Gitmo & Abu Ghraib: Renewed Disgraces In The Making
Guantanamo Bay has been a disgrace from the day it first received prisoners that were denied access to legal counsel, allowed no redress of grievances via the courts, began submitting prisoners to interrogation tactics that at least bordered on torture (most of us would call it torture), and it was revealed that almost none of those being held were really involved in terrorism or engaging in combat agains the US forces.
We should hold those folks that are clearly enemies and terrorists in prison, but we should do so in a manner that is in keeping with the Geneva Conventions, other applicable international law and principles of fairness and justice that we afford our own citizens and residents. We shouldn't have to be told to treat prisoners in a fair and just manner because we are supposed to be the "good guys" and because it is the right thing to do. Additionally, treating prisoners fairly is the Christian thing to do. No matter how you slice it, we have lowered ourselves to the same level of despots, fascists, authoritarian dictators and we are as bad as the "bad guys."
Now that the UN and the EU have identified the events and actions at Gitmo as being outside of international law, in violation of the UN Charter (which is part of our Constitution as a result of the treaties clause), in direct conflict with the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, in violation of the Geneva Conventions (we can't call it a war and not treat prisoners captured as a part of that war as anything other than POWs), and just plain wrong.... we need to either close the prison at Gitmo or allow the UN, International Red Cross, Amnesty International and representatives from the nations where these prisoners originate into the process. We also have to allow some sort of legal proceeding where the principle of habeas corpus is an allowable challenge to the charges against each prisoner.
In other words, we have to make the case that these folks are actual combatants or terroists or let them go.
This is what the world is saying about Gitmo:
"A UN report is expected to call on the United States to close its Guantanamo Bay detention centre in Cuba without delay and transfer the near-500 supposed "enemy combatants" held there to American soil to guarantee them access to fair trials. A leaked draft of the document, written over 18 months by five independent experts in international law appointed by the UN Commission on Human Rights, says the inmates at Guantanamo are being denied their rights to mental and physical health to a degree that sometimes amounts to torture."
"I must confess that I had few qualms about the prison when it first opened. Why, oh why, oh why, doesn't America simply shut down the abomination that is Guantanamo Bay? The argument is no longer one of moral outrage. It is one of common sense. However you approach the matter - even if you believe America is under existential threat from al-Qa'ida and that all means are justified in the "war on terror" - you must surely accept that the prison in the little plot of Cuba that is the US, is now doing America far more harm than good. You might have imagined that Guantanamo's abysmal reputation could have sunk no lower. But over the past fortnight it has. A United Nations human rights report has just called for the place to be shut down, its inmates either be quickly tried or freed, and for any US personnel responsible for abuse of detainees to be brought to justice."
"The Archbishop of York, Dr John Sentamu, has launched a passionate attack on President George Bush, saying his administration's refusal to close the notorious Guantanamo Bay camp reflected "a society that is heading towards George Orwell's Animal Farm". Dr Sentamu, the Church of England's second in command, urged the UN Human Rights Commission (UNHRC) to take legal action against the US - through the US courts or the International Court of Justice at The Hague - should it fail to respond to a report, by five UN inspectors, advising that Camp Delta at Guantanamo Bay should be shut immediately because prisoners there are being tortured.
The report was published on Thursday, as a senior High Court judge, Mr Justice Collins, stated that American actions over Guantanamo's Camp Delta do not "appear to coincide with that of most civilised nations". As a result of his ruling, three of eight British inmates held in the camp are to appeal to the Foreign Secretary Jack Straw to intervene with the Bush administration on their behalf."
This article lists many of the British citizens being held at Gitmo with allegations of torture, wrongful imprisonment, mistaken identities and alibis that are verifiable. How accurate are these reports? We cannot verify them because of the manner in which Gitmo is being run. This one is worth reading and evaluating.
"When Omar Deghayes and his family arrived as refugees in Britain, they thought they had found a haven from secret police and torture. As a small boy in 1980, Omar saw his father, Amer, a prominent trade unionist and lawyer opposed to the dictatorship of Colonel Gaddafi, dragged from the family home in Tripoli by the Libyan secret police. He was subsequently executed. About seven years later, the young Mr Deghayes and his family managed to secure exit visas, so Omar could receive treatment for an eye condition, and fled to Britain, hoping for a new life.
Today Mr Deghayes is one of eight British residents being held in Guantanamo Bay. During his three-and-a-half years' incarceration he has been tortured, held in solitary confinement for months, had his finger smashed, lost the sight in one eye and has resorted to a hunger strike, unable to defend himself in a court."
"Tony Blair today said the US detention camp at Guantánamo Bay in Cuba was an 'anomaly' that would have to be 'dealt with'. In Berlin to meet the German chancellor, Angela Merkel, the prime minister was asked whether he supported a call from his Northern Ireland secretary, Peter Hain, for the centre to be closed. "I have always said it is an anomaly, and sooner or later has to be dealt with,' the prime minister told a news conference, repeating a comment he made to MPs last November."
There is no telling what Tony Blair means by the phrase "dealt with" given that he has supported the Bush Doctrine without reservation.
Abu Ghraib has come back to haunt us. The original reports of prisoner abuse (a euphemism for torture by UN standards) were a PR nightmare for the Bush administration and a blackeye for our international reputation. However, we took action. We ruined the career of a high ranking female officer, put a low-ranking enlisted woman in prison, prosecuted a couple other enlisted personnel and ignored the role of the CIA, military intelligence and the officers and civilian leaders (i.e. Secretary Rumsfeld and President Bush)
"Damning new photographs and videos purporting to show the abuse and even murder of Iraqi prisoners at the infamous Abu Ghraib jail have been broadcast on Australian television and picked up by Arab channels. The images are likely to trigger outrage because they show more graphically than before the scenes of humiliation which took place at Abu Ghraib in late 2003. Iraqis will be watching them on television days after seeing film of British soldiers beating up young men in the city of Amarah in southern Iraq and amid continuing Muslim fury over cartoons depicting the Prophet Mohamed.
The 60 pictures appearing to show a man with a cut throat, another suffering from severe head injuries and a naked man hanging upside down from a bed were broadcast last night on the Dateline programme by the state-owned Special Broadcasting Service."
"
Nearly two years after the first pictures of naked and humiliated Iraqi detainees emerged from Abu Ghraib prison, the full extent of the abuse became known for the first time yesterday with a leaked report from the US army's internal investigation into the scandal. The catalogue of abuse, which was obtained by the online American magazine Salon, could not have arrived at a worse time for the Bush administration, coinciding with yesterday's United Nations report on abuse of detainees at Guantánamo, the release of a video showing British troops beating up Iraqi youths, and lingering anger in the Muslim world over cartoons of the prophet Muhammad.
Bush administration officials had already been fending off a new wave of anger about the torture of detainees - following the airing of graphic images from Abu Ghraib on Australian television - when Salon posted a story on its website yesterday saying it had obtained what appears to be the fullest photographic record to date of the abuse.
It said the material, gathered by the army's criminal investigation division, included 1,325 photographs and 93 video clips of suspected abuse of detainees, 546 photographs of suspected dead Iraqi detainees, as well as 660 images of adult pornography, and 29 pictures of US troops engaged in simulated sex acts. Based on date stamps, all were recorded between October 18 and December 30 2003, the same timeframe as the original scandal."
Harry Truman used to spout that the buck stops at his desk. Truman recognized that no matter who was involved, where it occurred or who screwed up in the process, as president he was ultimately responsible for what occurs on his watch. President Bush, VP Cheney, Secretary Rumsfeld are not honorable because they pass the buck, make excuses and justify acting in un-American and un-Christian ways.
If we take a long hard look at the way the Bush administration is running things, we should ask for resignations from Bush, Cheney, Rice, Rumsfeld and Gonzalez. In the mean time all we can do is write in protest, urge congress to act, and wait for the next elections to vote some of these scoundrels out of office.
But for me, the scandals that are befalling the Bush administration are particularly shameful. I am a veteran of the US Navy and of the US Army National Guard. I took an oath to defend the Constitution and serve my country faithfully. While I did not serve in combat, I stood my watch and was placed on alert several times during my service. There were times and events that could have called me to respond overseas... to go into combat. While I am proud of my service to my country, and I believe in the first principles embodied in the Constitution, I find nothing but shame in the conduct of our congress and the Bush administration. The domestic surveillance without a warrant, the constant lying and spinning of events that have gone astray, the torture, the renditions, the violation of constitutional rights and principles, the claim to righteousness on false pretenses... Shame on you George W. Bush... Shame on you Dick Cheney... Shame on you Condaleeza Rice... Shame on you Donald Rumsfeld... Shame on you Alberto Gonzalez.... and Orrin Hatch, John Cornyn, and shame on all of us that are not standing up and telling our leaders that the scandalous actions of our leaders has to cease and desist... NOW! Speak up folks. They still think we support all of these wrongful actions.
posted by Jim Downey at 8:33 PM
0 Comments:
Post a Comment
<< Home