Syria prison deaths show sharp rise in 2011

[wautd]

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GENEVA — The number of deaths in Syrian prisons rose sharply in 2011, Amnesty International said Tuesday, describing it as one of the "most shocking features" of the regime's crackdown on demonstrations.

"No less than 88 such deaths have been reported to Amnesty International as occurring during the period from April 1 and August 15," including 10 children aged between 13 and 18, the human rights group said.
"The sharp rise in the number of reported deaths in custody has been one of the most shocking features of the government's bloody crackdown on the protests," the London-based group added.

This figure was "already many times higher than the yearly average over recent years," Amnesty said, noting the previous average annual death rate was five.

All 88 fatalities were male.

For at least 52 of them, Amnesty said "there is evidence that torture caused or contributed to the deaths."
"Such an increase in deaths cannot be a coincidence. It appears to be the expression of the same brutal violence that is being shown daily in the Syrian streets," said Reto Rufer, who heads the Middle East for the Swiss chapter of Amnesty International.

The rights group had examined 45 videos filmed by relatives or human rights defenders, after their bodies were returned to families. Twenty of the videos were also shown to forensic experts.

The corpses showed signs of violent beatings, burn marks and cuts, noted the group.

"Some of the dead ... were also mutilated either before or after death in particularly grotesque ways apparently intended to strike terror into the families to whom their corpses were returned," said Amnesty International.

The rights campaigner launched an urgent appeal to the UN Security Council to to condemn the mass violations and take measures to bring those responsible to account.

"The reaction of the UN Security Council has so far been inadequate," said the rights group, pointing to China, Russia, Brazil and India's opposition to any stronger response.

So what's with all these double standards? Gadaffi was stopped, yet Assad's regime is allowed to commit attrocities with impunity?

[K. A. Pital]

It only depends on convenience, imperialistic interests and military capabilities of NATO. Gaddafi was stopped at the same time as Germany was selling tanks to Saudi Arabia while the latter was "shutting up" Bahrain via the application of a nice Sharia word and a gun. Come on. Did anyone really think NATO embarked on some sort of a new age crusade against dictatorships? Puhleeze.

[Block]

It only depends on convenience, imperialistic interests and military capabilities of NATO. Gaddafi was stopped at the same time as Germany was selling tanks to Saudi Arabia while the latter was "shutting up" Bahrain via the application of a nice Sharia word and a gun. Come on. Did anyone really think NATO embarked on some sort of a new age crusade against dictatorships? Puhleeze.

I'm sure it has got nothing to do with the fact that a much larger portion of the population in Syria still supports the Assad government than did the Qaddafi one in Libya. Or with the fact that an organized resistence movement requested help in Libya, but has yet to do so in Syria. Or the terrain of the country, population density, military support, or anything else. It's all about imperialistic interests.

[K. A. Pital]

I'm sure it has got nothing to do with the fact that a much larger portion of the population in Syria still supports the Assad government than did the Qaddafi one in Libya

Before NATO intervention Qaddafi was readying to crush the rebellion. Assad has basically crushed his in the recent few days.

Or with the fact that an organized resistence movement requested help in Libya, but has yet to do so in Syria. Or the terrain of the country, population density, military support, or anything else. It's all about imperialistic interests.

Yes, it is, moron. If a major coalition of Western military powers had an imperialistic interest in Syria, it would crush it like a fucking bug. Iraq was a massive nation with lots of population and yet it was invaded. I'm not even speaking about the fact that Saudi Arabia's Bahrain venture was supported by Western powers via arms sales to the Saudites. *laughs* What else betrays imperialism more. They were so shittily afraid that the Saudites won't buy their killtoys that they couldn't grow a spine and drop a few Tomahawks on the sheiks, oh, lest the sheiks start buying from Russia... which means our military industry gloriously loses money. Oi, oi. Just like Russia is so up in arms because NATO is selling here and there and kicking Russia out from the African arms market.

What a brawl between death dealers, it is actually a sight to behold for years to come.

The fact that Syria is not yet crushed either means the West has no immediate interest in crushing Syria and organizing an imperialistic war there, or that these interest will take time to realize if an invasion actually commences.

Imperialistic interests and imperialistic benefits, monetary or non-monetary, determine 90% of all warmaking. 10% of the rest are determined by bad occasions.

[Block]

You're seeing what you choose to see. The West had no immediate interest in crushing Qaddafi either. He was working hand in hand with the US government for the last 9 years, hadn't been manipulating oil prices, hell he was basically the perfect puppet. Fact is crushing his military was much, much easier than destroying Syria's would be. While there may have been imperalistic reasons for our support in Libya, it's not anywhere near as cut and dry as you want it to be.

[K. A. Pital]

The West had no immediate interest in crushing Qaddafi either. He was working hand in hand with the US government for the last 9 years

That's why the intervention was so half-assed. Today we bomb, tomorrow we don't. The US didn't want to get involved much. Duh.

...hadn't been manipulating oil prices, hell he was basically the perfect puppet.

I think you should look to Europe to see that this "puppet" angered his puppetmasters - probably the ones from France, though we might never know exactly unless another Wikileaks-scale exposion would happen in Europe. I read that he opposed a French TNC deal in the Libyan oil sector and also chose to shift from French arms shipments to Russian arms shipments. I bet French oil and arms dealers weren't exactly very happy. And Nicholas Sarkozy, Europe's Putin-wannabe, needed a "small victorious war" more than anything else after his image was tarred by deportations and other crap.

Fact is crushing his military was much, much easier than destroying Syria's would be. While there may have been imperalistic reasons for our support in Libya, it's not anywhere near as cut and dry as you want it to be.

I'm not saying it is "cut and dry". In fact, the Libyan intevention betrays a distinct lack of interest, which is notable. Occasional plunder and imperialistic outrages are yet not enough to claim that this is an imperialistic neo-colonization. So far it seems the TNC will keep independence (though its evolution is to be closely observed).

However, what I am saying is that whatever happens in Syria, imperialistic interest has to be strong enough (very strong, in fact!) to override the difficulties of starting a war in the place. Things that you say about Assad's support base (probably not many people are happy with the fact that armed insurgents from Hama are most likely armed radical islamists, Syria's been secular since the last islamist uprising was brutally crushed at Hama) only underscore my point.

Saudi Arabia wasn't fucked over because of Bahrain for the exact same reason - imperialistic interests don't justify the application of force to a regime which has basically destroyed all viable opposition (Skimmer said the last whatever disturbance in KSA was sometime in the 1970s; I trust him on that). KSA is a good little puppet (not to mention they buy US and German weapons in loads and pay up with petrodollars without delay; the nicest bunch of theocrats in the world, not like those Irani freaks now). Much better and wealthier than Gaddafi, no matter that they're frankly much more horrible than any of Middle Eastern and North African secular dictators.

The idea that Syrian intervention can occur without a sizeable imperialistic interest is frankly preposterous. The half-assed Libyan one already had a sizeable interest which came from France. To commit to a bloody, full-scale war in Libya would mean that the fruits of victory must be very gratifying - political victories in foreign or domestic policy large enough, or loot and plunder of funds - both of the enemy nation and funds distributed from imperialist nations - on a huge scale, like in Iraq.

I hope I made myself clear. My position is that given the differences between Libya and Syria, a non-imperialistic intervention in Syria is much, much less likely to begin with.