Leaked Gitmo Files Highlight Need for Fair Trials and Accountability, Says Amnesty Int'l

[Hissyspit]

Source: Amnesty International Press Release

Amnesty International Media Release
For Immediate Release
Tuesday, April 26, 2011

Leaked Guantanamo Files Highlight Need for Fair Trials and Accountability, Says Amnesty International

(Washington, D.C.) -- Amnesty International today renewed its call on U.S. authorities to release or give fair trials to remaining Guantanamo Bay detainees, after leaked files revealed fresh details about those held at the detention center.

"The files confirm what we have been saying all along about Guantanamo Bay - that many were detained for spurious reasons and held for years without access to the U.S. legal system," said Susan Lee, Americas director at Amnesty International. "The authorities must either try those that remain there - in U.S. civilian courts rather than military commissions - or set them free."

The vast majority of the nearly 800 men who have been held at Guantanamo have been released without charge. To date only five have been convicted by the military commission system and one has been tried by civilian court. None of those released without charge are known to have been provided with compensation or any other form of remedy by the U.S. authorities.

"Of hundreds of detainees who have been held unlawfully for years, fewer than 50 are likely to be charged eventually - yet the U.S. government hasn't provided remedy to anyone,” said Lee. “There has been no accountability on the part of the U.S. authorities for the abuses committed against these men.”

Read more: http://www.amnestyusa.org/document.php?id=ENGUSA20110426001&lang=e

[Solly Mack]

1. K&R

[Recursion]

2. I think the whole "trial" mindset is the problem

POWs aren't criminals. Most of them haven't committed crimes, and they aren't being detained as punishment. Unfortunately since it's impossible for this war to "end", there's no real path to releasing them.

[EFerrari]

3. Isn't our whole system of law built around

the government has to show a reason for detaining you? And that reason has to be sorted out in a courtroom where you have a decent chance to clear yourself?

It doesn't matter what the intention of your detention is: there has to be a clear process you can follow to clear your name and regain your freedom.

We don't need to find a path for the detainees of the "war on terra". We're supposed to follow the path already on the books, due process. The rest is Rumsfeldian bullshit.

[DCKit]

4. "The rest is Rumsfeldian bullshit."

Exactly. They HAD to hold onto them, to justify their position(s) for continuing "Teh War on Terra".

Without a sizeable stable of terror suspects, they'd have looked like even bigger fools and liars.

[EFerrari]

5. Get this: this morning Uncle Don tweets, attacking NPR

for covering the Gitmo files.

Should US taxpayers fund the publishing of illegally obtained, classified docs? NPR apparently thinks so. I don’t. http://tiny.cc/lpexi
8 hours ago via web

http://twitter.com/#!/RumsfeldOffice/status/62859811569664000

LOL

[DCKit]

6. Can't blame him for not wanting to spend the last 20 years of his life in a Federal penitentiary.

I wonder how much he's spent covering his ass since leaving BushCo*?

[Recursion]

8. Well, no

Isn't our whole system of law built around the government has to show a reason for detaining you?

Well, no. Not when the military captures you. These people are not being held as criminals but as combatants, and combatants have historically been held without "trial" (again, since there's no crime here) until exchanged, paroled (neither of which are likely here), or the conflict ends.

[grahamhgreen]

9. How totalitarian. They are not POW's. They are political prisoners held without charge.

[Recursion]

10. Some of them are

What do you want to do with them?

[grahamhgreen]

11. Hold a trial or let them go.

[Recursion]

12. A trial for what?

Fighting against uniformed forces is not a crime. Combatants are detained so that they won't fight anymore. And what the hell do you do about the farmers who got hit over their head by their neighbors and sold off to the military? They may not have wanted to fight against the US beforehand but they sure as hell will now.

[grahamhgreen]

13. Then I guess we need to let them go and try the people who detained them.

[KoKo]

7. K&R..