The torture and suffering of the innocents

If you are someone who “hungers and thirsts for justice” for the abused and tortured, you will be happy to know that two leading representatives of the criminal regime of Syrian president, Bashar al-Assad, are on trial at the high court of Koblenz, Germany, for crimes against humanity under the principle of  Universal Jurisdiction. Under the principle, any suspect with strong evidence against them for crimes against humanity can be arrested anywhere and brought to stand trial in any jurisdiction.  Read more on this at www.preda.org. 

One day, Assad himself and other torturers and killers around the world, will stand trial. 

Anwar Raslan was a colonel in the Syrian army and headed up the notorious Branch 251 of the Syrian military intelligence. His unit allegedly arrested thousands of Syrians, imprisoned them, tortured, sexually abused, raped and executed many by state sanction.

Raslan and his hatchet man, Eyad al-Gharib, left Syria to hide out in Germany among thousands of Syrian refugees, but he was identified and arrested last February 2019.  

Abuse and torture in detention cells is not confined to the tyrants and dictators in Syria and elsewhere. In the Philippines, some mayors have youth detention centres, others call them Bahay Pag-asa (House of Hope), where abuse and torture of children goes on in secret. If they don’t know it, they just need to visit: www.preda.org/gallery/jailed children

This column revealed last April 19, in The Manila Times, drawings made by child victims showing cruel and inhuman treatment, abuse and torture in the cells of the youth detention centres of Metro Manila. What is done and allowed to be done to them are systematic crimes against the constitution and violate all Philippine child protection laws and international laws against torture and the abuse of children.

These laws are ignored and violated every day and night. The children now face the added threat of the Covid-19 coronavirus (SARS-CoV-2) should one infected person come into the overcrowded detention cells. Most of the children have no contact with their parents or relatives. They are abandoned and, if infected, they will be isolated and left to die alone, unknown and uncared for. Media reports indicate that Covid-19 is already in Philippine jails.

Many Bahay Pag-asa and youth detention centres are places of abuse, and are secret and closed to outsiders. Charities helping children are barred from going inside to inspect the cells and see the inhuman conditions or interview the children. They are under the jurisdiction of the mayors but the Philippine president, Rodrigo Duterte and Eduardo Año, the secretary of the Department of Interior and Local Government, can hold the mayors accountable. 

By law they must build proper homes for young people and children, instead they build highways. There are no regular inspections of the Bahay Pag-asa and no transparency. They are worse than animal cages and are hellholes of abuse, torture, and punishment.  

There are a few with beds and clean surroundings and better conditions but abuse still happens inside. Imagine if your child was picked up on the street and brought to a Bahay Pagasa. What would you do?  

Most Bahay Pagasa are small, dirty jail cells with a filthy toilet. The youngest prisoner has to clean it when it is stuffed with human excrement and smells. There are no shower, only a faucet with bucket and pail. Overcrowding is common, with as many as 20 or 30 boys or girls confined in small space. Infection of one will get them all.

Children aged between 10- and 15-years-old showed drawings depicting systematic abuse in overcrowded cells, sleeping on hard concrete floors and punished and tortured. They testified that they were beaten, clubbed, kicked, forced to stand in painful stress positions, hang on the steel bars of the cells and were beaten with rubber slippers. 

Many were attacked at night and held down by older prisoners and had toothpaste squeezed into their eyes. During the day they were forced to the ground and covered with a sheet and beaten so they could not identify their attackers. Another was put in a steel drum which was beaten so that he suffered pain in his head and ears. Others showed how they were hung upside down by their feet. 

Others reported in counselling of being forced to do sex acts on older prisoners and were then sexually abused. Others said they were bullied and older prisoners masturbated on their faces at night while they were sleeping. They were shouted at with foul language and were always hungry, having to eat expired, bad smelling sardines and fly-infested food. 

They said they felt isolated, lonely, had no visits from relatives, could not exercise and had no sunshine or entertainment of any kind. There is no stimulation or education in most of the cells. Some said a pastor came and read the Bible.

Those in charge of the Bahay Pag-asa and detention centres write glowing reports to higher government authorities. They are believed without any verification. These places are hellholes of suffering and abuse and must be closed. 

The law, Republic Act 9344, states that every highly-urbanised city and province must have a high standard, DSWD-accredited home for children. What most provide is a shameful house of torture and terror. These sub-human conditions have been verified in the past by the Juvenile Justice and Welfare Council (JJWC) but change has not yet come. The abuse has to stop; it must be ended. The people responsible must be held accountable for the child neglect and abuse.

We appeal to the president, Rodrigo Duterte, and Secretary Ano to use their power to free the children and order the local governments to close the Bahay Pag-asa and other jail-like youth detention centres and build new homes. All are in danger of infection by the deadly Covie-19 coronavirus. 

The Preda Foundation has offered to receive up to 20 children if they will be freed. Support our campaign to free the children.

Father Shay Cullen
www.preda.org/gallery/jailed children
www.preda.org