secret prisons

KIEV, UKRAINE — A former top official in Ukraine’s Security Service (SBU), who recently fled the country, has given explosive testimony regarding the involvement of the Ukrainian government in the 2014 downing of the MH-17 passenger plane. The incident, which killed all 283 passengers and 15 flight crew members on board, had been blamed on Russia by Ukraine’s government, the United States and much of Western media.

President Donald Trump’s nominations of Gina Haspel to lead the CIA and Mike Pompeo to be America’s top diplomat are the latest indications of steadily eroding human rights standards in the United States and the rollback of the rule of law that has characterized U.S. counterterrorism policies since Sept. 11, 2001.

It has been reported that U.S. forces have interrogated prisoners in secret prisons in Yemen, many of which are run by the United Arab Emirates, a member of the Saudi-led coalition that is waging war in the country. Acts of torture are said to have taken place in the prisons.

A former detainee shows how he was kept in handcuffs and leg shackles while held in a secret prison at Riyan airport in the Yemeni city of Mukalla in this May 11, 2017 photo.(AP/Maad El Zikry)

A deserted cell in the public section of Aden Central Prison is shown in this May 9, 2017 photo in Aden, Yemen. A separate, closed wing is run by Yemeni allies of the UAE, part of a network of secret prisons in southern Yemen into which hundreds of people have disappeared.(AP/Maad El Zikry)
The United States is interrogating hundreds of men who were tortured by UAE prison guards, an AP investigation has revealed.