Jordan fires warden after prison disturbances

0 Comments | AFP, August, 2007

AMMAN (AFP) — Jordan has fired a prison warden after inmates at his desert jail caused disturbances during a visit by a rights group to probe torture allegations, officials said on Wednesday.

Majed Rawashdeh was replaced at the Suwaqa prison by Colonel Abed Okaili following Sunday's incidents, police spokesman Major Bashir Daajeh said in a statement published in local newspapers.

He was sacked "because he committed serious administrative mistakes," during a visit by Human Rights Watch on Sunday to the prison, a security official told AFP on condition of anonymity.

During the HRW visit, around 100 prisoners cut themselves with ceramic tiles they broke from prison toilets, action that police said was designed to attract the attention of the rights team....