May/June 1991, Page 62

Human Rights

By Sally Clark Nyhan

Atrocities in Kuwait Continue After Iraqi Pullout

Amnesty International appealed to the emir of Kuwait to intervene personally to end the massive human rights violations taking place in Kuwait after the Iraqi withdrawal.

An Amnesty delegation visited Kuwait from March 28 to April 9 and documented hundreds of arbitrary arrests, torture, and killings carried out first by Kuwaiti resistance fighters and then by people identifying themselves as Kuwaiti armed forces personnel.

"Their [the human rights violations'] scale and persistence threaten to leave an indelible stain on Kuwait's human rights record. This is all the more lamentable in light of hopes that the kind of violations that occurred under the Iraqi occupation would be a thing of the past, " Amnesty International stated.

The vast majority of victims since Feb. 26 have been Palestinians, some of whom held Jordanian passports. Iraqi and Sudanese nationals have also been targeted. "Victims have been gunned down in public or taken away, tortured and killed in secret, " the report concluded. "Hundreds of victims were plucked from their homes, taken from streets or arrested at checkpoints, many to be tortured in police stations, schools and other makeshift detention centers."

Kuwaiti authorities have acknowledged that 600 detainees are being held in a military prison outside Kuwait City. Detainees who have since been transferred from the facility told Amnesty that torture is common and that at least seven inmates had died after being tortured.

The Amnesty team recorded details on 10 extra judicial killings, but suspected "scores" more. Access to detainees was not complete, thus the fate of many prisoners was still in doubt. In addition, relatives were not informed of detainees' locations.

Few torture victims taken to hospitals were recorded as being tortured, said Amnesty, noting that "some doctors told us Kuwaiti army and security personnel supervised treatment and even turned down doctors, recommendations for further treatment. It was also alleged that some doctors cooperated willingly with these personnel and themselves treated victims harshly."

One victim Amnesty examined, a 24-year-old Palestinian, had been beaten repeatedly for hours by men identifying themselves as Kuwaiti intelligence. Amnesty reported that the victim had been beaten, stamped on, had had acid thrown on him and had been subjected to electric shock torture. "Parts of his thighs were raw, with skin peeling off 'consistent with the application of sulfuric acid'. . . He was in a pitiable state."

The Amnesty team categorized over a dozen types of torture used by the Kuwaitis and concluded that victims were often tortured for hours by personnel working in relay teams.

The group did meet with Kuwaiti judicial authorities, who assured Amnesty that they were working to get the judicial system functional again. However, "In spite of some positive steps, overall safeguards against human rights violations appear to have been accorded 'an extremely low priority' by the country's rulers, " Amnesty concluded.

Finally, Amnesty addressed its report of December 1990, which accused Iraqi soldiers of killing large numbers of babies by removing them from their incubators. While the overall tone of that report was declared accurate, Amnesty re-examined its information after the credibility of the babies' deaths was questioned. Testimony from several sources appeared to confirm that the babies had died, and medical and cemetery officials insisted that the babies died after being removed from incubators, although they had no concrete evidence. After receiving similar reports from several different sources, Amnesty decided to include the allegations. The December report will be corrected to indicate that reports that Iraqi occupiers had removed babies from incubators in Kuwait were based on hearsay rather than hard evidence.

Church Group Sends Letter to Baker

The Catholic Near East Welfare Association (CNEWA) sent a letter to US Secretary of State James Baker before his first trip to the Middle East, calling on him to recognize the human rights abuses faced by Palestinians in the occupied territories.

The letter read, in part, "Provision and receipt of medical treatment during the prolonged curfew [in effect during the Gulf war] was absolutely prohibited unless a permit was obtained from hostile and medically unqualified combat soldiers and administrative personnel. We have documented a number of cases verifying that these practices resulted in death."

Included with the letter was testimony from an Israeli reservist soldier who was stationed in the Hawara refugee camp. He recounted the difficulties involved for camp residents to seek medical attention, citing "tens of cases" in which residents trying to get to a hospital were told by guards to go home. Residents were often stopped from receiving medical treatment by soldiers or administrative personnel, the soldier added.

Sally Clark Nyhan is the human rights editor and book club editor for the American Educational Trust.