A top United Nations official has said that he was “deeply disappointed and frustrated by the prevarication of the United States government,” after attempting to meet with Bradley Manning, the former army intelligence officer incarcerated on suspicion of leaking government data to Wikileaks, the whistleblower website.
The comments by Juan Mendez, the U.N. Special Rapporteur on Torture and Cruel, Inhuman and Degrading Treatment or Punishment, came even as allegations of inhumane treatment of Mr. Manning by the Pentagon have intensified.
In particular Mr. Mendez was said to have been frustrated by the fact that although most governments permitted unsupervised visits to detainees, officials at the military facility in Quantico, Virginia, where Mr. Manning is being held in solitary confinement, have denied Mr. Mendez’s request to make an “official visit.”
Mr. Manning’s defence attorney, David Coombs, said that the Pentagon allowed for two types of visitors for a detainee – “authorised” and “official,” and the “critical distinction between the two is that official visits are privileged and not subject to Brig monitoring.”
Mr. Coombs further said that the government’s insistence on an “authorised” visit by Mr. Mendez and others, including U.S. Congressman Dennis Kucinich and a representative from Amnesty International, was based on the notion that these individuals were not visiting on “official government business.”
“Such an authorised visit, of course, will be subject to Brig monitoring and can be used as evidence against PFC Manning in a court-martial proceeding,” Mr. Coombs explained.
Mr. Mendez further said that, “A private visit means with a guard;” however he added that his mandate was to conduct unmonitored visits and he would continue to press for an unmonitored visit. “I am insisting the U.S. government lets me see him without witnesses. I am asking [the U.S. government] to reconsider,” Mr. Mendez was quoted as saying.
Regarding the purpose of his visit with Mr. Manning, Mr. Mendez said, “I am acting on a complaint that the regimen of this detainee amounts to cruel, inhumane or degrading treatment or torture … until I have all the evidence in front of me, I cannot say whether he has been treated inhumanely.”
The latest controversy over Mr. Manning’s allegedly cruel treatment by the U.S. Department of Defence follows an earlier high-profile resignation by a senior State Department official who criticised the Pentagon’s actions. Last month State Department spokesman P.J. Crowley resigned after calling the Pentagon’s actions “ridiculous and counterproductive and stupid.”
Earlier this week, a group of 250 legal experts including a former professor of President Barack Obama wrote a letter condemning Mr. Manning’s treatment and in January a non-profit group called Psychologists for Social Responsibility wrote an open letter to Secretary of Defence Robert Gates saying that it was “deeply concerned about the conditions under which PFC Bradley Manning is being held.”
Concerns surrounding inhumane treatment have focused in particular on Mr. Manning’s solitary confinement for approximately 23 hours a day in a cell approximately six feet wide and twelve feet in length and allegations that he is stripped naked every night and prevented from resting and sleeping.
Yet according to reports Colonel Dave Lapan, a Pentagon spokesman, denied these allegations saying, “We cannot, under Quantico brig practice, guarantee the U.N. special rapporteur an unmonitored visit. At Quantico, such a guarantee is only reserved for attorney-client communications.”
He further added that there was a lot of “misinformation” about Mr. Manning and insisted he was neither in solitary confinement nor stripped naked every night. “Except for a brief period about a month ago, and for reasons of Manning's own physical safety, Manning does not sleep naked. Nor is Manning awakened every five minutes by brig personnel. These facts are simply not true,” Colonel Laplan said.
