Evidence of torture in Afghanistan?
The LATimes has been doing phenomenal work on this story of US flash drives stolen from bases in Afghanistan and then sold on the black market "not 200 yards" from Bagram. Short version, an LATimes reporter went and bought some of these stolen flash drives and has been reporting on what they've found.
The data on these drives includes info on US military personnel(names, addresses, family info, assignments, etc,) tactical information, planning and after action reports, identification of Afghanis who have been providing intel, all kinds of really bad stuff. (If you look on the right of this page under "related", you can check out the other stories in the series.)
This being a big fairly easy story, NBC sent one of their producers out to the black market to buy some of these flash memory cards for their own reporting. Pretty much the same results, except for this:
Especially with reporting in late February that a prison in Bagram has become the new Guantanamo.
The data on these drives includes info on US military personnel(names, addresses, family info, assignments, etc,) tactical information, planning and after action reports, identification of Afghanis who have been providing intel, all kinds of really bad stuff. (If you look on the right of this page under "related", you can check out the other stories in the series.)
This being a big fairly easy story, NBC sent one of their producers out to the black market to buy some of these flash memory cards for their own reporting. Pretty much the same results, except for this:
Among the photos of Americans are pictures of individuals who appear to have been tortured and killed, most too graphic to show. NBC News does not know who caused their injuries. The Pentagon would not comment on the photos.There is no way at this point to know if the effects shown in these photos(I'm guessing private photos,) were the result of US actions, US sponsored action, or whether "they found them like that," but I would certainly hope NBC would follow up.
Especially with reporting in late February that a prison in Bagram has become the new Guantanamo.
posted by mikevotes at
7:50 AM
4 Comments:
I saw that report last night, but I came away thinking that NBC didn't want to report on the implications of any of the contents. They ran it as a "shouldn't the military be protecting its data" story rather than a "look what's on here" story.
By
JUSIPER, at 9:54 AM
Yeah, that's the way the article read.
Frankly, they're both stories. The US should be protecting their data far better, AND there is torture going on in Afghanistan.
Mike
By
mikevotes, at 11:09 AM
Agreed. But NBC is not the GAO. It's responsibility to the public is qualitatively different, don't you think?
By
JUSIPER, at 11:43 AM
Yes. I do agree, but what I was intending to say is that both issues should be covered because both have big implications.
Perhaps I could have written the earlier response better. Both should be covered as separate storylines in separate stories.
One headline, Lax base security endangers troops and mission in Afghanistan,
And another story with another headline, Is the US torturing in Afghanistan? or Proof of wider torture policy?
Because I think they both are pretty big stories.
Mike
By
mikevotes, at 1:28 PM
Post a Comment
<< Home