The practice of “Extraordinary Rendition” has been widely publicized and criticized. It involves the covert transfer of alleged terrorists, who are citizens of other nations, from one country to another country in which the questioning of imprisoned persons involve extreme measures because pertinent international laws there are either lax or do not exist. In actuality, these countries have low regard for the humane treatment of prisoners, more often times than not, prisoners who are victims of “Extraordinary Rendition” are tortured. According to the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU), “the Central Intelligence Agency of the United States and other U.S. government agencies have been using “Extraordinary Rendition” since the early 1900s. The suspects are either detained and interrogated by U.S. personnel at a U.S.-run facility outside of the U.S., or are interrogated by foreign agents, in each instance with interrogation methods not sanctioned by international standards” (aclu.org).
“Extraordinary Rendition” differs from “Ordinary Rendition” in that “Ordinary Rendition”, like extradition, involves transferring a person who has been detained from one location to another jurisdiction to be tried. There is no torture in “Ordinary Rendition”, and there is no trial in “Extraordinary Rendition.” Ultimately, the main difference that puts the two practices into perspective for us is that “Ordinary Rendition” falls within the parameters of U.S. and International Law, while “Extraordinary Rendition” does not. The United Nation’s Universal Declaration of Human Rights clearly states in Article 5 that no persons should be tortured or undergo degrading, cruel inhuman punishment or treatment, and Article 10 states that all persons are entitled to have a fair and public hearing by impartial parties. Additionally, according to the ACLU, the U.S. Congress has stated that U.S. policy prevents the expulsion, extradition, or other types of forced deployment of persons to countries that the United States believes would subject them to inhumane treatment, or be exposed to possible torture or other harm, regardless of whether the person is physically in the United States (aclu.org).
Despite these declarations and policies, the U.S. uses “Extraordinary Rendition” as a regular method of extracting information from prisoners, bringing the U.S. under severe
scrutiny for engaging in the practice of Extraordinary Rendition; however, the United States has felt compelled to do so citing as their major reasons for doing so, the safety of the American people, and the value of the intelligence that they get from this practice. According to a Fact Sheet of the Central Intelligence Agency, the dehumanizing rendition program that George W. Bush sanctioned after the terrorist attacks on New York City, Pennsylvania and Washington D.C. in 2001 was found by the US Justice Department and the CIA to be well within the confines of the law. Moreover, the program was part of a larger world-wide movement initiated and put into play by the CIA in an effort to destroy al-Qa’ida and thwart any plan of further multiple casualties in America (cia.gov).
Additionally, the U.S. government has indicated that “Extraordinary Renditions” yielded information crucial in preventing attacks, retaining terrorists and saving the lives of the American people. In responding to the criticism, the CIA notes that they can ponder as to whether they would have been able to get the information by other means; and they indicate that they are not ascertaining that the fact that they were able to get the information by this method, an endorsement of that kind of treatment, but that it is what it is. The CIA maintains that having reviewed 20 case studies, they are confident that the program is effective (cia.gov).
An example they cite is the capture of Bid Laden, indicating that it was information that they had received from prisoners upon which severe methods were used, that led them to his capture and demise. They were able to get from the prisoners intel on Abu Ahmad al-Kuwaiti’s role as courier in delivering messages to Bin Laden, causing them to pay more attention to al-Kuwaiti. After they administered extreme measures on Ammar al-Baluchi he eventually revealed the information about al-Kuwaiti. The CIA was then able to use other information along with the crucial piece derived via the extreme measure to close in on Bin Ladin. (cia.org).
Moreover, the U.S. Department of Justice has maintained that foreign nationals who are held outside of the United States in countries that fall outside of the auspices of the United Nations and of the United States and its Territories, are not protected by Federal and International laws. Therefore it is well within the right of the U.S. to detain these persons without due process and to use brute force with them.
But the United States is still being criticized for continuing to practice “Extraordinary Rendition” for several reasons. If the US tries to explain away the use of this method of interrogation, they have come up short because for very meagre returns, people have been demoralized, stripped of their basic human rights, endured torture beyond compare, among much worse. In addition, and even more disgusting is the fact that they have sometimes captured and tortured the wrong people, and they have disregarded the UN Declaration of Human Rights, and sullied their name and reputation as far as preserving the basic decency and rights of each person. They are also criticized for not admitting to doing any wrong in this regard, and regardless of whether they have captured the right person or the wrong person, they do not compensate victims in any way for any reason. Additionally, the US people have weighed the behavior of the US government in the balance of morals and deemed it hypocritical on the part of the government to outlaw something on their soil, because it is so ghastly inhumane that it should not be practiced at all, but they habitually practice it outside, in the same lands that they judge and condemn in terms of moral standards.
In the “Paradox of an American Global Power”, R Kroes (2014) states that as a presidential candidate Barack Obama had promised to close the detention center at Guantanomo Bay, which gave the world and American citizens a bad taste about American practices regarding prisoners, and which symbolized the illegal methods the US used in the day-to-day practices. It was the symbol of “illegal surveillance of its own citizenry, a world of secret renditions of terrorist suspects, and of torture and hi-tech retaliatory assassination”. But after having been elected president, Obama realized how deep-seated this practice was, and how difficult it was for him to make change. He needed more than just his excellent oratory. Additionally, there were threats facing America. In 2009, Obama gave an executive order repudiating torture, but it did not include the CIA’s rendition program; rather it was designed to maintain the CIA’s privilege to have short-term detention of prisoners. His order also created an interagency team to review the interrogation and transfer policies issued. However, under his administration, Maher Arar was tortured in Syria, ad Ahmen Agiza and Muhammed al-Sery were tortured in Egypt (Opensocietyfoundations.org), rendition, some of which closely resembled “Extraordinary Rendition”, was alive and well. That is not to say that the Obama Administration sanctioned any wrong-doing: he ended the Extraordinary Rendition program in 2009, which had already been banished in 2007, and Obama also banned the CIA from using the centers in which extreme measures were conducted.
In addition, the following examples testify to the reason why America, who prides itself on being the land of the free, and on respecting the rights of every citizen should be criticized. According to Open Society’s Foundations, Under the Bush administration the CIA detained about 100 persons, using “enhanced interrogation techniques” on them (OpenSocietyFoundation.Org). This technique as defined by Bush’s administration included things like water dousing, forced nudity, water boarding, sleep deprivation, and insult slaps among others. Some of the persons who have been subject to this type of treatment are: Abu Zubaydah, Gul Rahman, Fatima Bouchar, Muhammed al-Zery, Ahmed Agiza, Abu Omar, Abd al Rahim al Nashire, Khaled El-Masri, Wesam Abdulrahman Ahmed al-Deemawi, Ibn al-Shaykh al-Libi among others.
Since 2001 the U.S. has done very little to convince the American people and the world at large of their honor in this matter. According to the Aziz Huq’s (2006) article, “Extraordinary Rendition and the Wages of Hypocrisy” in the World Policy Journal, Canada, Sweden, Italy, Germany and the European Union conducted parliamentary or judicial investigation of specific cases regarding their citizens and the use of their territory. In Berlin a newspaper ran a fake CIA recruiting advertisement: “Torturers Wanted: U.S. Citizens May Not Apply”.
The bottom line is that when the United States participates in these activities they call to mind images of United States citizens being themselves terrorist. When the support the laws of the countries from when the majority of terrorist groups recruit people it puts to question the integrity of their moral leadership. Moreover, it draws to the attention of the entire world that what lies inside of an American is the same thing they accuse some Middle Eastern countries of, and it reinforces a latent belief of others that America believes that it is above the law. And, according to Huq (2006), “to millions of Arabs and Muslims, stories of extraordinary rendition and secret offshore prisons speak louder than words about American values. They suggest that America is unwilling to accord foreigners the same basic human dignity enjoyed by its own citizens, that American ethics are purely instrumental. Extraordinary rendition has given al-Qaeda a potent recruiting tool”.
Today, this type of behavior will still go on because President Obama was able only to put a band aid on the issue.
References
Aftergood, Steve. (2008). “Rendition, ordinary and extraordinary”. Secrecy News. The American Federation of Scientists. Retrieved from
https://fas.org/blogs/secrecy/2008/07/rendition_ordinary/ 11 June 2016.
“CIA fact sheet regarding the SSCI study on the former detention andiInterrogation program”. (2014, Dec. 12). The Central Intelligence Agency. Retrieved from
https://www.cia.gov/news-information/press-releases-statements/2014-press-releases-statements/cia-fact-sheet-ssci-study-on-detention-interrogation-program.html. 11 June 2016.
Clarke, A. W. (2012). Rendition to torture. New Brunswick, N.J.: Rutgers University Press.
“Fact sheet: extraordinary rendition.” American Civil Liberties Union. Aclu.org. Retrieved from
https://www.aclu.org/fact-sheet-extraordinary-rendition 11 June 2016.
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