Dear Friend,
Did you read about Jay Bybee's recent "admissions" regarding US torture at Guantanamo, Abu Ghraib and other prisons?
At the Quaker Conference on Torture, Sept. 24-26 at Quaker Center in Ben Lomond CA, seeking accountability for the actions of officials like Bybee will be part of the agenda. We hope you'll join us there, and support this work.
Bybee is currently a judge on the US Court of Appeals in San Francisco. He holds this powerful post depite being one of the main authors of the notorious "torture memo," which formed the supposed legal basis for the US torture program. Bybee drafted his memo in 2002 for the Justice Department's Office of Legal Counsel. It was later withdrawn and repudiated by the same agency.
At first glance, Bybee's recent admissions to a Congressional committee might seem startling and even incriminating: he acknowledged that detainees--most of whom were later released without charge--were tortured. And torture is (or at least once was) a crime under US law.
Read more closely, all Bybee really said was that some torturers went too far in carrying out their orders.
Went too far? How? Torture victims died, for one thing; and for another, word of the abuse leaked out, producing a rising chorus of calls for holding accountable those who built and ran this system --including Jay Bybee.
Bybee regretted the negative publicity his own role has received -- but he said "I am going to stand by the memo." "We took a muscular view of presidential authority," Bybee said. "I wasn't running a debating society, and I wasn't running a law school." Instead, he was establishing torture as a policy of the US government. Unfortunately, that basic policy still stands, and Jay Bybee still sits on one of the highest courts in the land.
A government that can torture with impunity has laid the foundation of tyranny. The Quaker Torture Conference is part of the work of overturning this torture policy, dismantling the torture network, and bringing redress to torture victims and justice to perpetrators.
This effort ranks with the epic struggle against slavery in its importance. Please join us, Sept. 24-26. You can register online now at: http://www.quit-torture-now.org
And please pass this message on to others.
John Calvi QUIT Convener
John Calvi
calvij@sover.net
802/387-4789
PO Box 301
Putney VT 05346 USA
www.johncalvi.com
http://johncalvi.blogspot.com
www.quit-torture-now.org
Monday, July 26, 2010
Monday, July 12, 2010
4th QUIT Conference - Torture & Accountability Sept 24-26 QUAKER CENTER Ben Lomond, CA
Dear Friend,
We wish we didn’t need a Quaker Conference on Torture in 2010. But we do. And we hope you, or someone from your meeting community, will join us there.
It’s still hard for many to admit, but the United states government built an extensive “Torture Industrial Complex” as part of the “War On Terror.”
Torture is illegal, a crime under existing U.S. And international laws. There was hope it would end when a new administration came into office in early 2009.
Unfortunately, the actual progress has been very limited: Guantanamo remains open. Secret prisons are still operating in Afghanistan and, likely, elsewhere. The official ban on torture techniques is limited in its applicability.
And perhaps worst of all, none of those who designed or carried out the U.S. torture program has been held accountable. Nor have any of the thousands of victims later released as innocent received compensation, or even an apology.
We think accountability today is the best way to prevent torture in the future. Other countries, including Canada and England, have begun accountability investigations. But the U.S. government is still refusing to follow suit.
It will take persistent and determined effort to root out the “Torture Industrial Complex.” The 2010 Quaker Conference on Torture is one more step toward the goal.
Won’t you take the step, and join us?
Peace,
John Calvi, Convener
QUIT: The Quaker Initiative to End Torture
Quaker Conference on Torture & Accountability
September 24-26, 2010 - Quaker Center-California
Register online NOW at: www.quit-torture-now.org
We wish we didn’t need a Quaker Conference on Torture in 2010. But we do. And we hope you, or someone from your meeting community, will join us there.
It’s still hard for many to admit, but the United states government built an extensive “Torture Industrial Complex” as part of the “War On Terror.”
Torture is illegal, a crime under existing U.S. And international laws. There was hope it would end when a new administration came into office in early 2009.
Unfortunately, the actual progress has been very limited: Guantanamo remains open. Secret prisons are still operating in Afghanistan and, likely, elsewhere. The official ban on torture techniques is limited in its applicability.
And perhaps worst of all, none of those who designed or carried out the U.S. torture program has been held accountable. Nor have any of the thousands of victims later released as innocent received compensation, or even an apology.
We think accountability today is the best way to prevent torture in the future. Other countries, including Canada and England, have begun accountability investigations. But the U.S. government is still refusing to follow suit.
It will take persistent and determined effort to root out the “Torture Industrial Complex.” The 2010 Quaker Conference on Torture is one more step toward the goal.
Won’t you take the step, and join us?
Peace,
John Calvi, Convener
QUIT: The Quaker Initiative to End Torture
Quaker Conference on Torture & Accountability
September 24-26, 2010 - Quaker Center-California
Register online NOW at: www.quit-torture-now.org
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