US Citizen/Global Justice Activist & Professor Arrested and Tortured by Belgian Police

Among 500 Arrested in Police Crackdown on Migrant Rights Mobilization

Last Friday, during the No Border Camp, „a convergence of struggles aiming to end the system of borders that divide us All,” US citizen Dr. Marianne Maeckelbergh, professor at the University of Leiden in Holland and a long-time global justice, political prisoner solidarity, environmental, and animal rights activist and researcher was arrested for taking pictures while police were making arrests in Brussels, Belgium. Dr. Maeckelbergh is the author of The Will of the Many: How the Alterglobalisation Movement Is Changing the Face of Democracy.

Having just entered Belgium two and a half hours earlier, she was on the terrace of a café with friends when she witnessed violent arrests on the street. She went to take pictures and was herself arrested by the police chief. She was taken into police custody where she was violently dragged by her hair, chained to a radiator, hit, kicked, spat upon, called a whore, and threatened with sexual assault by the police. She also witnessed the torture of another prisoner also chained to a radiator.

This took place not in a dark corner of the police station but out in the open, directly witnessed by police station authorities who gave the impression that this was standard practice. Police removed her ID card, USB stick, the camera with the photos on it, and 25 euros in cash from her property and have refused to return them.

Roughly 500 people were arrested, many preemptively, including people involved in the No Border Camp and other protest activities including an alleged attack on a police station. As of Wednesday 6 October, 2010 at least four people are still incarcerated.

Supporters are calling on the UN Committee Against Torture to investigate these events as part of an ongoing pattern of torture of prisoners in Belgium. In 2003, the UN Committee Against Torture investigated Belgium for the abuse of prisoners, supported by case of abuse documented by Amnesty International. In 2009, Turkish citizen Mikayil Tekin , was tortured to death in a Belgian prison after being arrsted during a dispute with traffic police.

Source: email