[Congressional Record Volume 151, Number 133 (Wednesday, October 19, 2005)]
[House]
[Page H8951]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                          CULTURAL SENSITIVITY

  (Mr. McDERMOTT asked and was given permission to address the House 
for 1 minute and to revise and extend his remarks, and include 
extraneous material.)
  Mr. McDERMOTT. Mr. Speaker, I do not know how to get to the White 
House, but maybe you do. Could you please tell the President they need 
some cultural sensitivity training up there?
  When he sends out his ambassador, his good friend, Karen Hughes, and 
tells the Saudi women that she sees the day when they will drive cars 
and they laugh at her and tell her they like the way things are, there 
is something amiss. We are running this war on terror as though it was 
a war on Islam. We must change that.
  This morning's Sydney Morning Herald carries a story about our troops 
in Afghanistan which is very disturbing. It talks about our troops 
burning bodies and then saying in the villages where this happened, 
``You allowed your fighters to be laid down facing west and be burnt. 
You are too scared to retrieve their bodies. This just proves you are 
the lady boys we always believed you to be. You attack and run away 
like women.''
  Now, when one talks like that to an Arab, they are asking for it. 
That is not leading to peace. That is not done by culturally sensitive 
people who are bringing American democracy. That is the language of 
people who ran Abu Ghraib. That is the kind of thing that brings us 
down, not raises us up. No elections, no trials of Saddam will change 
that.

            [From the Sidney Morning Herald, Oct. 19, 2005]

                     Film Rolls as Troops Burn Dead

                            (By Tom Allard)

       U.S. soldiers in Afghanistan burnt the bodies of dead 
     Taliban and taunted their opponents about the corpses, in an 
     act deeply offensive to Muslims and in breach of the Geneva 
     conventions.
       An investigation by SBS's Dateline program, to be aired 
     tonight, filmed the burning of the bodies.
       It also filmed a U.S. Army psychological operations unit 
     broadcasting a message boasting of the burnt corpses into a 
     village believed to be harbouring Taliban.
       According to an SBS translation of the message, delivered 
     in the local language, the soldiers accused Taliban fighters 
     near Kandahar of being ``cowardly dogs''. ``You allowed your 
     fighters to be laid down facing west and burnt. You are too 
     scared to retrieve their bodies. This just proves you are the 
     lady boys we always believed you to be,'' the message 
     reportedly said.
       ``You attack and run away like women. You call yourself 
     Taliban but you are a disgrace to the Muslim religion, and 
     you bring shame upon your family. Come and fight like men 
     instead of the cowardly dogs you are.''
       The burning of a body is a deep insult to Muslims. Islam 
     requires burial within 24 hours.
       Under the Geneva conventions the burial of war dead 
     ``should be honourable, and, if possible, according to the 
     rites of the religion to which the deceased belonged''.
       U.S. soldiers said they burnt the bodies for hygiene 
     reasons but two reporters, Stephen Dupont and John Martinkus, 
     said the explanation was unbelievable, given they were in an 
     isolated area.
       SBS said Australian special forces in Afghanistan were 
     operating from the same base as the U.S. soldiers involved in 
     the incident, although no Australians took part in the 
     action.
       The incident is reminiscent of the psychological techniques 
     used in Iraq's Abu Ghraib prison.

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