Jordan under fire over jail torture

AMMAN // Jordan is not doing enough to curb torture in its prisons, despite embarking on a reform plan two years ago, according to a report made public yesterday by a human rights group. Although the reforms have led to improved health services, congestion, visitation and recreation facilities at the country's jails, torture persists and is widespread, said New York-based Human Rights Watch in a 95-page report.

The public security department (PSD), which is in charge of the prisons, rejected the report as groundless, saying it was an attempt to tarnish Jordan's image. "The methodology of the report is neither objective nor rational. It is exaggerated and it is based on individual allegations and lies," said Maher Sheishani, the director of the grievances and human rights office at the PSD. Nasser Judeh, the minister of state for media affairs and communications, said the government would examine and follow up on the report.

The report, Torture and Impunity in Jordan's Prisons: Reforms Fail to Tackle Widespread Abuse, said prisoners were beaten with cables and sticks, and suspended from metal gates by their wrists for hours at a time. "Guards beat me with the padlock on the door to our ward because I went to the toilet with the wrong clothes," said Ghaith, a prisoner at Gafgafa, who was interviewed by Human Rights Watch in August last year.

"Guard [name withheld] and two other guards beat me with the lock and their keys. Then they took me to the gate, hung me by the wrists with two separate handcuffs, spreading my arms out between two window grilles, and punched me in my stomach and chest. When the [International Committee of the Red] Cross came for a visit, they hid me in the computer room for one hour," he told the group. HRW interviewed 66 prisoners out of 110 at random in 2007 and 2008 in seven of the country's 10 prisons. It documented what it called credible allegations of mistreatment, often amounting to torture. The report said its evidence suggested that five prison directors personally participated in torturing detainees.

Sharif al Omari, who is the director of the correction and rehabilitation centres in the public security department, dismissed the report. "We have some 60,000 inmates who are in and out of prison in a year. So the HRW report is not based on a representative sample," he said. "Besides, the sample is not random but rather selective. "There could be cases of ill treatment, but there is no torture. But we can resort to the use of force according to the law on rehabilitation centres like when there are riots. But when the HRW interviews the inmates, they would say that they were tortured even though the force is used to quell the riot," Mr Omari said.

This is not the first time Jordan has come under fire from HRW and other human rights groups for beatings and abuse in the country's prisons. Last year, Jordan amended the penal code to make torture a crime. It also assigned prosecutors to investigate abuses this year. But HRW said there had been no prosecutions for torture to date. The reform plan has not gone smoothly, however. In April, a series of riots broke out at three prisons outside Amman in which three inmates were killed and more than 100 wounded, after authorities began implementing a policy of segregating prisoners. Prisoners were protesting against alleged beatings and mistreatment by wardens.

Although an extensive investigation was launched, the investigators did not prosecute a guard who prisoners alleged had tortured some of them, according to the report. "I was shocked to see that prosecutors have investigated in three months only one case of abuse," said Christof Wilcke, a senior researcher at HRW and author of the report. "There are seven prosecutors in seven prisons, with only one case of abuse."

Mr Wilcke said last year there were six cases of mistreatment and torture by prison staff before the police court and more than 60 credible allegations of torture. "So there is a mismatch here." But Mr Sheishani disagreed. He said the PSD follows up on the allegations. "There were cases that have been referred to courts and there were verdicts issued. What the report is saying is an illusion. The report is very damaging and was meant to harm Jordan. Jordan is a country that respects human rights," he said.

HRW called the police court's verdicts flawed. The court sentenced a former Swaqa prison director to a fine of US$180 (Dh660) for ordering and participating in the beating of 70 prisoners in Aug 2007. The court also found 12 other guards, who had participated in the beatings, not guilty because they were "following orders". The court sentenced prison guards who had beaten a prisoner to death in Aqaba prison in May 2007 to two and a half years. "This is neither a deterrent nor justice in the eyes of the victims," Mr Wilcke said.

The report also noted the complexities of the complaints mechanism at the prisons. "The problem with the complaints mechanism is that people who have the authority to investigate and who can receive the complaints are not independent from the prison administration. The prosecutors are from PSD, the grievance office is PSD, the prison director is PSD. "They all wear the same uniform and the prisoners see them having very good laughs and having coffee with the director. So they don't know how to trust them," he said.

Mr Judeh was quoted by the official news agency, Petra, on Tuesday as saying the government has been working on finding an effective mechanism for submitting complaints at correctional facilities. HRW urged the government to overhaul mechanisms for investigating, disciplining and prosecuting those who abuse prisoners and to transfer the prosecutor's investigations into prison abuse from police to civilian prosecutors. It had also called on Jordan's donors to tie part of their aid to the establishment of independent investigation and prosecution mechanisms.

smaayeh@thenational.ae