraib in Baghdad, Camp Cropper in Baghdad and Fort Sousa near Suleimaniya. In addition to these, US forces use the detention facilities of various regiments throughout the country for temporary purposes. British forces hold a number of "security detainees" in a detention facility in the Shoeiba Camp near Basra. Iman Khammas maintains that there are five secret prisons in Iraq on top of the 10 known, of which three are in Baghdad: the notorious Abu Ghraib, Al-Kazimiya and Al-Risafa. On 4 May 2004, Deputy Operations Commander Major General Jeffrey Miller told a press conference that in addition to the three major detention centres operated by the US army there were 13 or 14 smaller camps used for the assessment of detainees. Hajj Ali, director of the Organisation for the Defence of Detainees in Occupation Jails, remarked: "Under Saddam there were 13 prisons. Now there are 36 run by the government and 200 run by the militias. All these have the approval of the American government." According to the report of the US State Department's Democracy and Human Rights Bureau of 6 March 2006, there are 450 detention centres in Iraq. Some of these are administered the Ministry of Interior and others by the Iraqi Ministry of Defence. In addition, there are secret detention centres scattered throughout the country. Kurdish parties also run at least five detention centres outside the official penal system.  Female detainees, like men and children in Iraqi jails, are the victims of a brutal, degrading and life-threatening system.
 THIS IS INTOLERABLE: Torture and inhuman treatment are regarded as gross violations of human rights under the Fourth Geneva Convention (Article 147). Even following the supposed transfer of authority on 28 June 2004, the UN Security Council reaffirmed the continued and full standing of, and obligation of all parties to respect, international humanitarian law in Iraq, including the Geneva Conventions. Torture and inhuman treatment are prohibited under international law, as reflected in the Rome Statute establishing the International Criminal Court (Article 8:2) where cruel and inhuman treatment and torture in non-international armed disputes are considered war crimes. Whereas Amnesty International ranked the security detention system -- and the acts of torture and brutality inflicted upon the detainees in that system -- as crimes of war, it described the system that supplanted it following the handover of sovereignty as tyrannical because of the systematic and widespread violations of fundamental human rights and international humanitarian law. The human rights organisation holds American-led multinational forces in Iraq directly responsible for these crimes, including those that are increasingly perpetrated by Iraqi security forces. International law and international humanitarian law make absolutely no exceptions on the prohibition of torture, even under conditions of emergency or warfare. Compounding the intolerable, "multinational forces", and all who work with them, enjoy immunity from prosecution under Iraqi civil and criminal law, in accordance with Security Council Resolution 1546 and the accompanying exchange of letters between Iraqi and American authorities. In addition, the recommendations of the joint board of review for the release of detainees, whose membership includes representatives from the Iraqi ministries of justice, interior and human rights, are not binding. It is the multinational forces' deputy commanding general for detention operations who has the ultimate say as to whether or not a detainee is to be released. With respect to Iraqi governments under occupation, until now there are no cases of perpetrators of maltreatment, torture and murder having been brought to justice, with the sole exception of a few policemen in Baghdad charged with the systematic rape and torture of female detainees. Female detainees, like men and children in Iraqi jails, are the victims of a brutal, degrading and life-threatening system. In addition, the gender-related injustices perpetrated in the course of arrest, interrogation and detention constitute a deliberate affront to the cherished values and morals of Iraqi society. There will be no end to these violations as long as Iraq remains occupied by forces that enjoy immunity from prosecution under Iraqi law and as long as occupation authorities continue to treat Iraqi citizens with racist contempt in order to feel better about plundering the nation's wealth and depriving its people of their most fundamental rights under international law and human rights conventions. It is all the more unfortunate that this situation is condoned by Iraqi authorities that claim to represent an independent and sovereign nation. ============ Haifa Zangana is an Iraqi-born novelist and former prisoner of Saddam's regime.
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