SUNS 4298 Friday 9 October 1998


UNITED STATES: AMNESTY CAMPAIGNS AGAINST US RIGHTS ABUSES

Washington, Oct 6 (IPS/Jim Lobe) -- Amnesty International has launched a worldwide campaign against human rights abuses in the United States, charging that the rights of thousands of people were being violated across the country.

Abuses ranged from police and prison brutality to the death  penalty, which Amnesty said had been used in "an arbitrary, unfair and racist" manner against scores of people, including children, since executions were resumed in 1977.

The Amnesty campaign will involve some one million Amnesty members around the world joining the 300,000 members of Amnesty-USA to press federal, state and local officials to take action. The United States has never been the target of such a global effort.

"The United States was founded in the name of democracy, political and legal equality, and individual freedom," Amnesty noted in a 153-page report. "However, despite its claims to international leadership in the field of human rights, and its many institutions to protect individual civil liberties, the USA is failing to deliver the fundamental promise of rights for all."

The London-based human rights organisation, which won the Nobel Peace Prize in 1977, is most concerned about the plight of prisoners or criminal suspects in the United States, according to
the report, 'United States of America: Rights for All.'

They are not only subject to arbitrary, racist, and sometimes brutal behaviour by police or prison officials, but they may also become victims of weapons and restraints that can inflict great pain and worse, the report said.

"Law enforcement officials in the USA have a huge array of equipment at their disposal which at times contributes to human rights violations," according to Pierre Sane, Amnesty International's secretary-general.

Although banned by most West European countries, Canada, and some US states and cities, electro-shock stun guns and similar weapons are still authorised for use in many police departments, jails and prisons across the United States, according to the report.

These devices have killed, according to the report, which cited the death of two men in Pomona, California, who died after being jolted by police with stun guns on separate occasions.

In addition, some jurisdiction use stun belts, an electro-shock device often used to subdue prisoners, most recently during a criminal trial in California. According to the manufacturer's
literature, the belt will knock prisoners to the ground and may cause them to defecate or urinate involuntarily.

"The stun belt is, by its very nature, an instrument designed to instill fear and pain," said Sane. "Even if the button is never pressed, the constant threat of such a jolt is inhumane."

Pepper spray, used by 3,000 US police departments, is another weapon which should be urgently reviewed or banned, according to the report. More than 60 prisoners have died after being sprayed,
said Sane who noted that it has also been dabbed into the eyes and sprayed on the genitals of protesters - "which is tantamount to torture."

Aside from the use of hi-tech weapons, more conventional police abuse - including potentially lethal choke holds or "hog-tying" - remains widespread across the United States and is often deployed
against racial and ethnic minorities who are "particularly liable to suffer police brutality," according to the report.

That kind of brutality continues in prison where physical and sexual violence, including rape - a form of torture - against inmates, both by guards and fellow-prisoners, was "endemic." The United States currently has one of the largest prison populations in the world. Worse, as of last June, more than 3,500 minors were housed with adult inmates in US prisons and are thus subject to the same kind of abuses.

The death penalty, which is permitted by law in 38 of the 50 states, remains a major human rights concern in the United States. Amnesty said more than 350 people have been executed since 1990, 74 of them just last year, more than 3,300 others currently in prison have been sentenced to die.

The report noted that, while a similar number of black and white people are victims of violent crime, 82% of people executed over the last 20 years have been convicted of killing white victims.
"Factors like aggravating circumstances cannot explain this disparity," the report concludes.

Worse, some 24 states permit the execution of people who were under 18 at the time of the crime, and, since 1990, the US has been only one of six countries in the world known to have executed juveniles. The others are Iran, Nigeria, Pakistan, Saudi Arabia, and Yemen. Since 1989, more than 30 mentally impaired people have also been executed.

Amnesty also cited Washington's selective observance of other international human rights instruments, such as the UN's Convention on the Rights of the Child, and its use of dozens of reservations, such as its right to execute juveniles, to undermine such treaties.

Finally, Amnesty accused the United States of contribution to rights abuses in other countries as the world's largest producer and exporter of arms, including weapons that have been used for
torture and to carry out political killings.

"The USA should adopt and rigorously enforce a Code of Conduct to regulate all military, security and police sales and assistance to other countries, in order to ensure that US transfers of such
equipment or expertise do not contribute to serious human rights abuses elsewhere," the report concludes.