Torture And Terrorism

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The terrorist attacks of 9/11 has brushed in a new era of interrogation techniques that may or may not be protected by national and international laws, depending on how one defines detainees and torture.  These techniques are considered torture and are used to get valuable information from detainees.  These techniques violate various laws; it takes place in certain places, there are reasons why it goes on there and the definition of torture can be misconstrued.  

     The treatment of prisoners including, but not limited to torture or lite torture could be interpreted as being protected under a few amendments to the constitution.  The eighth amendment has a clause against cruel and unusual punishment.  Also, the due process clause of the 5th and14th amendment could also protect against being deprive of life, liberty, and property without due process of law.  Not only those but in a few landmark cases such as Brown v. Mississippi in which the defendant thought he was being hung and was also beaten brutally until he finally confessed when he was about to be hung.  In the Rochin v. United States developed the “shock the conscience” in this landmark case.  In this case the defendant was approach by police and he swallowed what appeared to be drugs and the officers had his stomach pumped, which violated his constitutional rights. 

Though we as Americans expect all of these rights, we don’t even give these rights to these prisoners of war.  Our country doesn’t even recognize them as prisoners of war; they are labeled as “enemy combatants”.  They are not citizens so they are not allotted right to a hearing or to argue the case.  Some of the families of the enemy combatants wrote a writ of Habeas Corpus to the Supreme Court to hear the case, but were denied because neither the families nor the detainees had any standing.   This seems to be a little hypocritical.  Because these “enemy combatants” have not been convicted of any crime or even accused of a crime they are not protected under our own constitution.  Most of these prisoners are not even terrorists, they are just average people. 

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     The next thing that protects prisoners of war from torture during their detainment is the Geneva Convention.  The Geneva Convention protects many people under the articles that were established and that we agreed to.  The people that are protected under the Geneva Convention include prisoners of war, inhabitants of an unoccupied area, and civilians working for the military.  There are treaties that are against torture and they are, ”the European Convention for the Protection of Human rights and Fundamental freedoms, the international covenant on Civil and Political Rights and the Convention against Torture and Other Cruel, Inhuman or Degrading ...

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