Sean Guillory on Guantanamo and Russia

Blogger Sean Guillory relatively recently posted a very interesting entry on the Human Rights Watch reports on both Russia and Guantanamo. He writes:

It seems that when it comes to torture the Bush Administration and Russia are joined at the hip in other ways. On March 27, Bush did a photo-op with Russian Major-General Vladimir Shamanov. The Major-General was visiting the White House as the co-chairman of the Russian-US Commission on mission soldiers. Shamanov, according to HRW, “is implicated in grave human rights abuses, including the killing of civilians in the villages of Alkhan-Yurt in 1999 and Katyr-Yurt in 2000, and the illegal detention and torture of detainees in 2000.” HRW documented these abuses in a report in 1999. In addition, according to the Washington Post, “The European Court of Human Rights also has found Shamanov’s troops responsible for the “massive use of indiscriminate weapons” that killed civilians in another village, and human rights investigators concluded that detainees at a base under his command were beaten, subjected to electric shocks and held in pits.” Shamanov called these allegations as “fairy tales” in 2004. The Bush Administration’s ignominy results not so much from meeting with Shamanov. After all, officials responsible for atrocities are easy to find working there daily. It comes from its feeble attempt to claim that it didn’t know about Shamanov’s crimes. As White House spokeswoman Dana Perino told reporters, “The president was not aware of the allegations made against (Shamanov) and he was seeking to sharpen the focus on the commission’s good work.” Not aware!? Perhaps a White House staffer should have consulted the Internets and do a search on the Google. Think Progress did and they found that “a quick Google search of “Vladimir Shamanov,” references to the general’s role in the killings come up on the first page.” Plus are we really to believe that anyone would get as much as a pinkie finger into the Oval Office without extensive background checks? Is White House security really that lax?

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