"Pregnant teen tells of Kenya arrest by Americans"

US Marine instructing a Kenyan soldier. By Jeremy L. Grisham (see note at end)

...So goes one of the most inflammatory and irresponsibly inaccurate headlines you will ever read. This more complete article from Der Spiegel is even worse.

Here is what everyone can agree on:

Safia Benaouda, a 17 year-old Swedish citizen of Moroccan descent, and her husband, Munir Awad, a Swede of Lebanese descent, traveled to Somalia back in January of this year. When Ethiopian troops invaded Somalia to drive out radical Islamic fighters, they fled to Kenya in an attempt to reach the Swedish embassy.

They were found at some point by a large group of Kenyan anti-terrorism police patrolling the border, who also had three US advisers as part of the East Africa Counter-Terrorism Initiative. They, along with many others, including some children, were turned over to Ethiopian authorities, and after several stops, taken to Addis Ababa, questioned, held under harsh conditions, and released about two months later (the exact amount of time they were held is not available).

They have accused the "Americans" of detaining and torturing all these people, and several "human rights" groups have jumped right along on the America-bashing bandwagon.

But here are some key facts to consider:

1) Safia was 17, married (notable, because normally you can't get married in Sweden before the age of 18), and pregnant. I don't want to sound like I'm blaming the victim, but didn't anyone tell her that a war zone is not a good place for pregnant teens to travel? Spiegel puts it mildly:

Following a stop in Dubai, the couple decided to make an ill-advised detour into Somalia -- for a quick holiday stop in a country torn by civil war.

2) She wasn't "arrested by the Americans", unless the US officers themselves took her and read her rights (which is doubtful). She is playing very, very loose with her descriptions here. US advisers can influence what the host nation does, but they can't order them. Ever. Otherwise, we are essentially taking over their country which just feeds into the paranoia of "neo-con imperialism" that many of these critics are just hoping for. Nor does anyone claim they were held in US custody at any time:

The prisoners were never in American custody, said an FBI spokesman, Richard Kolko, who denied the agency would support or be party to illegal arrests. He said U.S. agents were allowed limited access by governments in the Horn of Africa to question prisoners as part of the FBI's counter-terrorism work.

Yes, of course, Mr. Kolko could be lying. But so could everyone else, and his account simply makes more sense.

3) The prisoners were all held, questioned, and released. This includes children of course. Does Spiegel seriously expect them to separate children from their parents or release them in a war zone?

4) They claim they were mistreated and tortured, including being choked, beaten, and denied food. Well, here's the problem. At no point do I read where an American did any of these things. This all occurred while they were in Kenyan or Ethiopian custody. But from the headline, it looks like the US did everything. Why don't we just have a headline: "prisoners mistreated by Ethiopia". Oh, I know why. It wouldn't sell as well. Look at this passage:

The interrogations, carried out without Red Cross knowledge, without lawyers and without judges, herald a new phase in the US government's "war on terror."

That's not journalism. That's editorializing, and not even doing it well. Maybe the Red Cross could have been contacted. But to expect Ethiopia, a nation which can barely feed itself, to provide a lawyer to each of these detainees is incredibly naive.

4) I'm sorry for their inconvenience, but they have to look at it from Ethiopia's point of view. Here you had two Muslim Swedes, not belonging to any NGO or Aid organization, but claiming to be tourists in an Islamic war zone which isn't known for its many attractions for tourists. It's not really a big mystery why the Ethiopians were suspicious.

Andrew Sullivan, naturally, falls for this hook, line and sinker here and here. Notice, he leads one posting with Munir Awad, and the other Safia Benaouda, in order to imply that these are two separate cases, when in fact they are the same. And with hot button words like "rendition" and "Verschaerfte Vernehmung" (meaning US = Nazis) he dishonestly attempts to imply that this means we have secret prisons in Ethiopia and that we are torturing Africans. This is the worst kind of tabloid mudslinging disguised as high-brow commentary. For example, in response to this passage in Spiegel:

When we landed, we were immediately photographed by Americans in civilian clothing," he [Munir] says, adding that he and the others were repeatedly insulted as "Qaida bastards."

Sullivan replied:

Well, they looked nasty, especially those "Qaeda bastard" children. And every enemy we have is a subset of al Qaeda, aren't they?

Not only does the passage not say that the Americans made these remarks, or that this was directed at the children. And would it be too much to ask: if the men were in civilian clothing, how did Safia or Munir know they were Americans? But what do you expect from a completely self-absorbed man who, by his own admission, seldom ever leaves the comfort of his writing desk?

Probably the closest I found to a non-biased version of this story, was from the AP. Also, some great comments at Free Republic. One commenter there, Sherman Logan, pointed out:

Some of those fleeing a war zone are not innocent refugees. Some are the equivalent of the SS who fled to South America. Massive numbers of Hutu "refugees" from the 1994 Rwandan massacres were really the perpetrators of those massacres...That said, we need an effective way to sort the refugees out from the SS-types.

Note on photo above:
U.S. Marine Corps Cpl. Dustin Crouthamel, right, familiarizes a member of the Kenyan army with his rifle as part of bilateral exercise Edged Mallet '07 in Manda Bay, Kenya, on March 4, 2007. The 26th Marine Expeditionary Unit conducted a bilateral exercise which included Kenyan land and naval forces, as well as serving the local community at a medical clinic and refurbishing a school. This was a publicly released press photo.

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