title: Waterboarding

text: Christopher Hitchens voluntarily subjected himself to a filmed demonstration of waterboarding in 2008, an experience which he recounted in "Vanity Fair". He was bound on a horizontal board with a black mask over his face. A group of men said to be highly trained in this tactic, who demanded anonymity, carried out the torture. Hitchens was strapped to the board at the chest and feet, face up, and unable to move. Metal objects were placed in each of his hands, which he could drop if feeling "unbearable stress", and he was given a code word that if said would immediately end the exercise. The interrogator placed a towel over Hitchens' face, and poured water on it. After 16 seconds, Hitchens threw the metal objects to the floor and the torturers pulled the mask from his face, allowing him to breathe.


title: Waterboarding

text: Allen Keller, the director of the Bellevue Hospital/New York University Program for Survivors of Torture, has treated "a number of people" who had been subjected to forms of near-asphyxiation, including waterboarding. In an interview for "The New Yorker", he argued that "it was indeed torture. 'Some victims were still traumatized years later', he said. One patient couldn't take showers, and panicked when it rained. 'The fear of being killed is a terrifying experience', he said". Keller also gave a full description in 2007 in testimony before the U.S. Senate Select Committee on Intelligence on the practice:


title: Waterboarding

text: The CIA's Office of Medical Services noted in a 2003 memo that "for reasons of physical fatigue or psychological resignation, the subject may simply give up, allowing excessive filling of the airways and loss of consciousness".


title: Waterboarding

text: In an open letter in 2007 to U.S. Attorney General Alberto Gonzales, Human Rights Watch asserted that waterboarding can cause the sort of "severe pain" prohibited by (the implementation in the United States of the United Nations Convention Against Torture), that the psychological effects can last long after waterboarding ends (another of the criteria under 18 USC 2340), and that uninterrupted waterboarding can ultimately cause death.


title: Waterboarding

text: Waterboarding is considered to be torture by a wide range of authorities, including legal experts, politicians, war veterans, intelligence officials, military judges, and human rights organizations. David Miliband, then United Kingdom Foreign Secretary, described it as torture on 19 July 2008, and stated "the UK unreservedly condemns the use of torture". Arguments have been put forward in the United States that it might not be torture in all cases, or that it is unclear. The U.S. State Department has recognized "submersion of the head in water" as torture in other circumstances, for example, in its 2005 Country Report on Tunisia.


title: Waterboarding

text: The United Nations' "Report of the Committee Against Torture: Thirty-fifth Session" of November 2006, stated that state parties should rescind any interrogation techniques, such as waterboarding, that constitutes torture or cruel, inhuman, or degrading treatment or punishment.


title: Waterboarding

text: Whether waterboarding should be classified as a method of torture was not widely debated in the United States before it was alleged, in 2004, that members of the CIA had used the technique against certain suspected detained terrorists.


title: Waterboarding

text: Subsequently, the U.S. government released the Bybee memo, a memorandum dated 1 August 2002, from Jay Bybee at the Office of Legal Counsel for White House Counsel Albert Gonzales. The OLC memo concluded that waterboarding did not constitute torture and could be used to interrogate enemy combatants. Bybee reasoned that "in order for pain or suffering to rise to the level of torture, the statute requires that it be severe" and that waterboarding did not cause severe pain or suffering either physically or mentally. A separate memo in July 2002, written by the Defense Department's Joint Personnel Recovery Agency, described the use of waterboarding and other techniques of extreme duress as "torture" and said that its use could yield unreliable information, and warned that "The unintended consequence of a U.S. policy that provides for the torture of prisoners is that it could be used by our adversaries as justification for the torture of captured U.S. personnel." This memo was forwarded to the Defense Department Office of the General Counsel, and then to the CIA's acting general counsel and Justice Department, even as the George W. Bush administration authorized waterboarding and other measures.


title: Waterboarding

text: For over three years during the George W. Bush administration, the Justice Department's Office of Professional Responsibility conducted an investigation into the propriety of the Bybee memo and other memos by the Justice Department on waterboarding and other "enhanced" interrogation techniques. The OPR report findings were that former Deputy AAG John Yoo committed intentional professional misconduct and that former AAG Jay Bybee committed professional misconduct. These findings were dismissed in a memo from Associate Deputy Attorney General David Margolis, who found that Yoo showed "poor judgment" but did not violate ethical standards. Commentators have noted that the memos omitted key relevant precedents, including a Texas precedent under then-Governor George W. Bush when the state convicted and sentenced to prison for ten years a county sheriff for waterboarding a criminal suspect. Bush did not issue a pardon for the sheriff.


title: Waterboarding

text: Former George W. Bush administration officials Dick Cheney and John Ashcroft have stated since leaving office that they do not consider waterboarding to be torture. At least one Republican member of the U.S. Congress, Ted Poe, has taken a similar position.


title: Waterboarding

text: Other Republican officials have provided less definitive views regarding whether waterboarding is torture. Andrew C. McCarthy, a former Republican prosecutor including in the George W. Bush administration, has stated that when used in "some number of instances that were not prolonged or extensive", waterboarding should not qualify as torture under the law. McCarthy has also stated that "waterboarding is close enough to torture that reasonable minds can differ on whether it is torture" and that "[t]here shouldn't be much debate that subjecting someone to [waterboarding] repeatedly would cause the type of mental anguish required for torture".


title: Waterboarding

text: Many former senior George W. Bush administration officials, on the other hand, have seriously questioned or directly challenged the legality of waterboarding. These include former State Department Counselor Philip Zelikow, former Deputy Secretary of State Richard Armitage, former Homeland Security Chief Tom Ridge, former head of the Office of Legal Counsel Jack Goldsmith, General Ricardo Sanchez, FBI Director Robert Mueller, and former Convening Authority for the Guantanamo military commissions Susan J. Crawford.


title: Waterboarding

text: During his tenure as head of the Justice Department's Office of Legal Counsel in 2003–2004, Jack Goldsmith put a halt to the use of waterboarding as an interrogation technique because of serious concern over its legality, but Goldsmith's order was quickly reversed by others within the George W. Bush administration.


title: Waterboarding

text: A Republican 2008 candidate for president, Senator John McCain who himself was tortured during his years as a prisoner of war in North Vietnam during the Vietnam War, has stated unequivocally several times that he considers waterboarding to be torture:


title: Waterboarding

text: In May 2008, author and journalist Christopher Hitchens voluntarily underwent waterboarding and concluded that it was torture. He also noted that he suffered ongoing psychological effects from the ordeal.


title: Waterboarding

text: On 22 May 2009, radio talk show host Erich "Mancow" Muller subjected himself to waterboarding to prove that it is not torture, but changed his mind because of the experience.


title: Waterboarding

text: On 22 April 2009, Fox News host Sean Hannity, offered to be waterboarded for charity in order to prove that it did not amount to torture, though he did not follow through with it.


title: Waterboarding

text: On 15 January 2009, U.S. President-elect Barack Obama's nominee for Attorney General, Eric Holder, told his Senate confirmation hearing that waterboarding is torture and the President cannot authorize it. In a press conference on 30 April, President Obama also stated, "I believe waterboarding was torture, and it was a mistake."


title: Waterboarding

text: In covering the debate on the use of waterboarding as an interrogation technique by the U.S. government, U.S. reporters had to decide whether to use the term "torture" or "enhanced interrogation techniques" to describe waterboarding. National Public Radio's ombudsman detailed this debate and why NPR had decided to refrain from using the word torture to describe waterboarding. Due to criticism of the policy by the media and to NPR directly, a second piece was written to further explain their position and a desire to describe the technique rather than simply describe it as torture.


title: Waterboarding

text: A form of torture similar to waterboarding is called "toca", and more recently "Spanish water torture", to differentiate it from the better known Chinese water torture, along with "garrucha" (or strappado) and the most frequently used "potro" (or the rack). This was used infrequently during the trial portion of the Spanish Inquisition process. "The "toca", also called "tortura del agua", consisted of introducing a cloth into the mouth of the victim, and forcing them to ingest water spilled from a jar so that they had the impression of drowning". William Schweiker claims that the use of water as a form of torture also had profound religious significance to the Inquisitors.


title: Waterboarding

text: In general, waterboarding seemed to be very extended in the Spanish detention centers in the 1500s. Books from the time explain how to treat persons in custody, and used this "light" form of torture. After a specific way of beating, body, legs and arms, it was detailed how to pour 4 cuartillos (approx. 2.5 liters) of water over mouth and nose, with a covering cloth, making sure there was some cloth introduced in the mouth so water could also get in.


title: Waterboarding

text: In Joos de Damhouder's "Praxis rerum criminalium" (1554), a manual on the practice of criminal law, the chapter on torture and interrogation is illustrated with a woodcut of waterboarding, which it describes in detail. The Martyr's Mirror depicts one incident of waterboarding used against the early Mennonites thus:


title: Waterboarding

text: And as they did still not obtain anything from me, to the implication of my neighbor, Master Hans took water (during the entire time a cloth had lain on my face), and holding my nose shut with one hand, began to pour water on my abdomen and thence all over my breast, and into my mouth; even as one should drink when he is very thirsty. I think that the can from which he poured out – the water held about three pints. And when I was at the end of my breath, and wanted to fetch such, I drew the water all into my body, whereupon I suffered such distress, that it would be impossible for me to relate or describe it; but the Lord be forever praised: He kept my lips. And when they could still not obtain anything from me, they caused the cord which was on my thigh to be loosed and applied to a fresh place, and wound it much tighter than before, so that I thought he would kill me, and began to shake and tremble greatly. He then proceeded to pour water into me again, so that I think he emptied four such cans, and my body became so full of it, that twice it came out again at the throat. And thus I became so weak. that I fainted; for, when I recovered from my swoon, I found myself alone with Master Hans and Daniel de Keyser. And Master Hans was so busily engaged in loosing all my cords, that it seemed to me that they were concerned over me. But the Lord in a large degree took away my pain every time; whenever it became so severe that I thought it was impossible to bear it, my members became as dead. Eternal praise, thanks, honor, and glory be to the Lord; for when it was over I thought that, by the help of the Lord, I had fought a good fight.


title: Waterboarding

text: Agents of the Dutch East India Company used a precursor to waterboarding during the Amboyna massacre of English prisoners, which took place on the island of Amboyna in the Molucca Islands in 1623. At that time, it consisted of wrapping cloth around the victim's head, after which the torturers "poured the water softly upon his head until the cloth was full, up to the mouth and nostrils, and somewhat higher, so that he could not draw breath but he must suck in all the water". In one case, the torturer applied water three or four times successively until the victim's "body was swollen twice or thrice as big as before, his cheeks like great bladders, and his eyes staring and strutting out beyond his forehead".


title: Waterboarding

text: An editorial in "The New York Times" of 6 April 1852, and a subsequent 21 April 1852 letter to the editors documents an incidence of waterboarding, then called "showering" or "hydropathic torture", in New York's Sing Sing prison of an inmate named Henry Hagan, who, after several other forms of beating and mistreatment, had his head shaved, and "certainly three, and possibly a dozen, barrels of water were poured upon his naked scalp". Hagan was then placed in a yoke. A correspondent listed only as "H" later wrote: "Perhaps it would be well to state more fully the true character of this 'hydropathic torture.' The stream of water is about one inch in diameter, and falls from a of seven or eight feet. The head of the patient is retained in its place by means of a board clasping the neck; the effect of which is, that the water, striking upon the board, rebounds into the mouth and nostrils of the victim, almost producing strangulation. Congestion, sometimes of the heart or lungs, sometimes of the brain, not ensues; and death, in due season, has released some sufferers from the further ordeal of the water cure. As the water is administered officially, I suppose that it is not murder!" H. then went on to cite an 1847 New York law which limited prison discipline to individual confinement "upon a short allowance."


title: Waterboarding

text: Prisoners in late 19th-century Alabama, and in Mississippi in the first third of the 20th century, also suffered waterboarding. In Alabama, in lieu of or in addition to other physical punishment, a "prisoner was strapped down on his back; then 'water [was] poured in his face on the upper lip, and effectually stop[ped] his breathing as long as there [was] a constant stream'." In Mississippi, the accused was held down, and water was poured "from a dipper into the nose so as to strangle him, thus causing pain and horror, for the purpose of forcing a confession."


title: Waterboarding

text: The U.S. army used waterboarding, called the "water cure", during the Philippine–American War. It is not clear where this practice came from; it probably was adopted from the Filipinos, who themselves adopted it from the Spanish. Reports of "cruelties" from soldiers stationed in the Philippines led to Senate hearings on U.S. activity there.


title: Waterboarding

text: Testimony described the waterboarding of Tobeniano Ealdama "while supervised by ...Captain/Major Edwin F. Glenn". Elihu Root, United States Secretary of War, ordered a court martial for Glenn in April 1902." During the trial, Glenn "maintained that the torture of Ealdama was 'a legitimate exercise of force under the laws of war.'" Though some reports seem to confuse Ealdama with Glenn, Glenn was found guilty and "sentenced to a one-month suspension and a fifty-dollar fine", the leniency of the sentence due to the "circumstances" presented at the trial.


title: Waterboarding

text: President Theodore Roosevelt privately rationalized the instances of "mild torture, the water cure" but publicly called for efforts to "prevent the occurrence of all such acts in the future". In that effort, he ordered the court-martial of General Jacob H. Smith on the island of Samar, "where some of the worst abuses had occurred". When the court-martial found only that he had acted with excessive zeal, Roosevelt disregarded the verdict and had the General dismissed from the Army.


title: Waterboarding

text: Roosevelt soon declared victory in the Philippines, and the public lost interest in "what had, only months earlier, been alarming revelations".


title: Waterboarding

text: The use of "third degree interrogation" techniques to compel confession, ranging from "psychological duress such as prolonged confinement to extreme violence and torture", was widespread in early American policing. Lassiter classified the water cure as "orchestrated physical abuse", and described the police technique as a "modern day variation of the method of water torture that was popular during the Middle Ages". The technique employed by the police involved either holding the head in water until almost drowning, or laying on the back and forcing water into the mouth or nostrils. Such techniques were classified as "'covert' third degree torture" since they left no signs of physical abuse, and became popular after 1910 when the direct application of physical violence to force a confession became a media issue and some courts began to deny obviously compelled confessions. The publication of this information in 1931 as part of the Wickersham Commission's "Report on Lawlessness in Law Enforcement" led to a decline in the use of third degree police interrogation techniques in the 1930s and 1940s.


title: Waterboarding

text: During World War II, both Japanese military personnel, especially the Kempeitai, and the officers of the Gestapo, the German secret police, used waterboarding as a method of torture. During the Japanese occupation of Singapore, the Double Tenth Incident occurred. This included waterboarding, by the method of binding or holding down the victim on his back, placing a cloth over his mouth and nose, and pouring water onto the cloth. In this version, interrogation continued during the torture, with the interrogators beating the victim if he did not reply and the victim swallowing water if he opened his mouth to answer or breathe. When the victim could ingest no more water, the interrogators would beat or jump on his distended stomach.


title: Waterboarding

text: Chase J. Nielsen, one of the U.S. airmen who flew in the Doolittle raid following the attack on Pearl Harbor, was subjected to waterboarding by his Japanese captors. At their trial for war crimes following the war, he testified "Well, I was put on my back on the floor with my arms and legs stretched out, one guard holding each limb. The towel was wrapped around my face and put across my face and water poured on. They poured water on this towel until I was almost unconscious from strangulation, then they would let up until I'd get my breath, then they'd start over again... I felt more or less like I was drowning, just gasping between life and death." In 2007, Senator John McCain said that the United States military hanged Japanese soldiers for waterboarding American prisoners of war during World War II. A minimal sentence for Japanese soldiers convicted of waterboarding American soldiers was 15 years.


title: Waterboarding

text: The technique was also used during the Algerian War (1954–1962). French journalist Henri Alleg, who was subjected to waterboarding by French paratroopers in Algeria in 1957, is one of only a few people to have described in writing the first-hand experience of being waterboarded. His book "La Question", published in 1958 with a preface by Jean-Paul Sartre subsequently banned in France until the end of the Algerian War in 1962, discusses the experience of being strapped to a plank, having his head wrapped in cloth and positioned beneath a running tap:


title: Waterboarding

text: Alleg stated that he did not break under his ordeal of being waterboarded. He also stated that the incidence of "accidental" death of prisoners being subjected to waterboarding in Algeria was "very frequent".


title: Waterboarding

text: Waterboarding was designated as illegal by U.S. generals in the Vietnam War. On 21 January 1968, "The Washington Post" published a controversial front-page photograph of two U.S soldiers and one South Vietnamese soldier participating in the waterboarding of a North Vietnamese POW near Da Nang. The article described the practice as "fairly common". The photograph led to the soldier being court-martialled by a U.S. military court within one month of its publication, and he was discharged from the army. Another waterboarding photograph of the same scene, referred to as "water torture" in the caption, is also exhibited in the War Remnants Museum in Ho Chi Minh City. After reports by Lieutenant Colonel Anthony Herbert, investigators confirmed that military interrogators of the 173rd Airborne Brigade "repeatedly beat prisoners, tortured them with electric shocks and forced water down their throats". Interrogators employed a technique called the "water rag", which involved pouring water onto a rag covering the captive's nose and mouth.


title: Waterboarding

text: Based on the testimonies from more than 35,000 victims of the Pinochet regime, the Chilean Commission on Political Imprisonment and Torture concluded that provoking a near-death experience by waterboarding is torture.


title: Waterboarding

text: The Khmer Rouge at the Tuol Sleng prison in Phnom Penh, Cambodia, used waterboarding as a method of torture between 1975 and 1979. The practice was perfected by Duch's lieutenants Mam Nai and Tang Sin Hean and documented in a painting by former inmate Vann Nath, which is on display in the Tuol Sleng Genocide Museum. The museum also has on display boards and other actual tools used for waterboarding during the Khmer Rouge regime.


title: Waterboarding

text: During the Troubles, an ethno-nationalist conflict in Northern Ireland, there were instances of British security forces, including the British Army and the Royal Ulster Constabulary (RUC) waterboarding suspected Irish Republican Army (IRA) members. Former RUC interrogators who were active during the Troubles claimed that waterboarding, among other forms of torture, were systematically used against suspected IRA members in police custody. In October 1972, Liam Holden was arrested by members of the Parachute Regiment on the suspicion of being an IRA sniper who had killed a British paratrooper, Frank Bell. He was convicted the next year of the crime and sentenced to be executed, largely on the basis of an unsigned confession produced by a range of torture techniques, including waterboarding. Holden's death sentence was commuted to life imprisonment and he spent 17 years in prison. On 21 June 2012, in the light of CCRC investigations which confirmed that the methods used to extract a confession from Holden were unlawful, he had his conviction quashed by the Court of Appeal in Belfast and was cleared of murder.


title: Waterboarding

text: The South African Truth and Reconciliation Commission received testimony from Charles Zeelie and Jeffrey Benzien, officers of the South African Police under Apartheid, that they used waterboarding, referred to as "tubing", or the "wet bag technique" on political prisoners as part of a wide range of torture methods to extract information. Specifically, a cloth bag was wet and placed over victim's heads, to be removed only when they were near asphyxiation; the procedure was repeated several times. The TRC concluded that the act constituted torture and a gross human rights violation, for which the state was responsible.


title: Waterboarding

text: Until 2007, all special operations units in all branches of the U.S. military and the CIA's Special Activities Division employed the use of waterboarding as part of survival school (Survival, Evasion, Resistance and Escape) training, to psychologically prepare soldiers for the possibility of being captured by enemy forces. By 2002, many branches of the military had backed away from waterboarding trainees, at least in part "because it hurt morale", and in November 2007 the practice was banned by the Department of Defense because it "provided no instructional or training benefit to the student". John Yoo, former deputy assistant attorney general under President Bush stated that the United States has subjected 20,000 of its troops to waterboarding as part of SERE training prior to deployment to Iraq and Afghanistan.


title: Waterboarding

text: Dr. Jerald Ogrisseg, former head of Psychological Services for the Air Force SERE School has stated in testimony before the U.S. Senate's Committee on Armed Services that there are fundamental differences between SERE training and what occurs in real-world settings. Dr. Ogrisseg further states that his experience is limited to SERE training, but that he did not believe waterboarding to be productive in either setting.


title: Waterboarding

text: However, according to a declassified Justice Department memo attempting to justify torture which references a still-classified report of the CIA Inspector General on the CIA's use of waterboarding, among other "enhanced" interrogation techniques, the CIA applied waterboarding to detainees "in a different manner" than the technique used in SERE training:


title: Waterboarding

text: The difference was in the manner in which the detainees' breathing was obstructed. At the SERE school and in the DoJ opinion, the subject's airflow is disrupted by the firm application of a damp cloth over the air passages; the interrogator applies a small amount of water to the cloth in a controlled manner. By contrast, the Agency interrogator ... applied large volumes of water to a cloth that covered the detainee's mouth and nose. One of the psychiatrist / interrogators acknowledged that the Agency's use of the technique is different from that used in SERE training because it is 'for real' and is more poignant and convincing.


title: Waterboarding

text: According to the DOJ memo, the IG Report observed that the CIA's Office of Medical Services (OMS) stated that "the experience of the SERE psychologist / interrogators on the waterboard was probably misrepresented at the time, as the SERE waterboard experience is so different from the subsequent Agency usage as to make it almost irrelevant" and that "[c]onsequently, according to OMS, there was no a priori reason to believe that applying the waterboard with the frequency and intensity with which it was used by the psychologist/interrogators was either efficacious or medically safe."


title: Waterboarding

text: In 1983, San Jacinto County, Texas sheriff, James Parker, and three of his deputies were convicted for conspiring to force confessions. The complaint said they "subject prisoners to a suffocating water torture ordeal to coerce confessions. This generally included the placement of a towel over the nose and mouth of the prisoner and the pouring of water into the towel until the prisoner began to move, jerk (twitch), or otherwise indicate suffocation and/or drowning". James Parker was sentenced to ten years in prison, and the deputies to four years.


title: Waterboarding

text: The 21 June 2004 issue of "Newsweek" stated that the Bybee Memo, an early August 2002 legal memorandum drafted by John Yoo and signed by his boss, Jay S. Bybee, then head of the Office of Legal Counsel, described interrogation tactics against suspected terrorists or terrorist affiliates the George W. Bush administration would consider legal, was "prompted by CIA questions about what to do with a top Qaeda captive, Abu Zubaydah, who had turned uncooperative... and was drafted after White House meetings convened by George W. Bush's chief counsel, Alberto Gonzales, along with Defense Department general counsel William Haynes and David Addington, Vice President Dick Cheney's counsel, who discussed specific interrogation techniques", citing "a source familiar with the discussions". Amongst the methods they found acceptable was waterboarding. Jack Goldsmith, head of the Office of Legal Counsel (October 2003-June 2004) in the Department of Justice, later said this group was known as "the war council".


title: Waterboarding

text: In November 2005, ABC News reported that former CIA agents claimed that the CIA engaged in a modern form of waterboarding, along with five other "enhanced interrogation techniques", against suspected members of al Qaeda.


title: Waterboarding

text: On 20 July 2007, U.S. President George W. Bush signed Executive Order 13440, banning torture during interrogation of terror suspects. While the guidelines for interrogation do not specifically ban waterboarding, the executive order refers to torture as defined by 18 USC 2340, which includes "the threat of imminent death", as well as the U.S. Constitution's ban on cruel and unusual punishment. Reaction to the order was mixed, with the CIA satisfied that it "clearly defined" the agency's authorities.


title: Waterboarding

text: Human Rights Watch said that answers about what specific techniques had been banned lay in the classified companion document and that "the people in charge of interpreting [that] document don't have a particularly good track record of reasonable legal analysis".


title: Waterboarding

text: On 14 September 2007, ABC News reported that sometime in 2006, CIA Director Michael Hayden asked for and received permission from the Bush administration to ban the use of waterboarding in CIA interrogations. A CIA spokesperson declined to discuss interrogation techniques, stating the techniques "have been and continue to be lawful". ABC reported that waterboarding had been authorized by a 2002 Presidential finding. On 5 November 2007, "The Wall Street Journal" reported that its "sources confirm... that the CIA has only used this interrogation method against three terrorist detainees and not since 2003." John Kiriakou, a former CIA officer, is the first official within the U.S. government to openly admit to the use of waterboarding as an interrogation technique, as of 10 December 2007.


title: Waterboarding

text: On 6 February 2008, CIA director General Michael Hayden stated that the CIA had waterboarded three prisoners during 2002 and 2003, namely Abu Zubaydah, Khalid Sheikh Mohammed, and Abd al-Rahim al-Nashiri.


title: Waterboarding

text: On 23 February 2008, the Justice Department revealed that its internal ethics office was investigating the department's legal approval for waterboarding of al Qaeda suspects by the CIA and was likely to make public an unclassified version of its report.


title: Waterboarding

text: On 15 October 2008, it was reported that the Bush administration had issued a pair of secret memos to the CIA in June 2003 and June 2004 explicitly endorsing waterboarding and other torture techniques against al-Qaeda suspects. The memos were granted only after "repeated requests" from the CIA, who at the time were worried that the White House would eventually try to distance themselves from the issue. Field employees in the agency believed they could easily be blamed for using the techniques without proper written permission or authority. Until this point, the Bush administration had never been concretely tied to acknowledging the torture practices.


title: Waterboarding

text: In December 2008, Robert Mueller, the Director of the FBI since 5 July 2001, had said that despite Bush Administration claims that waterboarding has "disrupted a number of attacks, maybe dozens of attacks", he does not believe that evidence obtained by the U.S. government through enhanced interrogation techniques such as waterboarding disrupted one attack.


title: Waterboarding

text: In an interview in January 2009, Dick Cheney acknowledged the use of waterboarding to interrogate suspects and said that waterboarding had been "used with great discrimination by people who know what they're doing and has produced a lot of valuable information and intelligence".


title: Waterboarding

text: On 1 July 2009, the Obama administration announced that it was delaying the scheduled release of declassified portions of a report by the CIA Inspector General in response to a civil lawsuit. The CIA report reportedly cast doubt on the effectiveness of the torture used by CIA interrogators during the Bush administration. This was based on several George W. Bush-era Justice Department memos declassified in the Spring of 2009 by the U.S. Justice Department.


title: Waterboarding

text: In 2002, U.S. intelligence located Abu Zubaydah by tracing his phone calls. He was captured 28 March 2002, in a safehouse located in a two-story apartment in Faisalabad, Pakistan.


title: Waterboarding

text: One of Abu Zubaydah's FBI interrogators, Ali Soufan, wrote a book about his experiences. He later testified to Congress that Zubaydah was producing useful information in response to conventional interrogation methods, including the names of Sheikh Mohammed and Jose Padilla. He stopped providing accurate information in response to harsh techniques. Soufan, one of the FBI's most successful interrogators, explained, "When they are in pain, people will say anything to get the pain to stop. Most of the time, they will lie, make up anything to make you stop hurting them. That means the information you're getting is useless."


title: Waterboarding

text: Participating in his later interrogation by the CIA were two American psychologists, James Elmer Mitchell and R. Scott Shumate.


title: Waterboarding

text: In December 2007, "The Washington Post" reported that there were some discrepancies regarding reports about the number of times Zubaydah was waterboarded. According to a previous account by former CIA officer John Kiriakou, Abu Zubaydah broke after just 35 seconds of waterboarding, which involved stretching cellophane over his mouth and nose and pouring water on his face to create the sensation of drowning. Kiriakou later admitted that he had no first hand knowledge of the interrogation and accused the CIA of using him to spread disinformation.


title: Waterboarding

text: Former CIA operative John Kiriakou in 2007 told CNN's "American Morning" that the waterboarding of Al Qaeda's Abu Zubaydah indirectly led to the arrest of Khalid Sheikh Mohammed:


title: Waterboarding

text: Pakistani intelligence agents say Mohammed was carrying a letter from bin Laden at the time of his arrest, but there is no evidence he knew bin Laden's whereabouts. By this point, any information Mohammed had would have been years out of date.


title: Waterboarding

text: After being subjected to repeated waterboarding, Mohammed claimed participation in thirty-one terrorist plots. On 15 June 2009, in response to a lawsuit by the ACLU, the government was forced to disclose a previously classified portion of a CIA memo written in 2006. It recounted Mohammed's telling the CIA that he "made up stories" to stop from being tortured. Legal experts cast serious doubt as to the validity of Mohammed's "confessions" as being false claims, and human rights activists raised serious concerns over the "sham process" of justice and use of torture.


title: Waterboarding

text: During a radio interview on 24 October 2006, with Scott Hennen of radio station WDAY, Vice President Dick Cheney agreed with the use of waterboarding. The administration later denied that Cheney had confirmed the use of waterboarding, saying that U.S. officials do not talk publicly about interrogation techniques because they are classified. White House Press Secretary Tony Snow claimed that Cheney was not referring to waterboarding, despite repeated questions refused to specify what else Cheney was referring to by a "dunk in the water", and refused to confirm that this meant waterboarding.


title: Waterboarding

text: On 13 September 2007, ABC News reported that a former intelligence officer stated that Khalid Sheikh Mohammed had been waterboarded in the presence of a female CIA supervisor.


title: Waterboarding

text: On 2 June 2010, while speaking to the Economic Club of Grand Rapids, Michigan, former President Bush publicly confirmed his knowledge and approval of waterboarding Mohammed, saying "Yeah, we waterboarded Khalid Sheikh Mohammed...I'd do it again to save lives."


title: Waterboarding

text: President Barack Obama banned the use of waterboarding and several other interrogation methods in January 2009. He reported that U.S. personnel must stick to the Army Field Manual guidelines. In early April 2009, the Obama administration released several classified Justice Department memos from the George W. Bush administration that discussed waterboarding.


title: Waterboarding

text: Obama opposed prosecuting CIA personnel who committed waterboarding while relying on legal advice provided by their superiors. The American Civil Liberties Union has criticized his stance. In early April 2009, news reports stated that Obama would support an independent investigation over the issue as long as it would be bipartisan. On 23 April 2009, White House Press Secretary Robert Gibbs stated that the administration had changed its position and no longer supported such an idea. The topic was the subject of heated internal debate within the White House.


title: Waterboarding

text: National Intelligence Director Dennis Blair has stated that "high value information" came from waterboarding certain prisoners during the George W. Bush administration. He also commented that he could not know for sure whether or not other interrogation methods would have caused them to talk, had they been tried. In an administration memo that was publicly released, he wrote, "I do not fault those who made the decisions at that time, and I will absolutely defend those who carried out the interrogations within the orders they were given."


title: Waterboarding

text: An April poll by Rasmussen Reports found that 77 percent of voters had followed the story in the media and that 58 percent believed that releasing the memos compromised American national security. On the issue of a further investigation, 58 percent disagreed while 28% agreed.


title: Waterboarding

text: In May 2011, Obama authorized a successful commando raid to kill Osama Bin Laden. The extent to which waterboarding assisted in ascertaining the whereabouts of Bin Laden is a matter of dispute. Former Attorney General Michael Mukasey criticized the Obama administration for denying future missions the intelligence capability that made the raid possible: "Acknowledging and meeting the need for an effective and lawful interrogation program, which we once had, and freeing CIA operatives and others to administer it under congressional oversight, would be a fitting way to mark the demise of Osama bin Laden." CIA Director Leon Panetta, who supervised the operation that found and killed bin Laden, stated in an interview with NBC reporter Brian Williams: "...they used these enhanced interrogation techniques against some of these detainees. But I'm also saying, that the debate about whether we would have gotten the same information through other approaches, I think, is always going to be an open question."


title: Waterboarding

text: Republican Senator John McCain, in a "Washington Post" opinion piece, disputed Mukasey's account, saying:


title: Waterboarding

text: In December 2014, the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence issued a declassified 500-page summary of its still-classified 6,700 page report on the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) Detention and Interrogation Program. The report concluded that "the CIA's use of Enhanced Interrogation Techniques (EIT) was not effective for acquiring intelligence or gaining cooperation from detainees." According to the report, the CIA had presented no credible proof that information obtained through waterboarding or the other harsh interrogation methods that the CIA employed prevented any attacks or saved any lives. There was no evidence that information obtained from the detainees through EIT was not or could not have been obtained through conventional interrogation methods. The Committee examined in detail the specific question of whether torture had elicited information helpful in locating Osama Bin Laden, concluded that it had not, and further concluded that the CIA deliberately misled political leaders and the public in claiming otherwise.


title: Waterboarding

text: U.S. Attorney General Eric H. Holder Jr. announced on 30 August 2012 that no one would be prosecuted for the deaths of a prisoner in Afghanistan in 2002 and another in Iraq in 2003, eliminating the last possibility that any criminal charges will be brought as a result of the interrogations carried out by the CIA. The Justice Department closed its investigation of the CIA's use of severe interrogation methods, because investigators said they could not prove any agents crossed the lines authorized by the Bush administration in the "war on terror" program of detention and rendition. According to "the New York Times" the closing of the two cases means that the Obama administration's limited effort to scrutinize the counterterrorism programs, such as waterboarding, carried out under President George W. Bush has come to an end.


title: Waterboarding

text: In 2015, various Republican presidential candidates indicated their willingness to bring back waterboarding as an interrogation technique. Donald Trump (the eventual winner of the election) stated he believed in the effectiveness of the technique. Trump also stated that it is a "minimal" form of torture, and that it was necessary. Ben Carson had not ruled out approving its use, nor did Jeb Bush. Carly Fiorina endorsed its use, as did Rick Perry and Rick Santorum.


title: Waterboarding

text: In June 2015, in response to a critical assessment of China in the U.S. State Department's annual human rights report, China noted that the U.S., among other alleged human rights abuses, had engaged in torture of terrorism suspects by waterboarding.


title: Waterboarding

text: In October 2014, John Cantlie reported that ISIS had waterboarded prisoners, "Some of us who tried to escape were waterboarded by our captors, as Muslim prisoners are waterboarded by their American captors."


title: Waterboarding

text: Waterboarding is reported to be among the forms of torture used as part of the indoctrination process at the Xinjiang re-education camps.


title: Waterboarding

text: Waterboarding and other forms of water torture have historically been used for 1) punishing, 2) forcing confessions for use in trials, 3) eliciting false confessions for political purposes, and 4) obtaining factual intelligence for military purposes.


title: Waterboarding

text: Its use principally for obtaining confessions rather than as punishment dates back to the 15th century and the Spanish Inquisition. It was also in use for the same purpose, albeit illegally, by U.S. police officers as recently as 1981. During the Korean War, the North Koreans used several methods of torture to achieve prisoner compliance and false confessions. Such techniques caused a U.S.airmen to falsely "confess" that there was a plan to use biological weapons against North Korea. After 9/11, CIA interrogators sought to waterboard suspected terrorists to obtain actionable intelligence, but prisoners falsely confessed to whatever interrogators accused them of in order to stop the EIT. Khalid Shaykh Muhammad fabricated stories to give his tormentors "everything they wanted to hear." Later, he recanted, citing he was being tortured when he made up the stories. The same was true for the "confessions" elicited by EIT on Riduan Isamuddin, aka Hambali.


title: Waterboarding

text: Waterboarding's effectiveness as a technique for reliably obtaining truthful, useful intelligence has not been established. In May 2003, a senior CIA interrogator told the CIA's Office of Inspector General that the EIT then being used by the CIA was modeled after U.S. resistance training to prepare servicemen for "physical torture" by North Vietnamese. This torture, including waterboarding, was intended to extract "confessions for propaganda purposes" from U.S. airman "who possessed little actionable intelligence." If the CIA wanted to obtain useful information rather than false confessions, he said, the CIA needed "a different working model for interrogating terrorists." Nonetheless, with the active support of former Vice President Dick Cheney, the CIA embraced the EIT approach proposed by two psychologists, James Elmer Mitchell and Bruce Jessen, neither of whom had interrogation experience. While Cheney continues to maintain that waterboarding has "produced phenomenal results" including tracking down Osama bin Laden, the report of the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence concluded that "the CIA's use of its enhanced interrogation techniques was not an effective means of acquiring intelligence or gaining cooperation from detainees." There was no proof, according to the 6,700-page report, that information obtained through waterboarding prevented any attacks or saved any lives, or that information obtained from the detainees was not or could not have been obtained through conventional interrogation methods.


title: Waterboarding

text: All nations that are signatory to the United Nations Convention Against Torture have agreed they are subject to the explicit prohibition on torture under any condition. This was affirmed by Saadi v. Italy in which the European Court of Human Rights, on 28 February 2008, upheld the absolute nature of the torture ban by ruling that international law permits no exceptions to it. Article 2.2 of the Convention Against Torture states that "[n]o exceptional circumstances whatsoever, whether a state of war or a threat of war, internal political instability or any other public emergency, may be invoked as a justification of torture." Additionally, signatories of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights are bound to Article 5, which states, "No one shall be subjected to torture or to cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment or punishment." Many signatories of the UN Convention Against Torture have made specific declarations and reservations regarding the interpretation of the term "torture" and restricted the jurisdiction of its enforcement. However, UN High Commissioner for Human Rights, Louise Arbour, stated on the subject "I would have no problems with describing this practice as falling under the prohibition of torture", and that violators of the UN Convention Against Torture should be prosecuted under the principle of universal jurisdiction.


title: Waterboarding

text: Bent Sørensen, Senior Medical Consultant to the International Rehabilitation Council for Torture Victims and former member of the United Nations Committee Against Torture has said:


title: Waterboarding

text: Lieutenant General Michael D. Maples, the director of the Defense Intelligence Agency, concurred by stating, in a hearing before the Senate Armed Services Committee, that he believes waterboarding violates Common Article 3 of the Geneva Conventions.


title: Waterboarding

text: In a review of "The Dark Side: The Inside Story of How the War on Terror Turned Into a War on American Ideals", by Jane Mayer, "The New York Times" reported on 11 July 2008, that "Red Cross investigators concluded last year in a secret report that the Central Intelligence Agency's interrogation methods for high-level Qaeda prisoners constituted torture and could make the Bush administration officials who approved them guilty of war crimes", that the techniques applied to Abu Zubaydah were "categorically" torture, and that Abu Zubaydah had told investigators that, contrary to what had been revealed previously, "he had been waterboarded at least 10 times in a single week and as many as three times in a day".


title: Waterboarding

text: Shortly before the end of Bush's second term, news media in other countries were opining that under the United Nations Convention Against Torture, the U.S. is obligated to hold those responsible to account under criminal law.


title: Waterboarding

text: On 20 January 2009, Manfred Nowak—the United Nations Special Rapporteur on torture and other cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment or punishment—stated that following the inauguration of Barack Obama as president of the United States, George W. Bush had lost his head of state immunity; Nowak opined that under international law, the U.S. was mandated to start criminal proceedings against all those involved in violations of the UN Convention Against Torture. Law professor Dietmar Herz asserted that under U.S. and international law, Bush was criminally responsible for adopting torture as interrogation tool.


title: Waterboarding

text: The United States Supreme Court in Sosa v. Alvarez-Machain, said that the Universal Declaration of Human Rights "does not of its own force impose obligations as a matter of international law." However, the United States has a historical record of regarding waterboarding as a war crime, and has prosecuted individuals for such practice in the past.


title: Waterboarding

text: In 1947, during the Yokohama War Crimes Trials, the United States prosecuted a Japanese civilian who had served in World War II as an interpreter for the Japanese military, Yukio Asano, for "Violation of the Laws and Customs of War", asserting that he "did unlawfully take and convert to his own use Red Cross packages and supplies intended for" prisoners, but, far worse, that he also "did willfully and unlawfully mistreat and torture" prisoners of war. The charges against Asano included "beating using hands, fists, club; kicking; water torture; burning using cigarettes; strapping on a stretcher head downward." The specifications in the charges with regard to "water torture" consisted of "pouring water up [the] nostrils" of one prisoner, "forcing water into [the] mouths and noses" of two other prisoners, and "forcing water into [the] nose" of a fourth prisoner. Asano received a sentence of 15 years of hard labor.


title: Waterboarding

text: Following the September 11 attacks, several memoranda, including the Bybee memo, were written analyzing the legal position and possibilities in the treatment of prisoners. The memos, known today as the "torture memos", advocate enhanced interrogation techniques, while pointing out that refuting the Geneva Conventions would reduce the possibility of prosecution for war crimes. In addition, a new definition of torture was issued. Most actions that fall under the international definition do not fall within this new definition advocated by the U.S.


title: Waterboarding

text: In its 2005 Country Reports on Human Rights Practices, the U.S. Department of State formally recognized "submersion of the head in water" as torture in its examination of Tunisia's poor human rights record, and draws parallels between the two techniques, citing the similar usage of water on the subject.


title: Waterboarding

text: On 6 September 2006, the U.S. Department of Defense released a revised Army Field Manual entitled "Human Intelligence Collector Operations" that prohibits the use of waterboarding by U.S. military personnel. The department adopted the manual amid widespread criticism of U.S. handling of prisoners in the War on Terrorism, and prohibits other practices in addition to waterboarding. The revised manual applies only to U.S. military personnel, and as such does not apply to the practices of the CIA. Nevertheless, Steven G. Bradbury, acting head of the U.S. Department of Justice (DOJ) Office of Legal Counsel, on 14 February 2008 testified:


title: Waterboarding

text: In addition, both under the War Crimes Act and international law, violators of the laws of war are criminally liable under the command responsibility doctrine, and they could still be prosecuted for war crimes. Commenting on the torture memos, Scott Horton pointed out:


title: Waterboarding

text: Michael Mukasey's refusal to investigate and prosecute anyone that relied on these legal opinions led Jordan Paust of the University of Houston Law Center to write an article for JURIST stating:


title: Waterboarding

text: On 22 February 2008, Senator Sheldon Whitehouse made public that "the Justice Department has announced it has launched an investigation of the role of top DOJ officials and staff attorneys in authorizing and/or overseeing the use of waterboarding by U.S. intelligence agencies."


title: Waterboarding

text: Both houses of the United States Congress approved a bill by February 2008 that would ban waterboarding and other harsh interrogation methods, the Intelligence Authorization Act for Fiscal Year 2008. As he promised, President Bush vetoed the legislation on 8 March. His veto applied to the authorization for the entire intelligence budget for the 2008 fiscal year, but he cited the waterboarding ban as the reason for the veto. Supporters of the bill supporters lacked enough votes to overturn the veto.


title: Waterboarding

text: On 22 January 2009, President Barack Obama signed Executive Order 13491, which requires both U.S. military and paramilitary organizations to use the Army Field Manual as the guide on getting information from prisoners, moving away from the Bush administration tactics.


title: Waterboarding

text: While waterboarding has been depicted in several films and demonstrated at protest gatherings, images of its actual use are scarce. The CIA allegedly destroyed all videos it made of the procedure. The 1968 "Washington Post" photo of a captured North Vietnamese soldier being interrogated is arguably different because instead of being strapped to a board, the prisoner is held down by two soldiers as a third pours water from a canteen over a cloth covering face.


title: Waterboarding

text: One eyewitness depiction of waterboarding is a painting by Vann Nath, a Cambodian artist who was held captive and tortured by the Khmer Rouge. After his release in 1979 from Tuol Sleng Prison, he began to paint pictures of the abusive practices used there, including waterboarding, to let people know about them, saying of the prisoners he heard screaming for help: "I would like their souls to get something from what I paint."


title: Waterboarding

text: One of his waterboarding paintings depicts a sparse room with a man affixed to a board by iron bars. A cloth covers his head. Another man pours water from a watering can over his face. A similar board and watering can are on display at the Tuol Sleng Genocide Museum. "Waterboarding of Abu Zubaydah", a drawing by , has been exhibited at the Institute of Oriental Studies of the Russian Academy of Sciences, DePaul University, Brecht Forum, The Graduate Center, CUNY, and Palace of Culture and Science.


title: Waterboarding

text: In 2008, the "Coney Island waterboarding thrill ride" went on display in Coney Island amusement park: viewers would see two models, one a captive wearing an orange uniform who was spread-eagled on a tilted table, the other one a masked interrogator. When viewers inserted a dollar the interrogator figure would pour water onto a rag over the captive figures' nose and throat, upon which the captive figure would start convulsing.


title: Mahdi

text: The Mahdi () is a messianic figure in Islamic eschatology who is believed to appear at the end of times to rid the world of evil and injustice. He is said to be a descendant of Muhammad who will appear shortly before the prophet ʿĪsā (Jesus) and lead Muslims to rule the world.


title: Mahdi

text: Though the Mahdi is not referenced in the Quran, and is absent from several canonical compilations of hadith – including the two most-revered Sunni hadith collections: "Sahih al-Bukhari" and "Sahih Muslim" – he is mentioned in other hadith literature. The doctrine of the mahdi seems to have gained traction during the confusion and unrest of the religious and political upheavals of the first and second centuries of Islam. Among the first references to the Mahdi appear in the late 7th century, when the revolutionary Mukhtar ibn Abi Ubayd () declared Muhammad ibn al-Hanafiyya, a son of caliph Ali (), to be the Mahdi. Although the concept of a Mahdi is not an essential doctrine in Islam, it is popular among Muslims. It has been a part of the "ʿaqīdah" (creed) of Muslims for 1,400 years. Over centuries, there have been a vast number of Mahdi claimants.


title: Mahdi

text: The Mahdi features in both Shi'a and Sunni branches of Islam, though they differ extensively on his attributes and status. Among Twelver Shi'as, the Mahdi is believed to be Muhammad al-Mahdi, son of the eleventh Imam, Hasan al-Askari (), who is said to have been in occultation () by divine will. This is rejected by most Sunnis, who assert that the Mahdi has not been born yet.


title: Mahdi

text: The term "Mahdi" is derived from the Arabic root "h-d-y" (), commonly used to mean "divine guidance". Although the root appears in the Qur'an at multiple places and in various contexts, the word "Mahdi" never occurs in the book.


title: Mahdi

text: The associated verb is "hada", which means to guide. However, "Mahdi" can be read in active voice, where it means the one who guides, as well as passive voice, where it means the one who is guided.


title: Mahdi

text: In the doctrinal sense, Mahdi is the title of the end-times eschatological redeemer in most Islamic sects.


title: Mahdi

text: Some historians suggest that the term itself was probably introduced into Islam by southern Arabian tribes who had settled in Syria in the mid-7th century. They believed that the Mahdi would lead them back to their homeland and re-establish the Himyarite Kingdom. They also believed that he would eventually conquer Constantinople. It has also been suggested that the concept of the Mahdi may have been derived from earlier messianic Judeo-Christian beliefs. Accordingly, traditions were introduced to support certain political interests, especially anti-Abbasid sentiments. These traditions about the Mahdi appeared only at later times in "ḥadīth" collections such as "Jami' at-Tirmidhi" and "Sunan Abu Dawud", but are absent from the early works of Bukhari and Muslim.


title: Mahdi

text: The term "al-Mahdi" was employed from the beginning of Islam, but only as an honorific epithet ("the guide") and without any messianic significance. As an honorific, it was used in some instances to describe Muhammad (by Hassan ibn Thabit), Abraham, al-Husayn, and various Umayyad caliphs (, ). During the Second Muslim Civil War (680–692), after the death of Mu'awiya I (), the term acquired a new meaning of a ruler who would restore Islam to its perfect form and restore justice after oppression. Abd Allah ibn al-Zubayr, who laid claim to the caliphate against the Umayyads and found temporary success during the civil war, presented himself in this role. Although the title Mahdi was not applied to him, his career as the anti-caliph significantly influenced the future development of the concept. A hadith was promulgated in which Muhammad prophecies the coming of a just ruler. Refusing to recognize the new caliph, Yazid I (), after Mu'awiya's death in 680, Ibn al-Zubayr had fled to the Meccan sanctuary. From there he launched anti-Umayyad propaganda, calling for a of the Quraysh to elect a new caliph. Those opposed to the Umayyads were paying him homage and asking for the public proclamation of his caliphate, forcing Yazid to send an army to dislodge him in 683. After defeating rebels in the nearby Medina, the army besieged Mecca but was forced to withdraw as a result of Yazid's sudden death shortly afterward. Ibn al-Zubayr was recognized caliph in Arabia, Iraq, and parts of Syria, where Yazid's son and successor Mu'awiya II () held power in Damascus and adjoining areas. The hadith hoped to enlist support against an expected Umayyad campaign from Syria. The Umayyads did indeed send another army to Mecca in 692, but contrary to the hadith's prediction was successful in removing Ibn al-Zubayr. The hadith lost relevance soon afterward, but resurfaced in the Basran hadith circles a generation later, this time removed from its original context and understood as referring to a future restorer.


title: Mahdi

text: Around the time when Ibn al-Zubayr was trying to expand his dominion, the pro-Alid revolutionary al-Mukhtar al-Thaqafi took control of the Iraqi garrison town of Kufa in the name of Ali's son Muhammad ibn al-Hanafiyya, whom he proclaimed as the Mahdi in the messianic sense. The association of the name Muhammad with the Mahdi seems to have originated with Ibn al-Hanafiyya, who also shared the epithet Abu al-Qasim with Muhammad, the Islamic prophet. Among the Umayyads, the caliph Sulayman ibn Abd al-Malik () encouraged the belief that he was the Mahdi, and other Umayyad rulers, like Umar II (), have been addressed as such in the panegyrics of Jarir (d. 728) and al-Farazdaq (d. 728–730).


title: Mahdi

text: Early discussions about the identity of the Mahdi by religious scholars can be traced back to the time after the Second Fitna. These discussions developed in different directions and were influenced by traditions (hadith) attributed to Muhammad. In Umayyad times, scholars and traditionists not only differed on which caliph or rebel leader should be designated as Mahdi but also on whether the Mahdi is a messianic figure and if signs and predictions of his time had been satisfied. In Medina, among the conservative religious circles, the belief in Umar II being the Mahdi was widespread. Said ibn al-Musayyib (d. 715) is said to identify Umar II as the Mahdi long before his reign. The Basran, Abu Qilabah, supported the view that Umar II was the Mahdi. Hasan al-Basri (d. 728) opposed the concept of a Muslim Messiah but believed that if there was the Mahdi, it was Umar II.


title: Mahdi

text: By the time of the Abbasid Revolution in 750, Mahdi was already a known concept. Evidence shows that the first Abbasid caliph Saffah () assumed the title of "the Mahdi" for himself.


title: Mahdi

text: In Shi'a Islam, the eschatological Mahdi was commonly given the epithet al-Qa'im (), which can be translated as 'he who will rise,' signifying his rise against tyranny in the end of time. Distinctively Shi'a is the notion of temporary absence or occultation of the Mahdi, whose life has been prolonged by divine will. An intimately related Shi'a notion is that of (), which often means the return to life of (some) Shi'a Imams, particularly Husayn ibn Ali, to exact their revenge on their oppressors.


title: Mahdi

text: Traditions that predicted the occultation and rise of a future imam were already in circulation for a century before the death of the eleventh Imam in 260 (874 CE), and possibly as early as the seventh-century CE. These traditions were appropriated by various Shi'a sects in different periods, including the now-extinct sects of Nawusites and Waqifites. For instance, these traditions were cited by the now-extinct Kaysanites, who denied the death of Ibn al-Hanafiyya, and held that he was in hiding in the Razwa mountains near Medina. This likely originated with two groups of his supporters, namely, southern Arabian settlers and local recent converts in Iraq, who seem to have spread the notions now known as occultation and . Later on, these traditions were also employed by the Waqifites to argue that Musa al-Kazim, the seventh Imam, had not died but was in occultation.


title: Mahdi

text: In parallel, traditions predicting the occultation of a future imam also persisted in the writings of the mainstream Shi'a, who later formed the Twelvers. Based on this material, the Twelver doctrine of occultation crystallized in the first half of the fourth (tenth) century, in the works of Ibrahim al-Qummi (), Ya'qub al-Kulayni (), and Ibn Babawayh (), among others. This period also saw a transition in Twelver arguments from a traditionist to a rationalist approach in order to vindicate the occultation of the twelfth Imam.


title: Mahdi

text: The Twelver authors also aim to establish that the description of Mahdi in Sunni sources applies to the twelfth Imam. Their efforts gained momentum in the seventh (thirteenth) century when some notable Sunni scholars endorsed the Shi'a view of the Mahdi, including the Shafi'i traditionist Muhammad ibn Yusuf al-Gandji. Since then, Amir-Moezzi writes, there is Sunni support from time to time for the Twelvers' view of Mahdi. There has also been some support for the mahdiship of the twelfth Imam in Sufi circles, for instance, by the Egyptian Sufi al-Sha'rani"."


title: Mahdi

text: Before the rise of the Fatimid Caliphate, as a major Isma'ili Shi'a dynasty, the terms Mahdi and Qa'im were used interchangeably for the messianic imam anticipated in Shi'a traditions. With the rise of the Fatimids in the tenth century CE, however, al-Qadi al-Nu'man argued that some of these predictions had materialized by the first Fatimid caliph, Abdallah al-Mahdi Billah, while the rest would be fulfilled by his successors. Henceforth, their literature referred to the awaited eschatological imam only as Qa'im (instead of Mahdi). In Zaydi view, imams are not endowed with superhuman qualities, and expectations for their mahdiship are thus often marginal. One exception is the now-extinct Husaynites in Yemen, who denied the death of al-Husayn ibn al-Qasim al-Iyani and awaited his return.


title: Mahdi

text: In Sunni Islam, the Mahdi doctrine is not theologically important and remains as a popular belief instead. Of the six canonical Sunni hadith compilations, only three—"Abu Dawood", "Ibn Maja", and "Tirmidhi"—contain traditions on the Mahdi; the compilations of "Bukhari" and "Muslim"—considered the most authoritative by the Sunnis and the earliest of the six—do not, nor does "Nasai". Some Sunnis, including the philosopher and historian Ibn Khaldun (d. 1406), and reportedly also Hasan al-Basri (d. 728), an influential early theologian and exegete, deny the Mahdi being a separate figure, holding that Jesus will fulfill this role and judge over mankind; "Mahdi" is thus considered a title for Jesus when he returns. Others, like the historian and the Qur'an commentator Ibn Kathir (d. 1373), elaborated a whole apocalyptic scenario which includes prophecies about the Mahdi, Jesus, and the Dajjal (the antichrist) during the end times.


title: Mahdi

text: The common opinion among the Sunnis is that the Mahdi is an expected ruler to be sent by God before the end times to re-establish righteousness. He is held to be from among the descendants of Muhammad through his daughter Fatima and her husband Ali, and his physical characteristics including a broad forehead and curved nose. He will eradicate injustice and evil from the world. He will be from the Hasanid branch of Muhammad's descendants, as opposed to the Shi'a belief that he is of the Husaynid line. The Mahdi's name would be Muhammad and his father's name would be Abd Allah. Abu Dawood quotes Muhammad as saying: "The Mahdi will be from my family, from the descendants of Fatimah". Another hadith states: Even if only one day remains [until the doomsday], God will lengthen this day until He calls forth a man from me, or from the family of my house, his name matching mine and his father's name matching that of my father. He will fill the Earth with equity and justice just as it had previously been filled with injustice and oppression.


title: Mahdi

text: Before the arrival of the Mahdi, the earth would be filled with anarchy and chaos. Divisions and civil wars, moral degradation, and worldliness would be prevalent among the Muslims. Injustice and oppression would be rampant in the world. In the aftermath of the death of a king, the people would quarrel among themselves, and the as yet unrecognized Mahdi would flee from Medina to Mecca to take refuge in the Ka'ba. Against his will, would the Mahdi be recognized as ruler by the people. The Dajjal would appear and will spread corruption in the world. With an army bearing black banners, which would come to his aid from the east, the Mahdi would confront the Dajjal, but would be unable to defeat him. Dressed in saffron robes with his head anointed, Jesus would descend at the point of a white minaret of the Umayyad Mosque in eastern Damascus and join the Mahdi. Jesus would pray behind the Mahdi and then kill the Dajjal. The Gog and Magog would also appear wreaking havoc before their final defeat by the forces of Jesus. Although not as significant as the Dajjal and the Gog and Magog, the Sufyani, another representative of the forces of dark, also features in the Sunni traditions. He will rise in Syria before the appearance of Mahdi. When the latter appears, the Sufyani, along with his army, will either be swallowed up en-route to Mecca by the earth with God's command or defeated by the Mahdi. Jesus and the Mahdi will then conquer the world and establish caliphate. The Mahdi will die after 7 to 13 years, whereas Jesus after 40 years. Their deaths would be followed by reappearance of corruption before the final end of the world.


title: Mahdi

text: In Twelver Shi'ism, the largest Shi'i branch, the belief in the messianic imam is not merely a part of creed, but the pivot. For the Twelver Shi'a, the Mahdi was born but disappeared, and would remain hidden from humanity until he reappears to bring justice to the world in the end of time, a doctrine known as the Occultation. This imam in occultation is the twelfth imam, Muhammad, son of the eleventh imam, Hasan al-Askari. According to the Twelvers, the Mahdi was born in Samarra around 868, though his birth was kept hidden from the public. He lived under his father's care until 874 when the latter was killed by the Abbasids.


title: Mahdi

text: When his father died in 874, possibly poisoned by the Abbasids, the Mahdi went into occultation by the divine command and was hidden from public view for his life was in danger from the Abbasids. Only a few of the elite among the Shi'a, known as the deputies (, ; sing. ) of the twelfth imam, were able to communicate with him; hence the occultation in this period is referred to as the Minor Occultation ().


title: Mahdi

text: The first of the deputies is held to have been Uthman ibn Sa'id al-Amri, a trusted companion and confidant of the eleventh imam. Through him the Mahdi would answer the demands and questions of the Shi'a. He was later succeeded by his son Muhammad ibn Uthman al-Amri, who held the office for some fifty years and died in 917. His successor Husayn ibn Rawh al-Nawbakhti was in the office until his death in 938. The next deputy, Ali ibn Muhammad al-Simari, abolished the office on the orders of the imam just a few days before his death in 941.


title: Mahdi

text: With the death of the fourth agent, thus began the Major Occultation (, ), in which the communication between the Mahdi and the faithful was severed. The leadership vacuum in the Twelver community was gradually filled by jurists. During the Major Occultation, the Mahdi roams the earth and is sustained by God. He is the lord of the time ( ) and does not age. Although his whereabouts and the exact date of his return are unknown, the Mahdi is nevertheless believed to contact some of his Shi'a if he wishes. The accounts of these encounters are numerous and widespread in the Twelver community. Shi'a scholars have argued that the longevity of the Mahdi is not unreasonable given the long lives of Khidr, Jesus, and the Dajjal, as well as secular reports about long-lived men. Along these lines, Tabatabai emphasizes the miraculous qualities of al-Mahdi, adding that his long life, while unlikely, is not impossible. He is viewed as the sole legitimate ruler of the Muslim world and the constitution of the Islamic Republic of Iran recognizes him as the head of the state.


title: Mahdi

text: Before his reappearance (, ), the world will plunge into chaos, where immorality and ignorance will be commonplace, the Qur'an will be forgotten, and religion will be abandoned. There will be plagues, earthquakes, floods, wars and death. The Sufyani will rise and lead people astray. The Mahdi will then reappear in Mecca, with the sword of Ali () in his hand, between the corner of the Ka'ba and the station of Abraham.


title: Mahdi

text: By some accounts, he will reappear on the day of (tenth of Muharram), the day the third Shi'a imam Husayn ibn Ali was slain. He will be "a young man of medium stature with a handsome face," with black hair and beard. A divine cry will call the people of the world to his aid, after which the angels, jinns, and humans will flock to the Mahdi. This is often followed shortly by another supernatural cry from the earth that invites men to join the enemies of the Mahdi, and would appeal to disbelievers and hypocrites.


title: Mahdi

text: The Mahdi will then go to Kufa, which will become his capital, and send troops to kill the Sufyani in Damascus. Husayn and his slain partisans are expected to resurrect to avenge their deaths, known as the doctrine of (). The episode of Jesus' return in the Twelver doctrine is similar to the Sunni belief, although in some Twelver traditions it is the Mahdi who would kill the Dajjal. Those who hold enmity towards Ali ibn Abi Talib (, s) will be subject to (poll tax) or killed if they do not accept Shi'ism.


title: Mahdi

text: The Mahdi is also viewed as the restorer of true Islam, and the restorer of other monotheistic religions after their distortion and abandonment. He establishes the kingdom of God on earth and Islamizes the whole world. In their true form, it is believed, all monotheistic religions are essentially identical to Islam as "submission to God." It is in this sense, according to Amir-Moezzi, that one should understand the claims that al-Mahdi will impose Islam on everyone. His rule will be paradise on earth, which will last for seventy years until his death, though other traditions state 7, 19, or 309 years.


title: Mahdi

text: In Isma'ilism a distinct concept of the Mahdi developed, with select Isma'ili imams representing the Mahdi or al-Qa'im at various times. When the sixth Shi'a imam Ja'far al-Sadiq died, some of his followers held his already dead son Isma'il ibn Ja'far to be the imam asserting that he was alive and will return as the Mahdi. Another group accepted his death and acknowledged his son Muhammad ibn Isma'il as the imam instead. When he died, his followers too denied his death and believed that he was the last imam and the Mahdi. By the mid-9th century, Isma'ili groups of different persuasions had coalesced into a unified movement centered in Salamiyya in central Syria, and a network of activists was working to collect funds and amass weapons for the return of the Mahdi Muhammad ibn Isma'il, who would overthrow the Abbasids and establish his righteous caliphate. The propaganda of the Mahdi's return had a special appeal to peasants, Bedouins, and many of the later-to-be Twelver Shi'is, who were in a state of confusion () in the aftermath of the death of their 11th imam Hasan al-Askari, and resulted in many conversions.


title: Mahdi

text: In 899, the leader of the movement, Abd Allah ibn al-Husayn, declared himself the Mahdi. This brought about schism in the unified Isma'ili community as not all adherents of the movement accepted his Mahdist claims. Those in Iraq and Arabia, known as Qarmatians after their leader Hamdan Qarmat, still held that Muhammad ibn Isma'il was the awaited Mahdi and denounced the Salamiyya-based Mahdism. In the Qarmati doctrine, the Mahdi was to abrogate the Islamic law (the Sharia) and bring forth a new message. In 931, the then Qarmati leader Abu Tahir al-Jannabi declared a Persian prisoner named Abu'l-Fadl al-Isfahani as the awaited Mahdi. The Mahdi went on to denounce Moses, Jesus, and Muhammad as liars, abolished Islam, and instituted the cult of fire. Abu Tahir had to depose him as imposter and had him executed. Meanwhile in Syria, Abd Allah al-Mahdi's partisans took control of the central Syria in 903 before they were routed by the Abbasids. He now went to North Africa and founded the Fatimid Caliphate in Qayrawan in 909. Messianic expectations associated with the Mahdi nevertheless did not materialize, contrary to the expectations of his propagandists and followers who expected him to do wonders. He attempted to downplay messianism and asserted that the propaganda of Muhammad ibn Isma'il's return as the Mahdi had only been a ruse to avoid Abbasid persecution and protect the real imam predecessors of his. The Mahdi was actually a collective title of the true imams from the progeny of Ja'far al-Sadiq. He later branded as the Mahdi his son, who had the name as was expected of the Mahdi—Muhammad ibn Abd Allah. The Fatimids eventually dropped the millenarian rhetoric.


title: Mahdi

text: In Zaydism, the concept of imamate is different from the Isma'ili and Twelver branches; a Zaydi Imam is any respectable person from the descendants of Ali and Fatima who lays claim to political leadership and struggles for its acquisition. As such, the Zaydi imamate doctrine lacks eschatological characteristics and there is no end-times redeemer in Zaydism. The title of mahdi has been applied to several Zaydi imams as an honorific over the centuries.


title: Mahdi

text: In the Ahmadiyya belief, the prophesied eschatological figures of Christianity and Islam, the Messiah and Mahdi, actually refer to the same person. These prophecies were fulfilled in Mirza Ghulam Ahmad (1835–1908), the founder of the movement; he is held to be the Mahdi and the manifestation of Jesus. However, the historical Jesus in their view, although escaped crucifixion, nevertheless died and will not be coming back. Instead, God made Mirza Ghulam Ahmad the exact alike of Jesus in character and qualities. Similarly, the Mahdi is not an apocalyptic figure to launch global jihad and conquer the world, but a peaceful (renewer of religion), who spreads Islam with "heavenly signs and arguments".


title: Mahdi

text: Throughout history, various individuals have claimed to be or were proclaimed to be the Mahdi. Claimants have included Muhammad Jaunpuri, the founder of the Mahdavia sect; Ali Muhammad Shirazi, the founder of Bábism; Muhammad Ahmad, who established the Mahdist State in Sudan in the late 19th century. The Iranian dissident Massoud Rajavi, the leader of the MEK, also claimed to be a 'representative' of the Mahdi. The adherents of the Nation of Islam hold Wallace Fard Muhammad, the founder of the movement, to be the Messiah and the Mahdi. Adnan Oktar, a Turkish cult leader, is considered by his followers as the Mahdi.


title: Mahdi

text: Ibn Khaldun noted a pattern where embracing a Mahdi claimant enabled unity among tribes and/or a region, often enabled them to forcibly seize power, but the lifespan of such a force was usually limited, as their Mahdi had to conform to hadith prophesies – winning their battles and bringing peace and justice to the world before Judgement Day – which (so far) none have.


title: Men at Work

text: Men at Work are an Australian rock band formed in Melbourne in 1978 and best known for breakthrough hits such as "Down Under", "Who Can It Be Now?", "Be Good Johnny", "Overkill", and "It's a Mistake". Its founding member and frontman is Colin Hay, who performs on lead vocals and guitar. After playing as an acoustic duo with Ron Strykert during 1978–1979, Hay formed the group with Strykert playing bass guitar and Jerry Speiser on drums. They were soon joined by Greg Ham on flute, saxophone, and keyboards and John Rees on bass guitar, with Strykert switching back to lead guitar. The group was managed by Russell Depeller, a friend of Hay, whom he met at La Trobe University. This line-up achieved national and international success during the early to mid 1980s.


title: Men at Work

text: In January 1983, they were the first Australian artists to have a simultaneous No. 1 album and No. 1 single on the United States "Billboard" charts: "Business as Usual" (released on 9 November 1981) and "Down Under" (1981), respectively. With the same works, they achieved the distinction of a simultaneous No. 1 album and No. 1 single on the Australian, New Zealand, and United Kingdom charts. Their second album "Cargo" (2 May 1983) was also No. 1 in Australia, No. 2 in New Zealand, No. 3 in the US, and No. 8 in the UK. Their third album "Two Hearts" (3 April 1985) reached the top 20 in Australia and top 50 in the US.


title: Men at Work

text: They won the Grammy Award for Best New Artist in 1983, they were inducted into the ARIA Hall of Fame in 1994, and they have sold over 30 million albums worldwide. In May 2001, "Down Under" was listed at No. 4 on the APRA Top 30 Australian songs and "Business as Usual" appeared in the book "100 Best Australian Albums" (October 2010).


title: Men at Work

text: In 1984, Speiser and Rees were asked to leave the group, leaving Hay, Ham, and Strykert. During the recording of the "Two Hearts" album, Strykert decided to leave. Soon after the release of "Two Hearts", Ham left also, leaving Hay as the sole remaining member. From 1996 until 2002 Hay and Ham toured the world as Men at Work. On 19 April 2012, Ham was found dead at his home from an apparent heart attack.


title: Men at Work

text: In 2019, Hay revived the Men at Work moniker and began touring with the assistance of a backing band including none of the other original members.


title: Men at Work

text: The nucleus of Men at Work formed in Melbourne around June 1979 with Colin Hay on lead vocals and guitar, Ron Strykert on bass guitar, and Jerry Speiser on drums. They were soon joined by Greg Ham on flute, sax and keyboards, and then John Rees on bass guitar, with Strykert switching to lead guitar. Hay had emigrated to Australia in 1967 from Scotland with his family. In 1978, he had formed an acoustic duo with Strykert, which expanded by mid-1979 with the addition of Speiser. Around this time as a side project, keyboardist Greg Sneddon (ex-Alroy Band). a former bandmate of Jerry Speiser, together with Speiser, Hay and Strykert performed and recorded the music to 'Riff Raff", a low budget stage musical, upon which Sneddon had worked.


title: Men at Work

text: Hay asked Greg Ham to join the group, but Ham hesitated, as he was finishing his music degree. Ultimately, he decided to join the band in October 1979. John Rees, a friend of Jerry, joined soon after. The name Men At Work was thrown into the hat by Colin Hay, and was seconded by Ron Strykert, when a name was required to put on the blackboard outside The Cricketer's Arms Hotel, Richmond. The band built a "grass roots" reputation as a pub rock band. In 1980, the group issued their debut single, "Keypunch Operator" backed by "Down Under", with both tracks co-written by Hay and Strykert. It was "self-financed" and appeared on their own independent, M. A. W. label. Australian musicologist, Ian McFarlane, felt the A-side was "a fast-paced country-styled rocker with a clean sound and quirky rhythm". Despite not appearing in the top 100 on the Australian Kent Music Report Singles Chart, by the end of that year the group had "grown in stature to become the most in-demand and highly paid, unsigned band of the year".


title: Men at Work

text: Early in 1981 Men at Work signed with CBS Records, the Australian branch of CBS Records International, (which became Sony Music) on the recommendation of Peter Karpin, the label's A&R person. The group's first single with CBS Records in Australia "Who Can It Be Now?", was released in June 1981 which reached No. 2 and remained in the chart for 24 weeks. It had been produced by United States-based Peter McIan, who was also working on their debut album, "Business as Usual".


title: Men at Work

text: McIan, together with the band worked on the arrangements for all the songs that appeared on "Business As Usual". Their next single was a re-arranged and "popified" version of "Down Under". It appeared in October that year and reached No. 1 in November, where it remained for six weeks. "Business as Usual" was also released in October and went to No. 1 on the Australian Kent Music Report Albums Chart, spending a total of nine weeks at the top spot. "The Canberra Times" Garry Raffaele opined that it "generally stays at a high level, tight and jerky ... There is a delicacy about this music — and that is not a thing you can say about too many rock groups. The flute and reeds of Greg Ham do much to further that". McFarlane noted that "[a]side from the strength of the music, part of the album's appeal was its economy. The production sound was low-key, but clean and uncluttered. Indeed, the songs stood by themselves with little embellishment save for a bright, melodic, singalong quality".


title: Men at Work

text: By February the following year both "Down Under" and "Business as Usual" had reached No. 1 on the respective Official New Zealand Music Charts – the latter was the first Australian album to reach that peak in New Zealand. Despite its strong Australian and New Zealand showing, and having an American producer (McIan), "Business as Usual" was twice rejected by Columbia's US parent company. Thanks to the persistence of Russell Depeller and Karpin, the album was finally released in the US and the United Kingdom in April 1982 – six months after its Australian release. Their next single, "Be Good Johnny", was issued in Australia in April 1982 and reached No. 8 in Australia, and No. 3 in New Zealand.


title: Men at Work

text: Men at Work initially broke through to North American audiences in the western provinces of Canada with "Who Can It Be Now?" hitting the top 10 on radio stations in Winnipeg by May 1982. It peaked at No. 8 on the Canadian "RPM" Top Singles Chart in July. In August the group toured Canada and the US to promote the album and related singles, supporting Fleetwood Mac. The band became more popular on Canadian radio in the following months and also started receiving top 40 US airplay by August. In October "Who Can It Be Now?" reached No. 1 on the US "Billboard" Hot 100, while Canada was one single ahead with "Down Under" topping the Canadian charts that same month. In the following month "Business as Usual" began a 15-week run at No. 1 on the "Billboard" 200.


title: Men at Work

text: While "Who Can It Be Now?" was still in the top ten in the US, "Down Under" was finally released in that market. It entered the US charts at No. 79 and ten weeks later, it was No. 1. By January 1983 Men at Work had the top album and single in both the US and the UK – never previously achieved by an Australian act. "Be Good Johnny" received moderate airplay in the US; it reached the top 20 in Canada.


title: Men at Work

text: "Down Under" gained international media exposure in September 1983 through television coverage of the Australian challenge for the America's Cup yacht trophy in September 1983 when it was adopted as the theme song by the crew of the successful "Australia II".


title: Men at Work

text: The band released their second album, "Cargo", in April 1983, which also peaked at No. 1 – for two weeks – on the Australian charts. In New Zealand it reached No. 2. It had been finished in mid-1982 with McIan producing again, but was held back due to the success of their debut album on the international market, where "Business as Usual" was still riding high. "Cargo" appeared at No. 3 on the "Billboard" 200, and No. 8 in the UK. The lead single, "Overkill", was issued in Australia ahead of the album in October 1982 and reached No. 6, it peaked at No. 3 in the US. "Dr. Heckyll & Mr. Jive" followed in March 1983 made it to No. 5 in Australia, and No. 28 in the US. "It's a Mistake" reached No. 6 in the US. The band toured the world extensively in 1983.


title: Men at Work

text: In 1984, long standing tensions between Hay and Speiser led to a split in the band. Both Rees and Speiser were told they were "not required", as Hay, Ham and Strykert used session musicians to record their third album, "Two Hearts" (23 April 1985). Hay later attributed the firing to a dispute over the band's manager, Russell Deppler, stating, "The rhythm section got sacked because they wanted to sack the manager, who was my friend." Speiser opined, "Russell was good for hustling gigs in Melbourne and Sydney but once the band became international and multi-million, the sheep farmer from Warrnambool had no idea." Studio musicians included Jeremy Alsop on bass guitar (ex-Ram Band, Pyramid, Broderick Smith Band); and Mark Kennedy on drums (Spectrum, Ayers Rock, Marcia Hines Band). "Two Hearts" was produced by Hay and Ham. It was a critical and commercial failure compared to their previous albums and only peaked at No. 16 in Australia, and No. 50 on the US chart. Strykert had left during its production.


title: Men at Work

text: Four tracks were released as singles, "Everything I Need" (May 1985), "Man with Two Hearts", "Maria" (August), and "Hard Luck Story" (October); only the lead single charted in Australia (No. 37) and the US (No. 47). The album relied heavily on drum machines and synthesisers, and reduced the presence of Ham's saxophone, giving it a different feel compared to its predecessors. Hay and Ham hired new bandmates, to tour in support of "Two Hearts", with Alsop and Kennedy joined by James Black on guitar and keyboards (Mondo Rock, The Black Sorrows). Soon after a third guitarist, Colin Bayley (Mi-Sex), was added and Kennedy was replaced on drums by Chad Wackerman (Frank Zappa). Australian singers Kate Ceberano and Renée Geyer had also worked on the album and performed live as guest vocalists.


title: Men at Work

text: On 13 July 1985 Men at Work performed three tracks for the Oz for Africa concert (part of the global Live Aid program)—"Maria", "Overkill", and an unreleased one, "The Longest Night". They were broadcast in Australia (on both Seven Network and Nine Network) and on MTV in the US. "Maria" and "Overkill" were also broadcast by American Broadcasting Company (ABC) during their Live Aid telecast. Ham left during the band's time touring behind the album. The final Men at Work performances during 1985 had jazz saxophonist Paul Williamson (The Black Sorrows), replacing Ham. By early 1986 the band was defunct and Hay started recording his first solo album, "Looking for Jack" (January 1987), which had Alsop and Wackerman as session musicians.


title: Men at Work

text: By mid-1996, after a ten-year absence, Hay and Ham reformed Men at Work to tour South America. They had enjoyed strong fan support there during their earlier career and demands for a reunion had persisted. The 1996 line up had Stephen Hadley on bass guitar and backing vocals (ex-The Black Sorrows, Paul Kelly Band); Simon Hosford on guitar and backing vocals (Colin Hay backing band); and John Watson on drums (The Black Sorrows). The tour culminated in a performance in São Paulo, which was recorded for the Brazilian release of a live album, "Brazil '96", in 1997, which was co-produced by Hay and Ham for Sony Music. It was re-released worldwide in 1998 as "Brazil" with a bonus track, "The Longest Night", the first new studio track since "Two Hearts".


title: Men at Work

text: In 1997 drummer Tony Floyd replaced Watson but by 1998 the lineup was Hay, Ham, James Ryan (guitar, backing vocals), Rick Grossman (of the Hoodoo Gurus) on bass and Peter Maslen (ex-Boom Crash Opera) on drums. In 1999 Ryan, Grossman and Maslen were out and Hosford and Floyd were back in, along with bassist Stuart Speed. Rodrigo Aravena was brought in on bass in 2000, along with Heta Moses on drums. Moses was replaced by Warren Trout in 2001 as Stephen Hadley returned on bass.


title: Men at Work

text: The band toured Australia, South America, Europe and the US from 1998 to 2000. Men at Work performed "Down Under" at the closing ceremony of the 2000 Summer Olympics in Sydney, alongside Paul Hogan of ""Crocodile" Dundee" (1986).


title: Men at Work

text: One of their European tours for mid-2000 was cancelled and the group had disbanded by 2002, although Hay and Ham periodically reunited Men at Work with guest musicians (including an appearance in February 2009, when they performed "Down Under" as a duo at the Australia Unites Victorian Bushfire Appeal Telethon).


title: Men at Work

text: In February 2010 Larrikin Music Publishing won a case against Hay and Strykert, their record label (Sony BMG Music Entertainment) and music publishing company (EMI Songs Australia) arising from the uncredited appropriation of "Kookaburra", originally written in 1932 by Marion Sinclair and for which Larrikin owned the publishing rights, as the flute line in the Men at Work song, "Down Under". Back in early 2009 the Australian music-themed TV quiz, "Spicks and Specks", had posed a question which suggested that "Down Under" contained elements of "Kookaburra".


title: Men at Work

text: Larrikin, then headed by Norman Lurie, filed suit after Larrikin was sold to another company and had demanded between 40% and 60% of the previous six years of earnings from the song. In February 2010 the judge ruled that "Down Under" did contain a flute riff based on "Kookaburra" but stipulated that neither was it necessarily the hook nor a substantial part of the hit song (Hay and Strykert had written the track years before the flute riff was added by Ham). In July 2010 a judge ruled that Larrikin should be paid 5% of past (since 2002) and future profits. Ham took the verdict particularly hard, feeling responsible for having performed the flute riff at the centre of the lawsuit and worried that he would only be remembered for copying someone else's music, resulting in depression and anxiety. Ham's body was found in his Carlton North home on 19 April 2012 after he suffered a fatal heart attack at age 58.


title: Men at Work

text: In June 2019, Hay toured Europe with a group of Los Angeles-based session musicians under the name Men at Work, despite the band featuring no other original members of the band.


title: Men at Work

text: In 2021, Australian producer Christian 'Luude' Benson (from the Tasmanian tech house dance duo Choomba) remixed "Down Under" as a drum and bass track, which became popular online. Hay re-recorded the vocal for the track's official release, now credited to Luude featuring Colin Hay, with the record charting at number 32 on the UK Singles chart on 7 January 2022 and at number 48 in Australia (on the ARIA Top 50 Singles for the week of 10 January 2022).


title: Men at Work

text: Hay maintained a solo career and played with Ringo Starr & His All-Starr Band. Strykert relocated to Hobart in 2009 from Los Angeles, and continued to play music and released his first solo album, "Paradise", in September that year. He expressed resentment towards Hay, mainly over royalties. Ham remained musically active and played sax with the Melbourne-based group The Nudist Funk Orchestra until his death. Rees was a music teacher in Melbourne and also played the violin and bass guitar for the band Beggs 2 Differ. Speiser played drums for the band The Afterburner.


title: Men at Work

text: The ARIA Music Awards is an annual awards ceremony that recognises excellence, innovation, and achievement across all genres of Australian music. They commenced in 1987. Men at Work were inducted into the Hall of Fame in 1994.


title: Men at Work

text: "Countdown" is an Australian pop music TV series that aired on national broadcaster ABC-TV from 1974 to 1987, it presented music awards from 1979 to 1987, initially in conjunction with magazine "TV Week". The TV Week / Countdown Awards were a combination of popular-voted and peer-voted awards.


title: Men at Work

text: In August 1983 they were given a Crystal Globe Award for $100 million worth of record business by their US label. That same year in Canada they were awarded a Juno Award for "International LP of the Year". Men at Work has sold over 30 million albums worldwide.


title: Men at Work

text: On 28 May 2001 "Down Under" was listed at No. 4 on the APRA Top 30 Australian songs. In October 2010, "Business as Usual" was listed in the book, "100 Best Australian Albums".


title: Erasmus

text: Desiderius Erasmus Roterodamus (; ; English: Erasmus of Rotterdam or Erasmus; 28 October 1466 – 12 July 1536) was a Dutch philosopher and Catholic theologian who is considered one of the greatest scholars of the northern Renaissance. As a Catholic priest, he was an important figure in classical scholarship who wrote in a pure Latin style. Among humanists he was given the sobriquet "Prince of the Humanists", and has been called "the crowning glory of the Christian humanists". Using humanist techniques for working on texts, he prepared important new Latin and Greek editions of the New Testament, which raised questions that would be influential in the Protestant Reformation and Catholic Counter-Reformation. He also wrote "On Free Will," "In Praise of Folly", "Handbook of a Christian Knight", "On Civility in Children", "", "Julius Exclusus", and many other works.


title: Erasmus

text: Erasmus lived against the backdrop of the growing European religious Reformation. He remained a member of the Catholic Church all his life, remaining committed to reforming the Church and its clerics' abuses from within. He also held to the doctrine of synergism, which some Reformers (Calvinists) rejected in favor of the doctrine of monergism. His middle-road () approach disappointed, and even angered, scholars in both camps.


title: Erasmus

text: Erasmus died suddenly in Basel in 1536 while preparing to return to Brabant and was buried in Basel Minster, the former cathedral of the city.


title: Erasmus

text: Desiderius Erasmus is reported to have been born in Rotterdam on 28 October in the late 1460s, probably 1466. He was named after Saint Erasmus of Formiae, whom Erasmus's father Gerard personally favored. A 17th-century legend has it that Erasmus was first named Geert Geerts (also Gerhard Gerhards or Gerrit Gerritsz), but this is unfounded. A well-known wooden picture indicates: "Goudæ conceptus, Roterodami natus" (Latin for "Conceived in Gouda, born in Rotterdam)". According to an article by historian Renier Snooy (1478–1537), Erasmus was born in Gouda.