WikiLeaks cables: India accused of systematic use of torture in Kashmir

[BOG PERSON]

Source: The Guardian

US officials had evidence of widespread torture by Indian police and security forces and were secretly briefed by Red Cross staff about the systematic abuse of detainees in Kashmir, according to leaked diplomatic cables released tonight.

The dispatches, obtained by website WikiLeaks, reveal that US diplomats in Delhi were briefed in 2005 by the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) about the use of electrocution, beatings and sexual humiliation against hundreds of detainees.

Other cables show that as recently as 2007 American diplomats were concerned about widespread human rights abuses by Indian security forces, who they said relied on torture for confessions.

The revelations will be intensely embarrassing for Delhi, which takes pride in its status as the world's biggest democracy, and come at a time of heightened sensitivity in Kashmir after renewed protests and violence this year.

Read more: http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2010/dec/16/wikileaks-cables-indian-torture-kashmir

[EFerrari]

1. K&R

[timo]

2. hmmmm

if they are good at it and can do it for a cheaper price maybe we should outsource our torture needs to them!!
Thats a win win we dont have torture blood on our hands and we created some jobs for some less fortunates!! by not flying the victims half way around the globe to gitmo, its an environmentally green plan as well!!!

[Luminous Animal]

3. Nothing to see. Yawn. Only gossip. Already reported (insert obscure reference here).

No crimes exposed. Old news.

[jberryhill]

6. Amnesty International Has Been Reporting This Since 1999

I'm sorry if you think AI is some "obscure reference", and if it takes "Wikileaks" in the headline to finally get you to be informed about what has been going on, that's great.

http://www.indiatogether.org/peace/kashmir/articles/indhr.htm

November 2002: The human rights record of the Indian security forces in Kashmir has been characterized by arbitrary arrests, torture, rape and extrajudicial killings. These have been extensively documented by human rights organizations such as Human Rights Watch and the PUCL (People's Union for Civil Liberties) and others. Most of these violations routinely go unchecked and unpunished, "justified" as unavoidable in a proxy war managed by Pakistan; only a handful cases have been brought to justice by due process. Often, New Delhi's response to the reports by various human rights organizations has been evasive.

2477 civilians had been killed by the Indian forces in the period 1990-1998 (PTI release, 13 September 1998), according to conservative estimates by official sources which mostly exclude thousands of custodial killings. In April 1997, the Minister of State for Home Affairs admitted that 454 persons were missing since 1990.

...

In 1995, Amnesty International documented 706 cases of custodial killings in the period 1990-1994, nearly all after gruesome torture; In its response to Amnesty, the Government of India (GOI) responded to 519 out of 706 cases in an evasive manner, dismissing half of them as "encounter killings" without supporting evidence despite eye-witness reports to the contrary; The government indicated that there was prima facie evidence of human rights violations in 85 other cases which were said to be under investigation, however no one has been brought to justice till date.

* Amnesty International, Torture and Deaths in Custody in Jammu and Kashmir, 1995.
* Amnesty International, Analysis of the Government of India's response to Amnesty International's report on torture and deaths in custody in Jammu and Kashmir , 1995.

---

Glad to see you are finally catching up on the news.

Been in a coma?

[Luminous Animal]

13. And I have been reading Arundhati Roy for years, too. The official U.S. position on Kashmir?

Move along. Nothing to see here. Thus, the corporate press is near mute.

[Turborama]

8. Or, they were 4 fake US diplomatic cables that were fed to the Guardian by Pakistan!!1! See below

Yeah, the lying Pakistanis did a really good job with these ones...

US embassy cables: US argues against visa for Kashmiri 'paramilitary'
http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/us-embassy-cables-documents/110718

US embassy cables: Seeing eye to eye on counter-terrorism
http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/us-embassy-cables-documents/60802

US embassy cables: India a diffident ally in the 'war on terror' - US
http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/us-embassy-cables-documents/97802

US embassy cables: Red Cross clashes with India over treatment of detainees
http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/us-embassy-cables-documents/30222


Just in case...




:sarcasm:

[midnight]

4. Should we be shipping our jobs there?

[cosmicone]

5. Pakistanis have already created fake wikileaks cables

and the Pakistani media apologized for falling for a hoax.

biosteve2001: if the patient is virus free, it's a cure

[Turborama]

9. Who's biosteve2001? And why are you quoting that random comment here?

Also: http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_mesg&forum=102&topic_id=4662514&mesg_id=4662711

[cosmicone]

11. My apologies ... here is the link that I wanted to post

http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/india/Pakistan-papers-apologise-after-running-anti-India-fake-WikiLeaks-cables/articleshow/7075670.cms

[Turborama]

14. Thanks for the link. Nothing to do with WikiLeaks, The Guardian or the contents of the OP.

On Friday, The News wrote that "on further inquiries, we learnt from our sources that the story was dubious and may have been planted".

The News said the report originated from some local websites "known for their close connections with certain intelligence agencies".

[Luminous Animal]

12. Which has nothing to do with the cables referenced in the OP.

[Solly Mack]

7. k/r

[Name removed]

10. Deleted message

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