Guantanamo detainees and American authoritarian regime

Society Pakistan & World Affairs
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All the talk of “freedom” and “liberty” by Americans is a mere propaganda. Guantanamo is a clear example. Americans criticize Chinese etc. of human rights abuses, while their own president Bush and their candidate McCain have no problem supporting such an abusive system of justice.

John McCain said Friday that the Supreme Court ruling on Guantanamo Bay detainees is “one of the worst decisions in the history of this country.”

The presumptive GOP nominee said the decision, a 5-4 ruling Thursday that determined Guantanamo detainees have the right to seek release in civilian courts, would lead to a wave of frivolous challenges.

“We are now going to have the courts flooded with so-called … habeas corpus suits against the government, whether it be about the diet, whether it be about the reading material. And we are going to be bollixed up in a way that is terribly unfortunate because we need to go ahead and adjudicate these cases,” he said at a town hall meeting in New Jersey.

McCain said he has worked hard to ensure the U.S. military does not torture prisoners but that the detainees at Guantanamo are still “enemy combatants.”

“These are people who are not citizens. They do not and never have been given the rights that citizens in this country have,” he said. “Now, my friends, there are some bad people down there. There are some bad people.”

There are some people who now think that this Zionist baba is going to bring Guantanamo style justice to American soil. Now America may start delivering such “justice” and “liberty” to all non-US-citizens, including green-card-holders.

Now THAT should be described “AMERICAN WAY” today. I would encourage Americans to continue following Zionist ways. It is the Zionist influence of people like Lieberman that America has completely lost its moral standing. And as it continues, America will lost its financial standing as well. Very soon. The cycle has started with the Iraq war which Zionists had America gotten involved in.

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Re: Guantanamo detainees and American authoritarian regime

These people should have been beheaded long ago.

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Why?

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^ That's called lynching.

zxcvb does not sound like an American, but it is these Zionist/anti-Islam/anti-semitic views which are bringing America closer to its downfall.

BTW, his use of the term "beheading" shows that he has Qaeda-mentality, even though in opposite direction.

;) Choose A Profession 4 Above Person ;)
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Re: Guantanamo detainees and American authoritarian regime

two extremes don't make one right. Whether left or right. It must be balanced.

;) Choose A Profession 4 Above Person ;)
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Long ago, before the Taliban and Al Qaedda, the Geneva Conventions were convened. The Conventions held that war should have some "Rules", and that those playing by the Rules should have "Benefits". People obeying the rules of war were considered "lawful combattants", and were entitled to the protections of the Geneva Conventions. A number of categories of warriors were considered to be "unlawful combattants" on the basis of their behavior on the battlefield. Mercenaries, people who targeted civilians, people who targeted medics, warriors who did not wear uniforms, were all considered as creating excess danger for innocents.

This ruling depowers the Geneva Conventions. By giving benefits to those who fight illegally, you create less motivation to "Fight by the rules", and to gain the protections of th Geneva Conventions. Obama has no experience with the Geneva Conventions, but McCain sure does.

Illegal combattants can and should be held until the end of the war. Wake me when that happens.

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OG, The issue isn't about holding enemy combatants until the end of war as they should be but making the U.S. government show to a judge that those held are indeed enemy combatants.

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Problem for McSame and Co. is that not all of detainees are Qaeda operatives. They are getting ‘lynched’ in the sense that American regime has them under detention while no one is to judge but the regime itself. Hence they are called ‘illegal combatants’ by Zionist evangelicals while no one can question the proofs of their involvement. THAT’s why it is a human rights issue, and not just a Geneva Convention issue.

One example: Lakhdar Boumediene.

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UTD,

That is not correct. The Geneva conventions process prescribes military tribunals, not civilian courts. Enemy combattants are entitled to precisely the same process that any soldier would face in a court marshall. Enemy combattant are not "charged" with anything, nor are they entitled to civilian protections. This is the same whether they are housed on US soil, or directly off the battlefield.

Post your pic
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Re: Guantanamo detainees and American authoritarian regime

how can captives captured not on the battlefield but in hiding be considered "combatants" OG? there are many people who've been rounded up from their homes/shelters/hiding places on the basis of tip-offs. Such people are terrorism suspects, not prisoners of war (lawful or unlawful)

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Guantanamo Bay has been quite the experiment. The Bush administration attempted to create a zone where U.S. laws and regulations did not apply and the Geneva conventions were tossed aside. In 2006 the Supreme Court rejected this and told the Bush administration that this was unacceptable. So a group of new laws were pushed through including one that gave the White House sole power on deciding on what non-citizens were to be listed as enemy combatants which in turn would strip them the right of appeal.

Now by allowing the right of habeas corpus to those detained at Guantanamo Bay it allows a judicial review of a Bush experiment that from the get go has tainted the U.S. internationally and made it's message of freedom, justice, and democracy look hypercritical. Up until now Guantanamo Bay has allowed dictatorships around the world to point to it so they could justify their own perversions of justice. With this Supreme Court ruling the Bush administration has been put in check in regards to Guantanamo Bay and in turn helps restore the proper image of the U.S.

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Guantanamo and the betrayal of American values

Almerindo Ojeda
Tuesday, June 17, 2008

Guantanamo, the prison, may close soon. But Guantanamo, the experience of lawlessness, will remain with us for a long time. If we as a nation are to recover from it - and achieve reconciliation with the rest of the world - we will have to take stock of the many facets of this experience.

First, there is the issue of human trafficking. One of the little-known facts about Guantanamo is that the majority of those imprisoned there were not seized by American forces; they were snatched instead by our supposed allies - mostly Afghans and Pakistanis - who were operating in areas where we issued substantial bounties for the capture of members of Taliban and al Qaeda.

Then, there is the issue of abduction and forced disappearance. Some of the individuals incarcerated in Guantanamo were seized on or near the battlefields of Afghanistan - even if mostly fleeing from them. But many were seized far away from any battlefield. Some were seized in the streets of Pakistan. Others were taken from their homes, late at night, and in front of their families. Some were abducted a continent away in Gambia, or in a Bosnian courthouse, after leaving a trial that had exonerated them of terrorism charges.

Once kidnapped, the abductees were taken to black sites - secret prisons into which they effectively disappear. Guantanamo itself was a black site until 2006, when the Department of Defense was forced to release the names of the prisoners there.

There is also the issue of child abuse. According to documents released by the Department of Defense, the three youngest prisoners in Guantanamo were three Afghan boys, Naqib Ullah, Assad Ullah and Abdul Qudus. According to U.S. medical and flight records, Abdul Qudus was no more than 14 years old when he entered Guantanamo; the others were no older than 15.

Let’s not forget torture.

Last month, the Inspector General of the Justice Department released a report detailing the instances of abuse witnessed by FBI personnel at Guantanamo. According to this report, FBI officers personally observed deprivations of food, water, clothing, light and sensory input; prolonged shackling in painful positions, use of extreme temperatures and loud music, use of military dogs on or near prisoners; threats of injury to prisoners or their families, and even a materialization of such threats through extraordinary rendition (overseas transfer for the purpose of interrogation under torture). Things got to the point that FBI officers began to compile a “war crimes file” with their observations.

And forms of religious abuse, both coarse and refined, have been reported as well.

A military interpreter has reported that a female interrogator smeared a detainee with fake menstrual blood in order to render him unclean for prayer, thus preventing him from seeking strength and solace from his religion. And both Department of Defense investigations and FBI officers have reported offensive treatment of the Koran.

None of these practices are licensed by law, be it military, civilian, national, international, human or divine. In fact, the very point of Guantanamo was to create a prison law could not reach - a prison, that is, where law could be breached. It was somewhat ironic that Guantanamo was the place where trials by military commission were scheduled to take place this year.

The predecessors to the trials by military commission were the Combatant Status Review Tribunals. Forced on the Department of Defense by the Supreme Court, these were tribunals in which the prosecution gets to write the rules, appoint the judge, appoint the defense, place both under its military command, and remove either at its pleasure. A similar process has been taking place in the military commissions. The goal of these tribunals is to determine whether a prisoner was properly classified as an enemy combatant. But enemy combatancy is such a recent crime that it was not recognized as such until after it was committed - a case of retroactive application of the law. The evidence presented by the prosecution can be hearsay. It can be coerced. It can be secret. Even from the judge. The prisoner does not have the right of self-defense and may only call witnesses that the judge considers reasonably available. Only fellow prisoners have been considered as such - and then not all of them. The staff for the defense gets appointed by the prosecution. The defense can only appeal decisions on procedural grounds - when, for example, the prosecution failed to follow the rules it imposed on itself. The prosecution, on the other hand, may appeal the verdict, and may even order a new trial. With a different judge.
Finally, prisoners found to be improperly classified as enemy combatants may still be held captive until the end of the war on terrorism. And many have.
Let us hope that the recent Supreme Court decision, news of which comes to us at the moment of writing, will help restore us to ourselves and reconcile us with the rest of the world.

http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2008/06/17/EDOQ11A397.DTL&type=printable