BAGHDAD: Amnesty International on Tuesday alleged cases of “torture and ill-treatment” among Iraqis who returned home from Syria to a rehabilitation center for people suspected of Daesh group ties.
The London-based human rights group said it documented cases involving seven men and one woman, detained over the past two years at the Al-Jadaa camp in northern Iraq.
“Seven of them faced torture and ill-treatment,” Amnesty said, describing beatings, electric shocks and suffocation by plastic bags.
Family members observed signs of torture, including broken fingers and dislocated shoulders, the group said in a statement.
“The torture and other ill-treatment suffered by those arrested... is horrifying. It must be stopped and investigated immediately,” said Amnesty secretary general Agnes Callamard.
Iraq and the United Nations had agreed to repatriate tens of thousands of Iraqis from Syria’s Al-Hol camp, but Callamard called it “unconscionable” that those returning from war and detention face further horrors.”
Amnesty said it spoke with detainees, their families and 16 UN staff members during interviews conducted between July and September.
Of the eight cases, seven detainees described torture by Iraqi security forces. Six are now serving lengthy sentences based on forced confessions, it said.
One detainee, identified by the pseudonym Saleem, described his experience.
“They beat me, and... handcuffed my hands behind my back. They hit the soles of my feet with a green water pipe... I was just saying ‘no’, again and again,” he was quoted as saying by Amnesty.
“During the torture, they said they wanted me to confess to things I didn’t do. I didn’t confess, and so I didn’t walk for four days.”
Amnesty urged Iraqi authorities to “immediately end the use of torture and other ill-treatment and the enforced disappearance of those arrested” at Al-Jadaa.
The non-governmental organization said it had requested but was denied access to interview detainees in July due to “security concerns.”
On October 2, Amnesty said it wrote to Iraq’s prime minister with its findings but has not received a response.
Iraq is one of the few countries to regularly repatriate its nationals from Al-Hol, a policy welcomed by the United Nations and the United States.
Since 2021, Iraqi forces have arrested about 80 people in the camp on charges of affiliation with the Daesh group, Amnesty said.
While some arrests may be “legitimate,” Amnesty noted accusations have occasionally stemmed from personal quarrels or a relative with ties to Daesh.
As of September, Al-Jadaa held 2,223 people, including 1,318 children, 627 women and 278 men, the rights group said.
Iraqis returning from Syria face torture: Amnesty
https://arab.news/y2wjf
Iraqis returning from Syria face torture: Amnesty
- Iraq and the United Nations had agreed to repatriate tens of thousands of Iraqis from Syria’s Al-Hol camp
- Iraq is one of the few countries to regularly repatriate its nationals from Al-Hol
Trial opens in Tunisia of NGO workers accused of aiding migrants
- Aid workers accused of assisting irregular migration to Tunisia went on trial on Monday, as Amnesty International criticized what it called “the relentless criminalization of civil society”
TUNIS: Aid workers accused of assisting irregular migration to Tunisia went on trial on Monday, as Amnesty International criticized what it called “the relentless criminalization of civil society” in the country.
Six staff members of the Tunisian branch of the France Terre d’Asile aid group, along with 17 municipal workers from the eastern city of Sousse, face charges of sheltering migrants and facilitating their “illegal entry and residence.”
If convicted, they face up to 10 years in prison.
Migration is a sensitive issue in Tunisia, a key transit point for tens of thousands of people seeking to reach Europe each year.
A former head of Terre d’Asile Tunisie, Sherifa Riahi, is among the accused and has been detained for more than 19 months, according to her lawyer Abdellah Ben Meftah.
He told AFP that the accused had carried out their work as part of a project approved by the state and in “direct coordination” with the government.
Amnesty denounced what it described as a “bogus criminal trial” and called on Tunisian authorities to drop the charges.
“They are being prosecuted simply for their legitimate work providing vital assistance and protection to refugees, asylum seekers and migrants in precarious situations,” Sara Hashash, Amnesty’s deputy MENA chief, said in the statement.
The defendants were arrested in May 2024 along with about a dozen humanitarian workers, including anti-racism pioneer Saadia Mosbah, whose trial is set to start later this month.
In February 2023, President Kais Saied said “hordes of illegal migrants,” many from sub-Saharan Africa, posed a demographic threat to the Arab-majority country.
His speech triggered a series of racially motivated attacks as thousands of sub-Saharan African migrants in Tunisia were pushed out of their homes and jobs.
Thousands were repatriated or attempted to cross the Mediterranean, while others were expelled to the desert borders with Algeria and Libya, where at least a hundred died that summer.
This came as the European Union boosted efforts to curb arrivals on its southern shores, including a 255-million-euro ($290-million) deal with Tunis.
