MobBoss
Off-Topic Overlord
Actually, didnt congress change the law in regards to this in order to appease the 2004 Supreme Court ruling in order to make all thing gitmo legal?
I thought they did.
Guantanamo Bay detainee commits suicide
- Thread starter nonconformist
- Start date
Actually, didnt congress change the law in regards to this in order to appease the 2004 Supreme Court ruling in order to make all thing gitmo legal?
I thought they did.
-0blivion-
Musically inclined
Don't forget NonCon, this is the nation that imprisons hundreds of innocent people, including BRITISH nationals later found to be innocent, nationals of a supposedly allied nation. International law focused on providing humanitarian treatment is ignored, and evidence gathered using torture. Need I remind you that the statements given by prisoners interred in Guantanamo have been declared by British officials to be unusable in a British court due to being taken under duress.
I mean, take a look at this transcript, from the tribunal of Feroz Abbasi, one of the nine British nationals that have experienced Guantanamo Bay.
Abbasi: So, you are telling me I am an enemy combatant. I am telling you by special Geneva Conventions, I am a non-combatant .
Tribunal president: Once again, international law does not matter here. Geneva Convention does not matter here. What matters here and I am concerned about and what I really want to get to is your status as enemy combatant based upon the evidence that has been provided and your actions while you were in Afghanistan. If you deviate from that one more time you will be removed from this tribunal and we will continue to hear evidence without you being present .
Abbasi: I know, but I have the right to speak .
Tribunal president: No, you dont.
Abbasi: And the personal representative told me I can say whatever I like.
Tribunal president: He was mistaken if he told you that .
[Abbasi continues to speak at length.]
Tribunal president: Once again international law . [Abbasi interrupts.] Mr. Abbasi, your conduct is unacceptable and this is your absolute final warning. I don't care about international law. I dont want to hear the words international law again. We are not concerned with international law.
Just ridiculous. I may be harping on about the whole British thing as well which is slightly off the topic, as this happens to the prisoners from many countries all the time. But I have been looking for a place to say this for a while so whatever - it is the sort of thing that makes my blood boil. If this is the special relationship, then you can stuff it, and I certainly hope we do with the current US administration which seems to care more about the suppression of human rights (and not just in Gitmo) than the great country of freedom it puts itself forward as.
-0blivion-
Musically inclined
Considering the number of 'illegal combatants' that have been released and returned to their own countries, one wonders if illegal combatants are even in the majority at Gitmo, hmm?
I am well aware that the Third Geneva convention only applies to uniformed soldiers of a recognised government, in the case of soldiers. However, the Fourth Geneva convention protects civilians in the hands of the enemy - and given that men interred at Gitmo have been and are civilians, it is in violation of the geneva convention.
Hell, if I was an American, i would be angry at the harm Gitmo is doing to American prestige, and to relations - ie, Anglo-American and Euro-American. These rifts cannot be a good thing. To borrow a quote from the esteemed Peter Goldsmith "The historic tradition of the United States as a beacon of freedom, liberty and of justice deserves the removal of this symbol"
I am well aware that the Third Geneva convention only applies to uniformed soldiers of a recognised government, in the case of soldiers. However, the Fourth Geneva convention protects civilians in the hands of the enemy - and given that men interred at Gitmo have been and are civilians, it is in violation of the geneva convention.
Hell, if I was an American, i would be angry at the harm Gitmo is doing to American prestige, and to relations - ie, Anglo-American and Euro-American. These rifts cannot be a good thing. To borrow a quote from the esteemed Peter Goldsmith "The historic tradition of the United States as a beacon of freedom, liberty and of justice deserves the removal of this symbol"
nonconformist
Miserable
Okay, how many of them are illegal combattants then?
That would mean people who are not:
-civilians
-members of the Mujaheddin
-people carrying arms openly operating under a military structure
-civilians who have spontaneously taken up arms in reaction to the pprocch of a hostile force
How many of them are proven, proven, illegal combattants?
Otherwise, what's hapening is you're spiriting away random people who are likely innocent, and interning them on political charges, which effectively makes the place a concentration camp.
And then you're having to release the ones who are found innocent, and guess what?
I bet some of them really have an axe to grind after spending five years of their lives wasted. Why, they could be pissed off enough to actually go out of their ways to seek out ways to harm the US.
I know I'd be sorely tempted to if I were in the same position.
Why ask me? That's for my government to decide. When dealing with foreign enemy combatants, I'll trust them to make that distinction.
nonconformist
Miserable
You trust the govermnment to?
Can I ask why, for example, you trust the government in this case, but not enough to give up your right to bear arms?
So? They can't prevent someone who is determined enough to kill himself from getting away with it. Unless they stuck him alone in a room with a loaded gun and told him "If you're alive when we get back, we'll kill your mother" I don't see how this is the US government's fault.
Old news from a biased European newspaper. Surely you can do better than that? Additionally, who says that even if such treatment did occur, that this man who committed suicide was subjected to it? Even accepting for a moment that torture did occur, that's not the same as saying this man himself was tortured.
No, you didn't. He wasn't charged, but that's not the same as being sentenced to jail for life.
Why does this matter? I imagine most criminals, when in jail, are depressed and full of hopelessness. Simply because these men may or may not be depressed doesn't mean the US government caused their suicides. They're in a prison, not a seaside resort.
They all have legal representation, trials are getting underway, and they are being treated justly. I don't see a problem in the current arrangement.
nonconformist
Miserable
Except for the whole right to a speedy and public trial, the presumption of innocence and pretty much every other jurisprudent standard accepted by western democracies.
Christ, the fact that it's taken five years to ever get the wheels into motion signifies one of many things:
a)The US had no intention to try them, but only did when it realised public opinion ould cause such a backlash
b)The US legal sysytem is crappy, bloated, and needs a huge overhaul
C)The US has absolutely nothing against any of these people, so it's just interning them perpetually
They are being given as speedy a trial as possible, and they are indeed considered innocent until proven guilty.
I don't think they had a plan to try them, but more out of incompetence than deliberate malfeasance.
Probably.
That doesn't make any sense at all. Why suffer the PR hit just for kicks? They wouldn't. They obviously think all, or most of these people are guilty, or they wouldn't keep them locked up. Locking up innocents is wrong, and hurts the US' image abroad, and is simply illogical. Perhaps you could come up with a coherent reason why they would knowingly do such a thing?
I am a citizen, not a foreigner. Note how I worded the sentence where I said I trusted them.
nonconformist
Miserable
A 5 year waiting period is not aspeedy trial-a speedy trial is defined as within six months in most cases.
Because the US government has some kind of ******ed need to assert itself to god knows who, by keeping these (innocent until proven beyond reasonable doubt) people in what is essentially a concentration camp for the last five years, all the while not even managing to come up with a shred of evidence, let alone denying these people fundemental rights, that even backwards psedo-democracies in the middle east apply, which even high-ranking members of the armed forces (including the USMC lawyer appointed to represent one of these guys) have condemned.
Denying these people rights makes a complete sham and mockery of everything the US claims to stand for, and no doubt fuels some of the bitterness that drives people against it.
How can you claim to be a paragon of democracy and freedom abroad when you can't even apply fundemental rights that Europe has kept in place for the last 60 years, instead having to resort to some totalitarian measure of secret courts, and throwing every single legal rule of the last 2500 years right out of the window?
-0blivion-
Musically inclined
Considering that men have had to be released already and are living in their nations of origin without being under charge, that trust may be unfounded.
Pasi Nurminen
Deity
You know the place where you can go
I see. When someone makes a very good point that you can't refute, you troll it and stick a smilie on the end to avoid getting some points from a moderator? Nice.
