Black sites are clandestine detention centers operated by a state where prisoners who have not been charged with a crime are incarcerated without due process or court order, are often mistreated and murdered, and have no recourse to bail. [1] [2] [3]
Several clandestine detention centres operated in Argentina during the military dictatorship that ruled the country from 1976 to 1983. Prisoners, many of whom had been "disappeared", were tortured and murdered, including pregnant women who were killed after giving birth, and their babies given to military families. [4]
Black sites are widespread within China and a Chinese black site has been alleged to exist in Dubai by a former detainee. [2] Black sites in China are also known as "black jails". [5]
Black sites are used extensively by the Egyptian security services. During the Egyptian Crisis (2011–2014) hundreds of protesters alleged that torture occurred at these black sites. The Egyptian security service also operated black sites involved with the CIA's counter-terror black site program. [6]
Rights groups have documented abuse in clandestine detention centers. Sources cited by CNN noted in 2023 that black-site torture appeared to increase during the Mahsa Amini protests. [7]
During the Israel-Hamas war, Gazan detainees were reportedly transported from Gaza to Sde Teiman, a military base used as a black field. Severe violence, abuse, and in some cases rape and deaths have been reported. [8]
Another longstanding black site in Israel is Camp 1391, noted as the "Israeli Guantanamo".
In Chechnya, gay men have allegedly been tortured at black sites by Chechen security forces. [9] Gay men in other parts of Russia have been kidnapped and transported to sites in Chechnya, where over 100 have been tortured, and some killed. [10] Chechen authorities have thwarted attempts by the Russian LGBT Network to help gay people in Chechnya escape to safe locations in Russia, and inhibited investigations by the Commissioner for Human Rights Tatyana Moskalkova. Despite protests in major Russian cities against the situation in Chechnya, President Vladimir Putin, wanting to maintain good relations with local leader Ramzan Kadyrov, has denied that any abuses of homosexuals in Chechnya have occurred. Chechnya is arguably the most homophobic area in Russia, with 95% of its population adhering to Orthodox (Sunni) Islam. It remains the only district of Russia where homosexuality is outlawed and punishable with jail time. [11] [12]
CIA controlled black sites have been used by the U.S. government in its War on Terror to detain enemy combatants. [3] US President George W. Bush acknowledged the existence of secret prisons operated by the CIA during a speech on September 6, 2006. [13] [14] A claim that the black sites existed was made by The Washington Post in November 2005 and before this by human rights NGOs. [15]
A European Union (EU) report adopted on February 14, 2007, by a majority of the European Parliament (382 MEPs voting in favor, 256 against and 74 abstaining) stated the CIA operated 1,245 flights and that it was not possible to contradict evidence or suggestions that secret detention centers where prisoners have been tortured were operated in Poland and Romania. [3] [16] After denying the fact for years, Poland confirmed in 2014 that it has hosted black sites. [17]
In January 2012, Poland's Prosecutor General's office initiated investigative proceedings against Zbigniew Siemiątkowski, the former Polish intelligence chief. Siemiątkowski was charged with facilitating the alleged CIA detention operation in Poland, where foreign suspects may have been tortured in the context of the War on Terror. The involvement of Leszek Miller, Poland's Prime Minister from 2001 to 2004, is also considered possible. [18] [19]
A 2022 United Press International story cited former Polish President Aleksander Kwaśniewski as admitting in 2014 that his country had provided "a quiet location" for the CIA to operate a black site to torture accused 9/11 terrorists. [20]
Abu Zubaydah is a Palestinian citizen born in Saudi Arabia currently held by the U.S. in the Guantanamo Bay detention camp in Cuba. He is held under the authority of Authorization for Use of Military Force Against Terrorists (AUMF).
Russia has consistently been criticized by international organizations and independent domestic media outlets for human rights violations. Some of the most commonly cited violations include deaths in custody, the systemic and widespread use of torture by security forces and prison guards, the existence of hazing rituals within the Russian Army —referred to as dedovshchina — as well as prevalent breaches of children's rights, instances of violence and prejudice against ethnic minorities, and the targeted killings of journalists.
Mustafa Ahmed Adam al-Hawsawi is a Saudi Arabian citizen. He is alleged to have acted as a key financial facilitator for the September 11 attacks in the United States.
Abd al-Rahim Hussein Muhammed Abdu al-Nashiri is a Saudi Arabian citizen alleged to be the mastermind of the bombing of USS Cole and other maritime attacks. He is alleged to have headed al-Qaeda operations in the Persian Gulf and the Gulf states prior to his capture in November 2002 by the CIA's Special Activities Division.
Extraordinary rendition is a euphemism for state-sponsored kidnapping in another jurisdiction and transfer to a third state. The phrase usually refers to a United States-led program used during the War on Terror, which had the purpose of circumventing the source country's laws on interrogation, detention, extradition and/or torture. Extraordinary rendition is a type of extraterritorial abduction, but not all extraterritorial abductions include transfer to a third country.
Ghost detainee is a term used in the executive branch of the United States government to designate a person held in a detention center, whose identity has been hidden by keeping them unregistered and therefore anonymous. Such uses arose as the Bush administration initiated the War on Terror following the 9/11 attacks of 2001 in the United States. As documented in the 2004 Taguba Report, it was used in the same manner by United States officials and contractors of the Joint Interrogation and Debriefing Center at the Abu Ghraib prison in Iraq in 2003–2004.
The Salt Pit and Cobalt were the code names of an isolated clandestine CIA black site prison and interrogation center outside Bagram Air Base in Afghanistan. It was located north of Kabul and was the location of a brick factory prior to the Afghanistan War. The CIA adapted it for extrajudicial detention.
Abed Hamed Mowhoush was an air vice-marshal believed to be in command of the transport, logistics and airlifting division of the Iraqi Air Force during the regime of Saddam Hussein immediately prior to the 2003 Invasion of Iraq, until his surrender to United States forces on 10 November 2003. He died on 26 November 2003 while in U.S. custody at the Al-Qaim detention facility approximately 200 miles (320 km) northwest of Baghdad, following a 16-day period of detention.
Extrajudicial prisoners of the United States, in the context of the early twenty-first century War on Terrorism, refers to foreign nationals the United States detains outside of the legal process required within United States legal jurisdiction. In this context, the U.S. government is maintaining torture centers, called black sites, operated by both known and secret intelligence agencies. Such black sites were later confirmed by reports from journalists, investigations, and from men who had been imprisoned and tortured there, and later released after being tortured until the CIA was comfortable they had done nothing wrong, and had nothing to hide.
Hassan Muhammad Salih bin Attash is a citizen of Saudi Arabia, held by the United States in the Guantanamo Bay detention camp in Cuba. Joint Task Force Guantanamo counter-terrorism analysts estimate that bin Attash was born in 1985, in Jeddah, Saudi Arabia.
Human rights violations were committed by the warring sides during the second war in Chechnya. Both Russian officials and Chechen rebels have been regularly and repeatedly accused of committing war crimes including kidnapping, torture, murder, hostage taking, looting, rape, decapitation, and assorted other breaches of the law of war. International and humanitarian organizations, including the Council of Europe and Amnesty International, have criticized both sides of the conflict for blatant and sustained violations of international humanitarian law.
The rights of lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender people in Chechnya have long been a cause of concern for human rights organizations such as Amnesty International and Human Rights Watch. As a member of the Russian Federation, Russia's LGBT laws formally apply. De facto, there are no protections for LGBT citizens, and the Chechen authorities allegedly encourage the killing of people suspected of homosexuality by their families.
Marwan Jabour is a former captive held in the CIA's network of black sites. He was raised in Saudi Arabia by his Palestinian guest worker parents. He moved to Pakistan for study, in 1994.
Chernokozovo detention center is a prison in the village of Chernokozovo, Chechnya, Russia. The detention center is operated by the Ministry of Internal Affairs and currently has the status of penal colony.
Filtration camps, also known as concentration camps, were camps used by the Russian forces for their mass internment centers during the First Chechen War and then again during the Second Chechen War.
The Committee Study of the Central Intelligence Agency's Detention and Interrogation Program is a report compiled by the bipartisan United States Senate Select Committee on Intelligence (SSCI) about the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA)'s Detention and Interrogation Program and its use of torture during interrogation in U.S. government communiqués on detainees in CIA custody. The report covers CIA activities before, during, and after the "War on Terror". The initial report was approved on December 13, 2012, by a vote of 9–6, with seven Democrats, one Independent, and one Republican voting in favor of the report and six Republicans voting in opposition.
Anti-gay purges in Chechnya, a part of the Russian Federation, have included forced disappearances, secret abductions, imprisonment, torture and extrajudicial killing by authorities targeting persons based on their perceived sexual orientation, primarily gay men. At least 2 of the 100 people, whom authorities detained on suspicion of being gay or bisexual, have reportedly died after being held in what human rights groups and eyewitnesses have called concentration camps.
The British Indian Ocean Territory, sometimes known as the Chagos Archipelago has had many threats of occupation by various groups, especially since the Depopulation of Chagossians from the Chagos Archipelago, as well as being a joint UK-US facility that is used in countering terrorism. The UK maintains that there is a low risk of terrorism in this territory.
Following the September 11 attacks of 2001 and subsequent War on Terror, the United States Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) established a "Detention and Interrogation Program" that included a network of clandestine extrajudicial detention centers, officially known as "black sites", to detain, interrogate, and often torture suspected enemy combatants, usually with the acquiescence, if not direct collaboration, of the host government.
Sde Teiman is an Israeli military base located in the Negev desert near the border with the Gaza Strip. During the Israel–Hamas war, its use as a detention camp doubled and gained international attention for its systemic human rights violations against its Palestinian detainees from the strip.