The secretary general of the Khiam Rehabilitation Center for Victims of Torture, Mohammad Safa announced in a press conference the transformation of the Follow-Up Committee for the Support of the Lebanese Detainees in the Israeli Prisons to the:
ARAB ORGANIZATION FOR DEFENDING DETAINEES

To read Safa's statement in Arabic, please click here.

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From the Daily Star Newspaper

FCLD enters 'a new qualitative phase'
Committee now operates under the Arab Organization for Defending Detainees in the Israeli and Arab Prisons

By Hania Taan  
Special to the Daily Star
Friday, October 14, 2005 

BEIRUT: The Follow-Up Committee for the Support of the Lebanese Detainees in Israeli Prisons (FCLD) has been restructured in recognition of the regional nature of its cause, and will now operate under the name the Arab Organization for Defending Detainees (AODD). The announcement came yesterday during a news conference held by FCLD Secretary General Mohammad Safa.

Safa said the follow-up committee, created 13 years ago to defend Lebanese detainees in Israeli prisons, has now entered "a new and qualitative phase in its struggle in order to develop it and turn it into an Arab organization to defend detainees in Israeli, Arab or foreign jails."

The secretary general said he would soon announce the names of the members of AODD's Advisory Council, which will be composed of Arab figures from throughout the Middle East.

"The issue of Arab detainees in Israeli prisons is a national, nationalist, humanitarian and world case that has not received serious attention from Arab governments," said Safa, adding that some 9,000 Arabs from Lebanon, Palestine, Syrian Golan, Jordan and Egypt are being held inside Israeli jails.

According to Safa, Arab prisoners held by Israel suffer the cruelest forms of physical and psychological torture. He said 190 detainees have died under torture; more than 36 detainees have been held in custody for more than 20 years; and 300 children and 120 women are detained in Israel, "while the world is silent and indifferent."

Safa said FCLD had made the issue the core of its activities on the national, regional and international levels.

"But no matter how enormous the committee's efforts are, they will remain limited if efforts inside and outside the Occupied Territories are not coordinated with the Higher Commissioner for Human Rights at the United Nations and other humanitarian organizations to launch the largest world solidarity campaign with the detainees," he added.

With this goal in mind, the FCLD called on the Palestinian Ministry for Detainees' Affairs and all civil and legal Palestinian bodies to create an action plan to develop the campaign and "break the silence surrounding this issue," suggesting the movement operate under the banner of "Releasing Children, Women and Veteran Detainees."