A UN report has condemned the
United States for violating the terms of an international anti-torture treaty.
The panel took Washington to task for police brutality, military
interrogations, and capital punishment protocols.
“The Committee is concerned
about numerous reports of police brutality and excessive use of force by law
enforcement officials,” the paper released by the UN Committee Against Torture
says, adding that in particular this brutality is seen against persons
belonging “to certain racial and ethnic groups, immigrants and LGBTI
individuals.”
The document was released on
Friday, just days after the contentious decision of a Missouri grand jury not
to indict a white officer accused of shooting Michael Brown, an unarmed black
teen. The decision triggered a wave of protests nationwide.
Although the report didn’t
specifically mention the events in Ferguson, Mike Brown’s parents met with the
committee to discuss their son’s case in Geneva earlier this month.
The UN watchdog expressed “deep concern at the
frequent and recurrent police shootings or fatal pursuits of unarmed black
individuals.”
The 10-person panel, which
periodically reviews the records of the 156 countries which ratified the
Convention Against Torture – a non-binding international human rights treaty –
cited mounting concerns over “racial profiling by police and immigration
offices, and growing militarization of policing activities.” f the "
The committee called on US authorities to
“prosecute persons suspected of torture or ill-treatment and, if found guilty,
ensure that they are punished in accordance with the gravity of their acts.”
“We recommend that all
instances of police brutality and excessive use of force by law enforcement
officers are investigated promptly, effectively and impartially by an
independent mechanism,” said panel member, Alessio Bruni, at a news conference
in Geneva.
Urging for tougher laws to
define and ban torture, the committee called on Washington to reevaluate the
treatment of detainees at the infamous Guantanamo Bay detention facility, which
currently houses 148 prisoners.
“The Committee is particularly
disturbed at reports describing a draconian system of secrecy surrounding
high-value detainees that keeps their torture claims out of the public domain.”
In addition, the committee
criticized the recent spate of botched executions, especially in Arizona,
Oklahoma, and Ohio, citing reported cases “of excruciating pain and prolonged
suffering that procedural irregularities have caused to condemned prisoners in
the course of their execution.”
The UN body further highlighted
“continued delays in recourse procedures which keep prisoners sentenced to
death in a situation of anguish and incertitude for many years.”
“The Committee notes that in
certain cases such a situation amounts to torture in so far as it corresponds
to one of the forms of torture (i.e. the threat of imminent death) contained in
the interpretative understanding made by the State party at the time of
ratification of the Convention.”
The report urges US authorities
to establish “a moratorium on executions with a view to abolish the death
penalty” and “to commute the sentences of individuals currently on death row.”
US activists welcomed the
findings as a call to action for the federal government.
“This report - along with the
voices of Americans protesting around the country this week - is a wake-up call
for police who think they can act with impunity,” said Jamil Dakwar of the
American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU), as quoted by Reuters.
