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Guantanamo

New Legal Filing Against Guantanamo Prison

January 10, 2018 Staff, Ccrjustice.org , ,
January 11 marks the 16th anniversary of the opening of the prison at Guantánamo, and the first anniversary under this president. If you're in the D.C. area, please join us at 11:30 a.m. to gather  with human rights activists, torture survivors, Guantánamo attorneys, 9/11 family members, and members of diverse faith communities at Lafayette Square, at the north side of the White House. Together, we will rally to end indefinite detention, close the prison, and stop torture. We're also excited to announce the book launch of There is a Man Under that Hood, which sets the words of Luke Nephew's (Peace Poets) remarkable poem to photographs of anti-torture demonstrations taken or curated by Justin Norman (Witness Against Torture). The afterword is written by CCR Senior Staff Attorney Omar Farah.

The Art Of Keeping Guantánamo Open

December 7, 2017 Erin L. Thompson, creativeresistance.org , ,
By Erin L. Thompson for Tom Dispatch - We spent the day at a beach in Brooklyn. Skyscrapers floated in the distance and my toddler kept handing me cigarette filters she had dug out of the sand. When we got home, I checked my email. I had been sent a picture of a very different beach: deserted, framed by distant headlands with unsullied sands and clear waters. As it happened, I was looking not at a photograph, but at a painting by a man imprisoned at the Guantánamo Bay detention camp. Of the roughly 780 people once imprisoned there, he is one of 41 prisoners who remain, living yards away from the Caribbean Sea. Captives from the Bush administration’s Global War on Terror began to arrive at that offshore prison in January 2002. Since Guantánamo is located on a military base in Cuba and the detainees were labeled“alien enemy combatants,” they were conveniently to be without rights under either United States or international law and so open to years of whatever their jailers wanted to do to them (including torture). President Barack Obama released 197 of them in his years in office, but was unable to fulfill the promise he made on his first day: to close Guantánamo. The man whose painting I saw has been held for nearly 15 years without trial, without even having charges filed against him. The email came from his lawyer who had volunteered to defend a number of Guantánamo detainees.

The Terror Suspect Who Had Nothing To Give

July 10, 2016 Raymond Bonner, www.propublica.org , , ,
By Raymond Bonner for Pro Publica. In 2009, Abu Zubaydah’s lawyers interviewed their client and prepared a handwritten, first-person account of the torture their client suffered at the hands of the U.S. government. The document, quoted above, recounts the terrifying experience of a man repeatedly waterboarded in the mistaken belief that he was al-Qaida’s No. 3 official. It was filed in federal court as part of his lawsuit seeking release from Guantanamo, and like nearly all the documents in the case, was sealed at the government’s request. Now, seven years later, Zubaydah’s statement, which he signed under oath, has been released, and it provides the most detailed, personal description yet made public of his “enhanced interrogation” at a Central Intelligence Agency “black site” in Thailand.

Obama Appointee Ruled Gitmo Prisoners Had No Rights

March 16, 2016 Emily Shire, www.bustle.com ,
By Emily Shire for Bustle. While serving on the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit, Garland often ruled in support of George W. Bush's Guantanamo Bay detainee policies and "showed great deference to President George W. Bush's indefinite detentions at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba," the Washington Post noted in 2010. In 2014, Garland was part of three-judge panel that unanimously ruled a "new policy of probing into a prisoner's groin area and alongside his clothed genitals is a reasonable security measure," as Josh Gerstein at Politico wrote. Garland's most famous decision, though, in regards to Guantanamo Bay policies may be the 2003 ruling in Al Odah v. United States. In that case, Garland joined the majority opinion that Guantanamo Bay detainees were not entitled to habeas corpus, which effectively blocked them "from seeking relief in civilian courts," as Ian Millhiser at ThinkProgress noted. That ruling was overturned the next year by the Supreme Court in Rasul v. Bush, which said the detainees were entitled to challenge their detention.

Guantanamo Chief Under Investigation Ignores Hearing

March 2, 2016 Center for Constitutional Rights, www.popularresistance.org , , ,
By the Center for Constitutional Rights. NEW YORK, PARIS - Retired U.S. General Geoffrey Miller, the former Guantánamo prison chief, was a no-show in a French court Tuesday. Miller had been summoned to answer questions stemming from accusations that he oversaw the torture of three French nationals at Guantánamo prison. The Center for Constitutional Rights and the European Center for Constitutional and Human Rights, who submitted expert reports and other submissions in the proceedings, issued the following statement. Miller’s absence speaks volumes about the Obama administration’s continued unwillingness to confront America’s torture legacy. The administration not only refuses to investigate U.S. officials like Miller for torture, it apparently remains unwilling to cooperate with international torture investigations like the one in France.

Newsletter: Why Protests Will Continue To Grow

January 16, 2016 Kevin Zeese and Margaret Flowers, www.popularresistance.org , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , ,
By Kevin Zeese and Margaret Flowers for Popular Resistance. This week the reason that there are a growing protest movement and growing disenchantment with government was put on display. The divergence between government and reality was thrust in our faces. The entire government came together, Members of Congress, the Cabinet, military leaders, the Supreme Court, Vice President and President (minus the 'selected survivor' in case the Capitol was attacked, the head of Homeland Security) to hear the State of the Union. The choreographed self-praise of people who will spend $5 billion this year of mostly big business money to get re-elected was evident from the moment the door was opened. Hugs and kisses, backslapping all around, required applause as the President approached the podium, more staged applause when he was introduced and then, as if they were trained, dozens of standing ovations on cue – 89 times in a 58-minute speech the President was applauded.

Cuba Impression

January 5, 2016 Gene Bruskin, www.stansburyforum.com , , , , ,
By Gene Bruskin for Stansbury Forum - As I prepared for my recent November trip to Cuba I thought back to my many memories of my first visit in the spring of 1970. Having left teaching in the South Bronx, discouraged and risking the draft deferment NYC teaching ironically provided, I decided, with my wife at the time, to go on to Cuba on the Second Venceremos Brigade. The Brigade was a left initiative to help break the US imposed blockade on Cuba and 800 of us went from across the country to cut cane with the Cubans and help them succeed in their production goal in the Year of the Ten Million tons.

Lawyers For Guantanamo Prisoners Blame Obama Admin For Delays

December 28, 2015 Ed Pilkington, www.theguardian.com ,
By Ed Pilkington for The Guardian - Lawyers representing Guantánamo Bay detainees who have been held at the camp in Cuba for up to 14 years without charge or trial have accused President Obama of stalling on his promise to close the military prison. As the US president enters his final year in office, pressure is mounting on him to stand by his pledge to shut down the detention center by the time he leaves the White House. Numerous defense lawyers working directly with Guantánamo detainees have told the Guardian that they hold Obama and his senior officials personally responsible for the lack of action.

After Guantánamo, Shaker Aamer’s BBC Interview

December 18, 2015 Andy Worthington, www.andyworthington.co.uk ,
Andy Worthington for Andy Worthington - On Monday, after an exclusive interview with the Mail on Sunday, published the day before (which I wrote about here and here), both the BBC and ITV News ran interviews with Shaker Aamer, who, until October 30, was the last British resident in the prison. I am delighted to have played a part in securing Shaker’s release through ten years of writing about Guantánamo, and campaigning to get the prison closed, and, for the last eleven months of Shaker’s imprisonment, through the We Stand With Shaker campaign that I launched with the activist Joanne MacInnes last November.

Newsletter: Past And Present Myths Are Indivisible

November 29, 2015 Kevin Zeese and Margaret Flowers, www.PopularResistance.org , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , ,
By Kevin Zeese and Margaret Flowers for Popular Resistance. This week two remarkable reports came out about US militarism. The first by James Lucas, documented that the US has killed 20 to 30 million people in 37 nations in wars since World War II. The second by Nicholas Davies showed the impacts of US militarism since 9/11 finding 120,000 air strikes in seven countries, occupation of Afghanistan for 14 years, Iraq for over 8 years, and destruction of Libya, Syria and Yemen, 1.6 million people killed, mostly civilians, and 59.5 million people driven from their homes.US military why did you kill my family This is quite a remarkable record. These reports coincided with the celebration of Thanksgiving. Popular Resistance published eight articles debunking the founding myths and highlighting reality of genocide against the Indigenous to take their land and slavery of Africans brought to the United States for free labor. There are deep problems in the US culture. They are built on myths that cover-up genocide, slavery, racism and poverty wages. All transformations begin with a revolution of the mind. We need to change the American consciousness.

The Criminalization Of The Hunger Strike

September 3, 2015 Rob Bryan, www.truth-out.org , , ,
By Rob Bryan in Truth Out - Seven years ago, Barack Obama pledged to close down the detention center at Guantánamo Bay, telling the crowds that flocked to his campaign speeches that the United States must "restore habeas corpus" in order to "lead by example." Though the Department of Defense is still weighing options on how to close the facility before Obama leaves office, the process seems to be going nowhere. Some of this blame rests on Congress, which has repeatedly refused to lift restrictions on moving detainees even though nearly half of them are cleared for transfer. Despite Obama's professed concern for civil liberties, his administration is currently challenging the habeas corpus petition of a Guantánamo detainee on hunger strike.

Obama Seeks To Stop Release Of Hunger Striking Gitmo Detainee

August 17, 2015 Spencer Ackerman, www.theguardian.com , , , ,
By Spencer Ackerman in The Guardian - In an extremely rare legal manoeuvre, the Obama administration has challenged a legal request to free a hunger-striking Guantánamo Bay detainee entirely in secret. US officials said the objection to freeing Tariq Ba Odah, who is undernourished to the point of starvation, and the decision to challenge his legal gambit outside of public view, are indications that the Obama administration will fight tenaciously to stop detainees from seeking freedom in federal courts, despite Barack Obama’s oft-repeated pledge to close Guantánamo. Late on Friday, the US justice department submitted a long-awaited filing in Ba Odah’s habeas corpus petition. The filing was kept under seal, a rarity for a challenge to the so-called “great writ,” the underpinning of Anglo-American jurisprudence.

Six Rebel Psychologists Win Long War Against Torture

August 8, 2015 Peter Aldhous, www.buzzfeed.com , ,
By Peter Aldhous for Buzz Feed - They were ridiculed and sidelined by the leadership of the American Psychological Association, which they accused of complicity in human rights abuses. When the association voted to ban psychologists from these activities on Friday, the rebels scored an improbable — and emotional — victory. They call themselves “the dissidents.” Officially, they are the Coalition for an Ethical Psychology. In reality, they’re just six psychologists united by a shared moral outrage at their profession’s involvement in torture. Last month, these tenacious rebels were vindicated by a damning independent report, which concluded that the American Psychological Association (APA) colluded with the Pentagon to allow psychologists to help U.S. military interrogators employing brutal methods on terrorist suspects. On Friday morning, amid emotional scenes, the APA’s governing Council of Representatives overwhelmingly backed the dissidents’ proposal to ban psychologists from taking part in national security interrogations.

Guantánamo Nurse Refused To Force-Feed, To Receive Ethics Award

July 23, 2015 Physicians For Human Rights, www.physiciansforhumanrights.org , ,
Physicians for Human Rights (PHR) today commended the American Nurses Association (ANA) for honoring a nurse who refused to take part in the unethical and criminal practice of force-feeding detainees on hunger strike at Guantánamo Bay. “We commend the American Nurses Association for honoring the Guantánamo Navy nurse for his exceptional commitment to medical ethics in refusing to force-feed his patients,” said Dr. Vincent Iacopino, PHR’s medical director. “Bestowing a prestigious ethics award on the nurse not only confirms he followed his profession’s highest ethical standards, but also sets an example that all health professionals should follow.” The ANA will present its Year of Ethics award to the nurse’s attorney during its membership meeting in Washington, D.C. tomorrow.

Cuban Embassy Opens In Washington, But Issues Remain Unresolved

July 21, 2015 Paul Lewis, www.theguardian.com , , , ,
By Paul Lewis in The Guardian - Cuba’s blue, red and white-starred flag has been raised above the country’s newly inaugurated embassy in Washington, heralding the formal restoration of diplomatic relations between the US and Cuba . The establishment of embassies in both Washington and Havana, for the first time in 54 years, marked the symbolic end to one of the last vestiges of the cold war. After more than half a century of diplomatic animosity, the world’s capitalist superpower is once again on formal speaking terms with the small, communist state to the south. Cuba’s foreign minister, Bruno Rodríguez, flew to Washington to preside over the flag-raising ceremony on Monday and met with his US counterpart, John Kerry. It was the first time a Cuban foreign minister was hosted by a secretary of state in Washington since 1958. Appearing side by side at a State Department press conference, both diplomats expressed hope that a reset between the US and Cuba would lead to significant improvements in relations between the two countries.
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