Today, a group of musicians, including REM, Pearl Jam and The Roots filed a Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) request to find out whether their music was played at the detention facility at Guantánamo Bay.  The request for information stems from former Guantánamo detainees’ testimony and released government documents that document that music has been used as part of interrogations.

The Roots said in a statement, “When we found out that music was being used as part of the torture going on at Guantanamo, shackling and beating people — we were angry.  Just as we wouldn’t be caught dead allowing Dick Cheney to use our music for his campaigns, you can be damn sure we wouldn’t allow him to use it to torture other human beings. Congress needs to shut Guantánamo down.”

Tom Morello of Rage Against the Machine, another of the artists who initiated the FOIA request, stated, “Guantánamo may be Dick Cheney's idea of America, but it's not mine. The fact that music I helped create was used in crimes against humanity sickens me – we need to end torture and close Guantánamo now."

Documents that the ACLU has uncovered through our five-year-old FOIA request about the abuse and torture of detainees in U.S. custody detail how “torture music” was used. Criminal investigation records, sworn statements by military intelligence personnel and detainees, and other documents detailing the use of music as an interrogation method are searchable on the ACLU’s torture document database, which makes available to the public over 130,000 pages of government records released to the ACLU. Among the records we’ve disclosed through our lawsuit are:

• A February 12, 2004 memorandum (PDF) that records the use of a "Fear Up approach" involving "disrespect for the Koran," insulting the detainee, having a room upstairs with spotlights and turning the music on very loud.
• A June 2004 sworn statement (PDF) of a detainee that describes being placed in a small box where he could not stand for two and a half days. Loud music was played constantly, he was denied food and water until the last day, and slapped by a translator during an interrogation.

The ACLU has also interviewed former Guantánamo detainees about their experiences in U.S. custody. Ruhal Ahmed, a 27-year–old, life-long British resident who spent two-and-a-half years at Guantánamo described the use of heavy metal music in combination with stress positions:

…[T]hroughout our stay in Guantánamo, we was all physically, and psychologically, and sexually abused in many forms… we were put into stress positions for days… sometimes exceed[ing] two days, three days, and at the same time you would have the loud music playing, extremely loud, heavy metal would be the most common one they used to use. Strobe lights which you find in discos, these would be flashing in your eyes constantly for two hours and at the same time someone would come and interrogate you – shout questions. There were dogs coming in barking right by your face.

…the physical abuse is hard to bear…[but] no matter how much physically you are beaten up… even if they break your leg, arm… it always will heal over time… [B]ut when you are in a stress position and have got extremely loud music especially heavy metal playing for two or three days continuous without stopping without giving you a break to think for yourself, it’s hard to actually focus… [W]hen they have something [like heavy metal] to replace your thoughts …it’s extremely hard to concentrate on things and it would make you hallucinate and it would make you see… things that is not there. So I think the psychological abuse is much worse and is much harder to bear rather than the physical. Because as I said before the physical pain can always be cured…over months of time that bruise or the broken leg would always heal. But when a human, a person is pushed past a certain barrier psychologically, once he is pushed over his limit, there is no turning back there is no medicine that will actually bring him back to his sanity, once he loses his mind, that’s it. And it was the case for a few of the detainees that we seen who went through this same treatment that we went through.

(Emphasis added.)

The more we learn about the inhumane methods used on detainees in the Bush administration’s “War on Terror,” the greater the need for meaningful accountability for the torture and abuse of detainees in America’s name. To read the documents and take action demanding accountability for torture toady, head on over to our Accountability for Torture site.

Nearly four years have passed since I first traveled to Guantánamo to observe proceedings in the military commission prosecution of Canadian Omar Khadr, who was 15 years old when seized in Afghanistan and has now spent fully a third of his life in captivity. In an ordinary justice system, Khadr's trial – and very likely any possible sentence – would have been completed long ago. Here at Guantánamo, we were back to square one with the dismissal of one of Khadr's lawyers and the introduction of two new defense lawyers – numbers 10 and 11 by my count – who are unfamiliar with the case and will need quite a bit of time to get up to speed. In other words, it's déjà vu all over again.

Or perhaps not. Today the prosecution requested, and the court granted, a further delay in proceedings until November 16, 2009, on which date the Obama administration has pledged to reach a "definitive forum resolution" in Khadr's case. In other words, on or before that date, the administration will decide whether to continue the prosecution in the military commission system, transfer it to a federal court, or dismiss the case altogether. It appears that the administration is still deliberating.

Chief military prosecutor John Murphy used a post-hearing press conference to lobby, quite openly, for the Khadr case to remain within the military commission system. His stated rationale is that military prosecutors are most familiar with the case, but that's hardly a persuasive justification for further tarnishing the nation's historic leadership on human rights by prosecuting a child soldier in an illegitimate system. Of course, the military has other reasons for seeking to keep control of these proceedings: Unlike federal courts, military commissions will permit the use of evidence obtained unconstitutionally and, perhaps more importantly, will allow the government to conceal details of its mistreatment of prisoners from the public.

That Murphy felt the need to plead publicly for the commissions' continued relevance may indicate that he believes he's losing this battle internally. Let's hope so. The commissions have been an unmitigated embarrassment, and an unnecessary one. They should be abolished. Every single offense charged by military commission prosecutors could and should have been prosecuted in established federal courts. Khadr's case belongs, if anywhere, in those courts. Or perhaps the Obama administration will decide that eight years in Guantánamo is punishment enough for a juvenile offender, and will repatriate Khadr to his country and his family.

President Obama spoke eloquently this morning, delivering a historic speech before the United Nations General Assembly. In his speech, Obama outlined his administration's steps towards what he called a "new era of engagement," noting that ensuring basic human rights is essential to a peaceful world. Anthony D. Romero, executive director of the ACLU, said in a statement released today, "For eight years under President Bush, the U.S. undermined international human rights laws and refused to ratify treaties that have been embraced by the overwhelming majority of nations."

Indeed, the first steps taken by Obama in his first nine months in office have been important.  Issuing an executive order to close Guantanamo within one year, joining the U.N. Human Rights Council, signing the Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities (CPRD) and prioritizing the ratification of the Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination Against Women (CEDAW) all signal a new era of engagement with the United Nations and a commitment to human rights for the Obama administration. However, as President Obama proclaimed today, "this is just a beginning."

While these are critical steps towards upholding and protecting human rights and illustrate a clear commitment to advancing human rights on behalf of the Obama administration, it's just the beginning.  There is much work to be done both at home and abroad. The U.S. has concrete steps to take in order to uphold a robust human rights policy.  Read more about these steps at http://www.udhr60.org/udhr_mag.html.

In the press statement released by the ACLU, Jamil Dakwar, director of the ACLU Human Rights Program, noted:

The Obama administration has already taken steps to break with the Bush administration's disastrous human rights policies but there is still much more to do, including honoring and expanding U.S. human rights commitments and fully incorporating them into domestic policy … we look forward to his administration taking concrete actions to translate these commitments to a robust human rights policy.

Real action is needed, such as ratifying CEDAW, the Convention on the Rights of the Child, the CPRD and other human rights treaties that are essential to promoting every human's dignity and well-being.

Lenora Lapidus, director of the ACLU Women's Rights Project concurred,

We hope that his speech today before the General Assembly will be followed by real action on the part of the U.S. in finally joining the overwhelming majority of nations of the world in ratifying CEDAW and other international human rights treaties, and making human rights a key component of both U.S. domestic and foreign policy.

Our credibility, just as Obama noted, will be judged by our deeds, not just by our words. Let's see how well we do.

Learn more at www.aclu.org/humanrights.

The government indicated today it would ask for a further delay in the Guantánamo military commissions cases of the defendants charged in the 9/11 attacks. The proceedings are currently scheduled to resume on Monday, September 21, and it will be up to the military judge whether or not to grant a requested delay. The government’s request would come on the heels of a petition filed by military defense lawyers on September 10 asking a federal court to halt the unconstitutional military commissions system.

Several defendants in the Guantánamo military commissions are represented by military attorneys assisted by the John Adams Project, a joint effort by the ACLU and the National Association of Criminal Defense Lawyers to provide support for the under-resourced military defense counsel in the Guantánamo military commissions.