Dakwar, Jamil - short clip - HoldingtheUSAccountable

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	(marker squeaking)	0:00
-	2006 was the first time that the US government appeared	0:03
	before the Committee Against Torture	0:06
	to talk about Guantanamo	0:08
	and to talk about torture elsewhere.	0:09
	And they lied.	0:13
	They said, "We don't torture."	0:15
	I mean, as far as they're concerned, they were not lying	0:17
	because their definition or perception	0:20
	of torture was different than the rest of the world.	0:22
	But they said, "We don't torture."	0:26
	They made other outrageous statements.	0:28
	And there was a lot of concern	0:32
	among international actors.	0:36
	The same bodies that the United States government	0:39
	supported for years and helped create	0:41
	post-World War II were unanimous in their condemnation	0:44
	of the United States' policy post 9/11.	0:49
	And that says a lot.	0:51
	There is a notion of exceptionalism.	0:52
	U.S. exceptionalism is very strong	0:54
	because it's also developed	0:57
	its own powerful diplomatic, economic,	0:58
	political, military position in the world	1:03
	that it is hard to challenge this big superpower.	1:08
	And the more, I think, the United States,	1:17
	unfortunately, they would be probably more vulnerable	1:25
	if they did not have that power.	1:28
	The problem is that this power has not been translating	1:30
	into always doing the right thing in the world.	1:32
	Certainly after 9/11 we saw how it was used	1:37
	in order to do other, to promote policies	1:41
	and to promote actions that did not really help	1:45
	maintain security, peace, and security in the world.	1:49
	By flouting Security Council resolutions, you know,	1:54
	on invading Iraq, for example.	1:57
	By violating Geneva Conventions,	2:00
	by creating extraterritorial,	2:03
	extrajudicial detention facilities,	2:05
	secretive, secret detention facilities to torture people.	2:08
	By creating massive surveillance program.	2:12
	All of these things, you know, put together,	2:16
	would, if they are, they're creating	2:19
	a precedent to other governments.	2:25
	They are setting infrastructure	2:27
	that could easily be abused in the future.	2:30
	And as we've seen,	2:33
	easily can be developed into something	2:37
	that would be worse and would fire back,	2:38
	would backfire on	2:43
	and cause more harm than good.	2:46
	And so I think that really remains	2:50
	to be the challenge of whether the international partners	2:53
	of the United States, close allies,	2:59
	would also see that their interest is not	3:02
	with the United States' interests continuing these policies.	3:06
	So far, it seems that they have been aligned	3:09
	because they had more to gain from the United States'	3:11
	cooperation or working with United States	3:16
	on these national security challenges and crises.	3:18
	They had more to gain by that than gaining	3:25
	by holding United States accountable	3:27
	for the abuses.	3:29
	And it's a calculation that every country	3:31
	in every part of the world is being made.	3:33
	And I think it's our challenge as human rights advocates	3:37
	to expose that.	3:41

Item Info

Title:

Dakwar, Jamil - short clip - HoldingtheUSAccountable

Date:

May 24, 2016

Interviewer:

Honigsberg, Peter Jan

Interviewee:

Dakwar, Jamil

Role:

Human Rights Advocate

Description:

This interview may include descriptions of violence.
Director of Human Rights Program, ACLU
Jamil Dakwar, male, age 42, is Director of the American Civil Liberties Union's Human Rights Program, which includes work on counter-terrorism and Guantanamo. He is also the ACLU's Main Representative to the United Nations, and has testified on the U.S.'s human rights violations in that capacity.
Description was provided by Witness to Guantanamo.

Subject:

Format:

oral histories

Language:

English

Extent:

2:14:45

Digital Collection:

Witness to Guantanamo

Source Collection:

Witness to Guantanamo Video Collection, 2009-2017

Rights:

Limited Re-Use

CC BY-NC-ND 4.0

Rights Note:

Unless otherwise noted, copyright is held by Peter Hongisberg. Under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International license, you are free to use and share these materials subject to the following conditions: You must attribute Peter Hongisberg as the rights holder. You may not use the material for commercial purposes. You may not distribute any modifications to the materials. For other uses, including commercial uses, please contact Rubenstein Library at http://library.duke.edu/rubenstein/ask.

Identifier:

3942dfd4b7a3a4c5afb8128a0f129c31
witnesstoguantanamo
ark:/87924/r4zs2sz4f
268a5f52-8a8c-485f-8838-664accb5b43d

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https://idn.duke.edu/ark:/87924/r4zs2sz4f

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Dakwar, Jamil - short clip - HoldingtheUSAccountable

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Human Rights Archive

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