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Banned
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In Case You Were Still Wondering if there is a "Daily Memo"...
I posted this "stuff" on the <a href="http://www.tfproject.org/tfp/showthread.php?p=2340102">"Who's Next"</a> thread here, about two weeks ago:
Quote:
http://www.tfproject.org/tfp/showthr...88#post2341388
...Now...we're not talking about the AP being unable to get their guy released, we're talking about them, despite their connections and ability to generate a huge amount of worldwide publiciity in protest, as in the example above, on one of their web pages, but about being unable to even pressure the US military to explain what the man has done to deserve indefinite detention, let alone the next customary step, a reading of the charges against him, and a hearing before a military or a civilian court....
http://www.tfproject.org/tfp/showthr...in#post2340102
Quote:
http://www.ap.org/bilalhussein/
THE DETENTION OF AP PHOTOGRAPHER BILAL HUSSEIN
....AP executives said an internal review of his work did not find anything to indicate inappropriate contact with insurgents, <h3>and any evidence against him should be brought to the Iraqi criminal justice system....</h3>
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On monday, Nov. 19, AP released this:
Quote:
http://www.ap.org/pages/about/whatsnew/wn_111907a.html
11/19/2007
U.S. military to seek criminal case against AP photographer detained in Iraq
By BRIAN MURPHY
Associated Press Writer
NEW YORK (AP) -- The U.S. military plans to seek a criminal case in an Iraqi court against an award-winning Associated Press photographer but is refusing to disclose what evidence or accusations would be presented.
An AP attorney on Monday strongly protested the decision, calling the U.S. military plans a "sham of due process." The journalist, Bilal Hussein, has already been imprisoned without charges for more than 19 months.
In Washington, Pentagon press secretary Geoff Morrell explained the decision to bring charges now by saying "new evidence has come to light" about Hussein, but said the information would remain in government hands until the formal complaint is filed with Iraqi authorities.
Morrell asserted the military has "convincing and irrefutable evidence that Bilal Hussein is a threat to stability and security in Iraq as a link to insurgent activity" and called Hussein "a terrorist operative who infiltrated the AP."
AP Associate General Counsel Dave Tomlin rejected the claim: "That's what the military has been saying for 19 months, <h3>but whenever we ask to see what's so convincing we get back something that isn't convincing at all."</h3>
The case has drawn attention from press groups as another example of the complications for Iraqis chronicling the war in their homeland — including death squads that target local journalists working for Western media and apparent scrutiny from U.S. intelligence agents.
A public affairs officer notified the AP on Sunday that the military intends to submit a written complaint against Hussein that would bring the case into the Iraqi justice system as early as Nov. 29. Under Iraqi codes, an investigative magistrate will decide whether there are grounds to try Hussein, 36, who was seized in the western Iraqi city of Ramadi on April 12, 2006.
Tomlin said the defense for Hussein is being forced to work "totally in the dark."
The military has not yet defined the specific charges against Hussein. Previously, the military has pointed to a range of suspicions that attempt to link him to insurgent activity.
The AP also contends it has been blocked by the military from mounting a comprehensive defense for Hussein, who was part of the AP's Pulitzer Prize-winning photo team in 2005.
Soon after Hussein was taken into custody, the AP appealed to the U.S. military either to release him or bring the case to trial — saying there was no evidence to support his detention. <h3>However, Tomlin said that the military is now attempting to build a case based on "stale" evidence and discredited testimony. He also noted that the U.S. military investigators who initially handled the case have left the country.</h3>
The AP says various accusations were floated unofficially against Hussein and then apparently withdrawn with little explanation.
Tomlin said the AP has faced chronic difficulties in meeting Hussein at the Camp Cropper detention facility in Baghdad and that its own intensive investigations of the case — conducted by a former federal prosecutor, Paul Gardephe — have found no support for allegations he was anything other than a working journalist in a war zone.
"While we are hopeful that there could be some resolution to Bilal Hussein's long detention, we have grave concerns that his rights under the law continue to be ignored and even abused," said AP President and CEO Tom Curley.
"The steps the U.S. military is now taking continue to deny Bilal his right to due process and, in turn, may deny him a chance at a fair trial. The treatment of Bilal represents a miscarriage of the very justice and rule of law that the United States is claiming to help Iraq achieve. At this point, we believe the correct recourse is the immediate release of Bilal," Curley added.
Hussein, a native of Fallujah and a member of a prominent clan in the western province of Anbar, began work for the AP in the summer of 2004 as the anti-U.S. insurgency was gaining ground.
On the morning of April 12, 2006, Hussein was out buying bread for breakfast when he heard a blast on a nearby street in Ramadi, according to the AP investigation. He dashed home and allowed several strangers to follow — as was customary to offer shelter during unrest in the city. Marines later arrived and used Bilal's apartment as a temporary observation post.
<h3>Hussein told the AP he was later taken into custody by the Marines who also confiscated equipment including a laptop and satellite phone. The guests he invited into his apartment amid the chaos were also detained.
On Monday, Morrell said two guests in the apartment that day were "suspected insurgents" and that one of them later was convicted in a court of having a phony ID. It was unclear whether he remained in custody or was released.</h3>
Calls for Hussein's freedom have been backed by groups such as the Committee to Protect Journalists.
Tomlin said it remains unclear what accusations, evidence and possible witnesses will be presented by military prosecutors in Baghdad.
"They are telling us nothing. ... We are operating totally in the dark," said Tomlin, who added that the military's unfair handling of the case is "playing with a man's future and maybe his life."
Although it's unclear what specific allegations may be presented against Hussein, convictions linked to aiding militants in Iraq could bring the death penalty, said Tomlin.
<h3>U.S. military officials in Iraq did not immediately respond to AP questions about what precise accusations are planned against Hussein.</h3>
Previously, the military has outlined a host of possible lines of investigation, <h3>including claims that Hussein offered to provide false identification to a sniper seeking to evade U.S.-led forces and that Hussein took photographs that were synchronized with insurgent blasts.
The AP inquiry found no support for either of those claims. The bulk of the photographs Hussein provided the AP were not about insurgent activity; he detailed both the aftermath of attacks and the daily lives of Iraqis in the war zone. There was no evidence that any images were coordinated with the insurgents or showed the instant of an attack.</h3>
Tomlin also questioned the U.S. military claims that Hussein's fate rests solely with Iraqi justice. Noting that Hussein has been in the sole custody and control of the U.S. military, he said it's up to military prosecutors to lay out the allegations and "it's impossible that they don't have a specific set of charges drawn up."
Gardephe, now a New York-based attorney, said the AP has offered evidence to counter the allegations so far raised by the military. But, he noted, it's possible the military could introduce new charges at the hearing that could include classified material.
"This makes it impossible to put together a defense," said Gardephe, who is leading the defense team and plans to arrive in Baghdad next week. "At the moment, it looks like we can do little more than show up ... and try to put together a defense during the proceedings."
One option, he said, is to contend that the Pentagon's handling of Hussein violated Iraqi legal tenets brought in by Washington after the fall of Saddam Hussein in 2003. Among the possible challenges: AP claims that Hussein was interrogated at Camp Cropper this year without legal counsel.
Hussein is one of the highest-profile Iraqi journalists in U.S. custody.
In April 2006 — just days before Hussein was detained — an Iraqi cameraman working for CBS News was acquitted of insurgent activity. Abdul Ameer Younis Hussein was held for about a year after being detained while filming the aftermath of a bombing in the northern city of Mosul.
Tomlin, however, said that freedom for Bilal Hussein, who is not related to the cameraman working for CBS, isn't guaranteed even if the judge rejects the eventual U.S. charges. The military can indefinitely hold suspects considered security risks in Iraq.
"Even if he comes out the other side with an acquittal — as we certainly hope and trust that he will — there is no guarantee that he won't go right back into detention as a security risk."
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<h3>Now, can someone who is familiar with these "bloggers", please explain their uniform reaction?</h3>
Quote:
http://michellemalkin.com/2007/11/19...-ap-complains/
...Faced with the prospect that the full breadth of Hussein’s suspicious activities might actually come to public light, the AP’s Tom Curley changes his tune:......
.....Bilal Hussein’s day in court should be illuminating, to say the least. No wonder the AP now objects.
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...and:
Quote:
http://www.newsbusters.org/taxonomy/term/244
Associated Press
US Plans Case Against AP Photographer Bilal Hussein
By John Stephenson | November 19, 2007 - 20:22 ET
AP photographer Bilal Hussein made a reputation staging anti-war propaganda photos. In April of 2006 American forces detained him with a cache of weapons. The AP waged an all out campaign against our military’s actions. <h3>They demanded that we either charge or release this tool of theirs.</h3> Now the military has decided to charge him, and the AP are still whining.
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...and:
Quote:
http://www.powerlineblog.com/archive.../11/019065.php
November 19, 2007
<h3>The AP Reports on Itself</h3>
We wrote here and elsewhere about Bilal Hussein, an Iraqi stringer who has taken many photographs for the Associated Press, some of which are in evident collaboration with Iraqi terrorists. Hussein has been held for 19 months in Iraq after being captured in the company of two terrorists. Now, the AP reports that new evidence has emerged against Hussein, on the basis of which a criminal case is likely to be pursued against him:
The U.S. military plans to seek a criminal case in an Iraqi court against an award-winning Associated Press photographer but is refusing to disclose what evidence or accusations would be presented. *** In Washington, Pentagon press secretary Geoff Morrell explained the decision to bring charges now by saying "new evidence has come to light" about Hussein, but said the information would remain in government hands until the formal complaint is filed with Iraqi authorities.
Morrell asserted the military has "convincing and irrefutable evidence that Bilal Hussein is a threat to stability and security in Iraq as a link to insurgent activity" and called Hussein "a terrorist operative who infiltrated the AP."
I'm not sure how much the AP minds being infiltrated by terrorists; after all, Bilal Hussein helped the agency win a Pulitzer Prize. Be that as it may, the remainder of the AP's account is devoted almost entirely to a spirited defense of Hussein.
But the AP's defense of Hussein is disingenuous, as it has been all along. Thus, this carefully worded paragraph:
The AP inquiry found no support for either of those claims. The bulk of the photographs Hussein provided the AP were not about insurgent activity; he detailed both the aftermath of attacks and the daily lives of Iraqis in the war zone. There was no evidence that any images were coordinated with the insurgents or showed the instant of an attack.
The fact (if it is a fact) that the "bulk" of Hussein's photos were "not about insurgent activity" is of course irrelevant. The question is, how did he get the ones that were, on their face, propaganda for the "insurgents." The AP's suggestion that there is "no evidence that any images were coordinated with the insurgents" is simply ludicrous, as we have noted before. This photo, to take just one example, was certainly "coordinated with the insurgents." Anyone who was not on friendly terms with the terrorists would have fled the scene, or, more to the point, would not have been invited to the scene by the terrorists:....
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...and:
Quote:
http://hotair.com/archives/2007/11/1...ustice-system/
....Whether he’s guilty or not (and the evidence suggests that he’s as guilty as a Kennedy in a sorority house), his alleged crimes were against the Iraqi people and committed inside Iraq. But the Associated (with terrorists) Press isn’t happy....
....Isn’t announcing the means and venue of trial at least a step in the direction of vindication if you believe, as the AP does, that he’s innocent? Would they have him just tossed out without the chance to at least clear his name?
Evidently not. And because they’re a global press organization, they’ll get the chance to try Hussein on their own wires and they will have the power to demonize the US military, the Iraqi prosecutors and anyone else who disagrees with them. Out of maintaining the thinnest veneer of objectivity, the AP ought to recuse itself from reporting on the Hussein case at all.
But they didn’t earn the Associated (with terrorists) Press nickname for being shrinking violets, did they?
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...and:
Quote:
http://mypetjawa.mu.nu/archives/190174.php
Bilal Hussein, a stringer for the Associated Press suspected of having ties to al Qaeda in Iraq, will be charged by the Iraqi government at the request of the U.S. military. Bilal Hussein was caught in an apartment with known members of al Qaeda-- with bomb making material.
Hussein, a native of once al Qaeda in Iraq "capital" Fallujah, alleged the U.S. committed war crimes when it retook the city. Absent from Hussein's reports were photos of al Qaeda torture and murder chambers as they killed any one in the city suspected of being 'too Western'.
True to form, the Associated Press is outraged.
This hot off the AP newswires:
The U.S. military plans to seek a criminal case in an Iraqi court against an award-winning Associated Press photographer but is refusing to disclose what evidence or accusations would be presented.
An AP attorney on Monday strongly protested the decision, calling the U.S. military plans a "sham of due process." The journalist, Bilal Hussein, has already been imprisoned without charges for more than 19 months.
A public affairs officer notified the AP on Sunday that the military intends to submit a written complaint against Hussein that would bring the case into the Iraqi justice system as early as Nov. 29. Under Iraqi codes, an investigative magistrate will decide whether there are grounds to try Hussein, 36, who was seized in the western Iraqi city of Ramadi on April 12, 2006.
What is the line between spreading enemy propaganda, having contacts with the enemy, and actually being one of the enemy? In war, no such line exists. This is why, as I have argued extensively in the past, Nazi propagandists such as Joseph Goebbels were as guilty of war crimes as any of the other leaders of the Third Reich.
So is Bilal Hussein.
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Quote:
http://littlegreenfootballs.com/webl...try=27981&only
AP Photographer to Be Charged in Iraq
Mon, Nov 19, 2007 at 2:58:37 pm PST
The military has announced plans to bring charges against Associated Press photographer Bilal Hussein (search): US plans case against AP photographer.
This AP release on the announcement doesn’t try to hide their outrage that anyone would suggest one of their photographers was in league with ... uh ... activists.
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Quote:
http://sweetness-light.com/archive/u...g-collaborator
....The news from Iraq just keeps getting better and better.
We had occasion to mention the work of Mr. Hussein several times in the past.....
....Previously, the military has pointed to a range of suspicions that attempt to link him to insurgent activity
How could anyone think such a thing?
There was no evidence that any images were coordinated with the insurgents or showed the instant of an attack.
Of course not. What a preposterous charge.
Still, it is great to see that this miscreant’s deeds may not go unrewarded.
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Quote:
http://stoptheaclu.com/archives/2007...bilal-hussein/
US Plans Case Against AP Photographer Bilal Hussein
by Jay @ 8:06 pm. Filed under 1st Amendment, War On Terror, News, Politics As Usual, Liberal Media/Bias
AP photographer Bilal Hussein made a reputation staging anti-war propaganda photos. In April of 2006 American forces detained him with a cache of weapons. The AP waged an all out campaign against our military’s actions. They demanded that we either charge or release this tool of theirs. Now the military has decided to charge him, and the AP are still whining.
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Quote:
http://www.floppingaces.net/2007/11/...raq/index.html
Posted by Curt on November 19, 2007 at 4:45 PM
The AP just doesn't know when to quit. First they're upset that one of their Iraqi employees, Bilal Hussein, gets arrested with damning evidence showing that he collaborated with the enemy and they demand he be charged or released:
...Now that the military has decided to bring charges against the scumbag, giving him his day in court, they are still not happy:....
.......Hold on a minute. First the lawyer for the AP, Dave Tomlin, states that the military won't disclose the evidence against Bilal (which, seeing as how he is not charged yet, is not surprising) and whines that his defense is operating in the dark. Then in the next breath he states the military is building a case against Bilal with "stale" evidence and testimony.
Which is it? Either you know what the evidence is or you don't.....
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Did I miss including anybody's favorite parrot?
<h3>Above is a sampling of the immediate, uniform reaction by the distinguished internet pundits who unwaveringly support bushwar. They twist what the AP has repeatedly reported...AP 2005 Pulitzer prize winning news photographer Bilal Hussein was taken into custody and held by US military in Iraq 19 months ago, and still has not been charged with any specific crimes or been afforded a hearing in front of an impartial, or any...magistrate, accompanied by competent legal counsel to hear and respond to a description (or any official disclosure of) specific evidence against him that would justify his continued detention or criminal charges that he can defend himself against.</h3>
So, what do you make of this reaction from the above assembly of bloggers? IMO, they have lost orientation of what the US military is attempting to "uphold", by it's own example, in Iraq, to Iraqis. Why is there no concern by these bloggers about what AP is so concerned about? 19 months of detention without charges, without official, specific presentation of evidence to justify detention or charges against Bilal Hussein.
Just a lockstep rubber stamping of bushwar and the disconnect of it's actions vs. it's stated goals of "spreading democracy". and the "rule of law". Doesn't AP make a valid point about now "stale evidence",if there is any, and the problem of the original investigating and arresting US military personnel, no longer even being in Iraq, and the problem of no disclosure of evidence to the accused (accused of what?) and his legal counsel?
The shrill noise seems strangely disconnected from the facts. Malkin, et al, certainly know less than AP, about any of this. I also wonder, since these "folks" have made it clear that they dismiss AP, and not just in this instance, where the fuck do they get their news reporting? Do they have a news feed, unknown to the rest of us, to compliment their odd, disturbing, lockstep pronouncements about the AP's Hussein? Is the POV of the white house, DOD, and DOJ as isolated as these bloggers have made themselves?
Last edited by host; 11-20-2007 at 01:14 AM..
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