© www.liberationnews.orgHRW report decries widespread abuse of mentally disabled prisoners in the US.
"The United States locks up 2.37 million people, the largest reported incarcerated population in the world," the report says, adding "about 12 million people annually cycle through county jails." It says that thirty-one US states still "impose the death penalty" with seven of them carrying out executions in 2014. Also, 27 people had been executed by lethal injection in the US in 2015, the report revealed.
On racial disparities in criminal justice, the report shows that "while whites and African Americans engage in drug offenses at comparable rates, African Americans are arrested, prosecuted, and incarcerated for drug offenses at much higher rates." Even though African Americans account for "only 13 percent of the US population, they constitute "29 percent of all drug arrests," says the report, adding "black men are incarcerated at six times the rate of white men."
The report also touches upon "high-profile police killings of unarmed African Americans" in the country, saying "the federal government does not maintain a full count of the number of people killed by police each year." The US is under harsh criticism over several incidents of white police killing unarmed African Americans in the last two years which have triggered large-scale protests across the country.
About poverty and criminal justice, the report reveals that "poor defendants nationwide are subjected to prolonged and unnecessary pretrial detention because they cannot afford to post bail." The privatization of misdemeanor probation services in many US states has resulted in certain abuses, "including fees structured by private probation companies in ways that penalize poor offenders or lead to the arrest of people who genuinely cannot afford to pay."
The report also criticizes the Obama administration's foreign policy, noting that, in Afghanistan for instance, a full withdrawal of US troops from the country "was planned for the end of 2014, (but) Obama ordered 9,800 US troops to remain" there through the end of 2015 and 5,500 to remain into 2017.
It criticizes US' policy in Syria, saying Washington's program to train and equip the so-called moderate rebels to fight the government of President Bashar al-Assad, cost "hundreds of millions of dollars." "The US continued to call for a political solution to the conflict in Syria (but) without a role for president," the report adds.
Since late September 2014, the US along with some of its allies has been conducting airstrikes purportedly against Daesh extremists inside Syria without any authorization from Damascus or the United Nations.
In Yemen, "the US provided intelligence, logistical support, and personnel to the Saudi Arabian center planning airstrikes and coordinating activities (there), making US forces potentially jointly responsible for laws-of-war violations," the report shows. Yemen has been under military attacks by Saudi Arabia since late March last year in a bid to undermine the Ansarullah movement and bring fugitive former president, Abd Rabbu Mansur Hadi back to power. At least 8,278 people, among them 2,236 children, have been killed and 16,015 others injured since March 2015.
Comment: A reality check. Unfortunately, the US is far down the road to a fascist military-police state accountable to no one. It is gearing to implode and it appears there's very little that can stop it.