Torture by Police, Forced Disappearance & Other Ill Treatment In the early years of the 21st Century, 2000 to
2025 gvnet.com/torture/Lebanon.htm
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CAUTION: The following links
have been culled from the web to illuminate the situation in Lebanon. Some of these links may lead to websites
that present allegations that are unsubstantiated or even false. No
attempt has been made to validate their authenticity or to verify their content. HOW TO USE THIS WEBPAGE Students If you are looking
for material to use in a term-paper, you are advised to scan the postings on
this page and others to see which aspects of Torture by Authorities are of
particular interest to you. You might
be interested in exploring the moral justification for inflicting pain or
inhumane or degrading treatment or punishment in order to obtain critical
information that may save countless lives, or to elicit a confession for a
criminal act, or to punish someone to teach him a lesson outside of the
courtroom. Perhaps your paper might
focus on some of the methods of torture, like fear, extreme temperatures,
starvation, thirst, sleep deprivation, suffocation, or immersion in freezing
water. On the other hand, you might
choose to write about the people acting in an official capacity who
perpetrate such cruelty. There is a
lot to the subject of Torture by Authorities.
Scan other countries as well as this one. Draw comparisons between activity in adjacent
countries and/or regions. Meanwhile,
check out some of the Term-Paper
resources that are available on-line. ***
ARCHIVES *** 2020 Country
Reports on Human Rights Practices: Lebanon U.S. Dept of State Bureau of Democracy, Human Rights, and
Labor, 30 March 2021 www.state.gov/reports/2020-country-reports-on-human-rights-practices/lebanon/
[accessed 27 July
2021] TORTURE AND OTHER
CRUEL, INHUMAN, OR DEGRADING TREATMENT OR PUNISHMENT The LAF
Investigation Branch conducted an internal investigation that began May 6
into the alleged torture of detainees in LAF detention facilities in Sidon
and Tripoli following protests in those cities. The investigations were
suspended due to the lack of formal allegations from the victims and because
the original investigating judge resigned from his position; the cases
remained open as of October 19. The LAF imposed the highest penalties allowed
by the military code of justice in several cases involving torture, while
noting that only a judicial decision could move punishment beyond
administrative penalties. PRISON AND DETENTION
CENTER CONDITIONS According to a
government official, most prisons lacked adequate sanitation, ventilation,
and lighting, and authorities did not regulate temperatures consistently. Roumieh prisoners often slept 10 in a room originally
built to accommodate two prisoners, and basic medical care suffered from
inadequate staffing, poor working conditions, and extreme overcrowding. The
ISF reported that seven individuals died in detention facilities during the
year. ARREST PROCEDURES
AND TREATMENT OF DETAINEES Pretrial detention
periods were often lengthy due to delays in due process, in some cases equal
to or exceeding the maximum sentence for the alleged crime. As of October,
the ISF reported 3,703 prisoners in pretrial detention, or approximately 55
percent of the 6,670 total detainees. Freedom House
Country Report 2020 Edition freedomhouse.org/country/lebanon/freedom-world/2020 [accessed 15 May
2020] F3. IS THERE PROTECTION FROM THE ILLEGITIMATE USE
OF PHYSICAL FORCE AND FREEDOM FROM WAR AND INSURGENCIES? Prisons and
detention centers are badly overcrowded and poorly equipped, and the use of
torture by law enforcement, military, and state security personnel remains
pervasive despite inconsistent efforts to stop the practice. The government’s
attempts to address this issue have progressed slowly; in late 2016, the
parliament established the National Preventative Mechanism against Torture
(NPM), and gave the National Human Rights Institute (NHRI) the responsibility
to enact this protocol. In 2017, the parliament passed antitorture
legislation, expanding on a criminal statute that narrowly prohibited the use
of violence to extract confessions. However, the NPM’s five members, who are
charged with overseeing this legislation’s implementation, were only named in
March 2019, and funding for the NPM remained unallocated by the end of the
year. Lebanese army
denies torture of protesters Morning Star, 5 May
2020 morningstaronline.co.uk/article/w/lebanese-army-denies-torture-protesters [accessed 10 May
2020] But lawyer for the
seven detainees Lama al-Amin from the Committee for the Defence
of Protesters told a different story after she was able to visit them at army
intelligence headquarters. “They were scared,
terrified, and had been beaten. They told me about all the torture they had
undergone. Two said they had been electrocuted,” she said. Six of those
detained were rushed to hospital after being released with a range of head
injuries, bruises to the back and legs and swelling on the soles of their
feet. Medical examinations concluded that they had been tortured. Exonerated Actor
Details Torture -- Zaid Itani’s Account a Test Case
for Country’s New Torture Law Human Rights Watch,
Beirut, 15 July 2018 www.hrw.org/news/2018/07/15/lebanon-exonerated-actor-details-torture [accessed 17 July
2018] Itani told Human Rights
Watch in March that after his arrest in November 2017, he was held in what
may have been an informal detention center where men in civilian clothing
beat him repeatedly, tied him in a stress position, hung him by his wrists,
kicked him in the face, threatened to rape him, and threatened his family
with physical violence and legal charges. Details of the investigation were
leaked to the media within a day of his arrest, and Itani
said interrogators, reportedly from State Security, used the damage to his
reputation to put additional pressure on him to confess. center for forensic
science and rehabilitation to open in Tripoli Published June 28th,
2015 via SyndiGate.info www.albawaba.com/business/lebanon-forensic-center-document-torture-in-tripoli-712790 [accessed 8 November
2015] A new center for
forensic science and rehabilitation will open at the JusticePalace
in Tripoli within two months to collect evidence of prison torture and help
victims heal. The initiative is especially pertinent in light of the Roumieh Prison videos that leaked last week showing
guards brutally assaulting prisoners. With consent from
prisoners, lawyers, doctors and psychologists will collect forensic evidence
of torture and offer physical and psychological care. Fahd Muqaddem, president of the North Lebanon Bar Association,
praised the center. “It’s the first of its kind,” he said. “Now we’ll be able
to meet with the detainees after their initial interrogations. We can prove
they’ve been beaten, and we will be able to pursue the perpetrators.” 52% of female
detainees in Lebanon are tortured: report The Daily Star,
Beirut, 17 April 2015 [accessed 5 May
2015] More than half of
the women arrested by the Lebanese authorities in 2013 and 2014 were
subjected to severe torture, according to a human rights group report. "Men and women
continue to face systematic and widespread torture during
investigations," said Wadih al-Asmar,
secretary-general of CLDH, in a press conference. “We hoped, in preparing
this report, that women would be less affected than men by arbitrary
detention and torture, but it is not the case.” “Investigating
judges have continued during the studied period to endorse confessions
extracted under torture, without revoking them or ordering investigations
into the allegations,” Lebanese jailers
'torture and abuse inmates' Ruth Sherlock, The
Telegraph, Beirut, 26 June 2013 [accessed 27 June
2013] Lebanese jailers
routinely torture and sexually abuse inmates, despite receiving foreign
funding, including from Britain, to improve the country's prison system, a
Human Rights Watch report has disclosed. "Abuse is
common in Lebanon's police stations, but it is even worse for people like
drug users or sex workers," said Nadim Houry, deputy Middle East director at Human Rights Watch.
Most cases of
torture by members of the ISF included beatings, using fists, boots and
sticks. Seventeen former detainees said they were denied food, water, or
medication. Others reported being handcuffed to bathrooms or being kept in
stress positions for hours. "They took me
to interrogation naked, poured cold water on me, tied me to a desk with a
chain, and hung me in the *farrouj* position,"
said "Mohammad," who was arrested for drug possession, describing
being suspended by the feet with hands tied to an iron bar passed under the
knees. "They broke all my teeth and nose, and hit me with a gun until my
shoulder was dislocated." A key cause for the continuing use of torture,
despite receiving large donations from countries including Britain and the
United to improve the prison system, is a lack of accountability, the rights
watchdog found. All of the victims
from marginalized social groups interviewed by HRW found it difficult, and
even dangerous, to report the abuse. In only three of the cases seen by HRW
did judges order investigations, leaving the other
attackers free to operate with impunity. In some
cases victims were threatened when they tried to report mistreatment. Human
Rights in Lebanon Human Rights Watch www.hrw.org/node/106602 [accessed 4 February
2013] Reform in Lebanon
stagnated in 2011, in part because Lebanon proved mostly immune to the Arab
Spring and its widespread popular calls for change. The stagnation was also
caused by internal divisions, which prevented progress on draft laws to stop
torture, improve the treatment of migrant domestic workers, and protect women
from domestic violence. Women face discrimination under personal status laws,
and vulnerable groups are reportedly mistreated or tortured in detention. AMNESTY INTERNATIONAL From an old article -- URL not available Article was
published sometime prior to 2015 TORTURE AND OTHER
ILL-TREATMENT There were new
reports of torture and other ill-treatment of detained security and criminal
suspects. In at least one case, an individual suspected on security grounds
was reported to have been apprehended, beaten and threatened by armed
non-state agents and then handed over to Military Intelligence for further
interrogation, during which he was subjected to additional assaults. In an effort to
address torture and other abuses, the government, with assistance from the UN
Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights, launched in January a code
of conduct for the Internal Security Forces. However, the government again
failed to establish an independent monitoring body to visit prisons and
detention centres, in breach of its international
obligations. It was therefore difficult to establish whether the code of
conduct brought about any improvements. IMPUNITY – ENFORCED
DISAPPEARANCES AND ABDUCTIONS The fate of
thousands who were abducted, detained or went missing during and after
Lebanon’s 1975-1990 civil war, including many said to have been taken to
Syria, mostly remained unresolved. A draft decree proposed by the Minister of
Justice to establish an Independent National Commission to investigate the
fate of the disappeared and missing was widely criticized and had not been
enacted by the end of the year. The release of Yacoub
Chamoun from a Syrian prison almost 27 years after
he went missing gave hope to families of the disappeared that some of their
loved ones may still be alive. Search … AMNESTY
INTERNATIONAL For more
articles:: Search Amnesty
International website www.amnesty.org/en/search/?q=lebanon+torture&ref=&year=&lang=en&adv=1&sort=relevance [accessed 6 January 2019] Scroll
Down ***
EARLIER EDITIONS OF SOME OF THE ABOVE *** Freedom House
Country Report - Political Rights: 5 Civil Liberties: 4 Status: Partly Free 2009 Edition www.freedomhouse.org/report/freedom-world/2009/lebanon [accessed 4 February
2013] LONG
URL ç 2009 Country Reports begin on Page 21 [accessed 13 May
2020] Arbitrary arrest
and detention by the security forces were commonplace before 2005, but they
have been curtailed since UN personnel were embedded with the security
services to investigate the assassination of former prime minister Rafiq Hariri. The use of torture to extract confessions
is widespread in security-related cases. Prison conditions are poor Human Rights
Reports » 2005 Country Reports on Human Rights Practices U.S. Dept of State Bureau of Democracy, Human Rights, and
Labor, March 8, 2006 www.state.gov/g/drl/rls/hrrpt/2005/61693.htm [accessed 4 February
2013] 2009-2017.state.gov/j/drl/rls/hrrpt/2005/61693.htm [accessed 4 July
2019] TORTURE
AND OTHER CRUEL, INHUMAN, OR DEGRADING TREATMENT OR PUNISHMENT – The law does not
specifically prohibit torture, and security forces abused detainees and in
some instances used torture. Human rights groups, including Amnesty
International and Human Rights Watch, reported that torture was a common
practice. During the period
of Syrian control prior to April, former detainees at the Lebanese Ministry
of Defense Detention Center and in Syrian jails stated that they were
routinely tortured during interrogation. Methods of torture frequently
included severe beating, food and sleep deprivation, and hanging by the
wrists which were tied behind the back. In September 2004
Ismail al-Khatib died in custody a week after being
arrested as a suspected leader of al-Qa'ida. The
government coroner reported al-Khatib, who was 31
years old, died of a massive heart attack, but speculation attributed his
death to torture. An independent investigation was undertaken by local human
rights organizations, but no findings had been released by year's end. The government
acknowledged that violent abuse of detainees usually occurred during
preliminary investigations conducted at police stations or military
installations, in which suspects were interrogated without an attorney. Such
abuse occurred despite national laws that prevent judges from accepting
confessions extracted under duress. In its October
report, the UNIIIC investigation of the assassination of former prime
minister Rafiq al-Hariri noted that some
unidentified security personnel had abused witnesses in the aftermath of
al-Hariri's assassination. Abuses also
occurred in areas outside the government's control, including in Palestinian
refugee camps. During the year there were reports that members of the various
groups that controlled specific camps detained their Palestinian rivals (see
section 1.d.). Rival groups, such as Fatah and Asbat
al-Nur, regularly clashed over territorial control
in the various camps, sometimes leading to exchanges of gunfire and the
detention of rival members. All
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ARTICLES. Cite this
webpage as: Patt, Prof. Martin, "Torture by Police, Forced Disappearance
& Other Ill Treatment in the early years of the 21st Century-
Lebanon", http://gvnet.com/torture/Lebanon.htm, [accessed <date>] |
