Journalists with the web-based project dedicated to bringing attention to the widespread use of solitary confinement, Solitary Watch, report the Bureau of Prisons (BOP) is going to be expanding the Thomson Correctional Center in Illinois to hold federal prisoners in supermax conditions. This means cells will be holding prisoners in conditions of solitary confinement and conflicts with plans by the Bureau to review the practice of solitary confinement in US prisons.

Writing at the Guardian, Karen McVeigh says that there is burgeoning outrage over army Lt Col Marion Carrington’s recent statement to the Military Times that troops assisting Afghan police forces were on the lookout for “children with potential hostile intent”.

Human Rights Watch (HRW) has released a major new report detailing how the Bush Administration and other allied governments tortured and imprisoned opponents of former Libyan dictator Muammar Gaddafi. The prisoners were then rendered to Gaddafi’s own prisons where many of them were tortured.

There aren’t many jobs in the U.S. that are tougher than farmwork. But the job is especially unbearable if you have to work yourself to exhaustion all day under the watch of the man who raped you.

Over the weekend, I attended a summit on drones co-organized by CODEPINK, CCR, and Reprieve. I had the opportunity to speak and hear from people from countries where the US has carried out drone attacks. I also spoke with journalists who have covered and spoken to people who are victims of the US covert drone war.

ast week at this time, the Bahraini government was “celebrating” their Formula One race by arresting a British Channel 4 television news crew who attempted to report on conditions in the country. The video here is the report they have now been able to file with footage smuggled out when they were deported.

There are reports that Saudi Arabia has sent military equipment to aid the rebels in the Free Syrian Army, according to an anonymous diplomat for the Arab nation. But who the “good guys” in this fight, considering the push by neoconservatives to arm these same Syrian rebels, or intervene militarily on their behalf. It turns out that human rights groups are now accusing the Syrian opposition of a litany of abuses.

What could possibly make a human being torture another human being?

That’s a question that, as a young boy, I recall asking my grandparents—Holocaust survivors—after they described to me in vivid detail the torture they and other members of my extended family were subjected to by the Nazis during World War II.

It’s a question I returned to earlier this year when I had the opportunity to interview a veteran of the US Army Reserves who was torn up about the torture he says he witnessed and participated in against some “war on terror” detainees while serving as a guard at the Guantanamo Bay prison facility. [That guard, Pfc. Albert Melise, has since been barred from reenlistment for speaking to me.]

According to the UK legal charity Reprieve, “the first large array of photographs depicting the devastating impact of US unmanned aircraft (‘drone’) attacks on innocent civilians in Pakistan” goes on display today at at Beaconsfield Art Gallery, 22 Newport Street, London. The show, which displays the work of Noor Behram, a 39 year old photographer from the North Waziristan Agency (NWA), runs until August 5. Reportedly, photos from 28 of 60 drone attack sites visited by Behram can be viewed at the London gallery.

As of tonight, there is still no word on AngryArabiya’s father, brother-in-law and husband –or her uncle who was arrested three weeks ago. She wrote last night: This will b one of the most difficult nights of my life, wat condition is my wonderful & kind husband in. I close my eyes & I see [...]