ACLU Complains to U.N. on Muslim Detainees in U.S.

Reuters ^ | January 27, 2004 | Stephanie Nebehay

[sarcasm]

GENEVA (Reuters) - The American Civil Liberties Union Tuesday brought a complaint to the United Nations charging that Muslim immigrants in the United States were unfairly detained and deported in the wake of Sept. 11.

The complaint, specifically on behalf of 10 former detainees and three men still in custody, was filed with the U.N. working group on arbitrary detentions.

It accuses the U.S. government of arbitrarily arresting hundreds of Muslim immigrants from South East Asia and the Middle East following the hijacked airliner attacks in 2001 on the World Trade Center and Pentagon, which killed nearly 3,000 people.

Most were held for months without criminal charges being laid and denied access to an attorney or judge while in legal limbo, according to the New-York based ACLU. Many were deported, some to face interrogation in their homelands, it added.

It charged U.S. officials "arbitrarily and indiscriminately arrested immigrants unconnected to terrorism or crime."

"By asking the United Nations to shine a global spotlight on the U.S. government's indiscriminate round up of immigrants, the ACLU warns the government that it cannot escape justice through secrecy," the ACLU said.

"Many of these policies remain in effect and there is a substantial danger that they will be applied again ...," it said.

Anthony Romero, ACLU executive director, said that hundreds of Muslims had been arrested and detained "using race, religion and national origin as proxies for suspicion."

Most were from Pakistan, Egypt and Turkey, followed by nationals of Jordan, Yemen, India and Saudi Arabia, according to the group which has also filed cases in U.S. domestic courts.

U.S. policies allegedly violated detainees' rights to equal treatment under law and to due process -- as guaranteed by the Universal Declaration of Human Rights and the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights -- according to the ACLU.

The U.S. government has 90 days to respond to the complaint. The U.N. working group, composed of five independent legal experts, reports to the U.N. Commission on Human Rights.    

Khurram Altaf, one of the 13 plaintiffs, was deported to his native Pakistan in summer of 2002 two months after being arrested at home in New Jersey and questioned about any links to al Qaeda, which he strenuously denies.

Altaf, who arrived in the United States in 1985, worked at a trucking company and had applied for a permanent residency card.

His three children are all U.S. citizens. His daughter Anza, who was born deaf, remains in America for treatment, while his wife and other two children have joined him in Islamabad.

"My two children in Pakistan are struggling with school and the language. I'd love to go back to the U.S.," Altaf said.

[Tamzee]

This is unbelievable. The AMERICAN Civil Liberties Union has appealed to the U.N., an international authority, against America?

Why isn't there a huge outcry against this treacherous act? Would Americans have allowed this to stand unchallenged fifty years ago???

[Mr. Mojo]

They should just rename themselves the International Islamist Enabling Union and be done with it.

[autoresponder]

ACLU's Romero is a flaming homosexual activist America hater.

Let the UN and ACLU armies bring on their Blue Helmet military might against the USA and our coalition allies.

The ACLU going to the UN means SCOTUS gave them the finger on this.

Time to cut the UN's weekly allowance and confiscate all their illegally parked NYC cars.

We are the UN's bank and landlord.

Good luck Ms. Romero!

Your ACLU is about to lose it's IRS tax exempt status for illegally acting as a democrat political subsidiary and money launderer tied to Al Qaeda cells here and abroad......

[Bikers4Bush]

The ACLU is a traitorous organization and should be eradicated.

[MeekOneGOP]

American Crazy Liberals Union ...

[b9]

Anti-American Crazy Liberals Union?

[MeekOneGOP]

ha ! Actually that is better. Thanks.

[potlatch]

All Crazy Lunatics Union!!!

[b9]

All Crazy Lunatics Union!!!

Yes!!!

Always-Crying Loud-Mouth Underminers

[MeekOneGOP]

#9-10:

[potlatch]

Lol, we need to collect all of these new names and send them to them!!!

[PhilDragoo]

Anarcho-Communist-Leninite-Uberperven

[lady lawyer]

This really is a traitorous act -- to try to get a foreign body to rule us. But that's what they and the others on the left have been about for a long time.

[b9]

Anarcho-Communist-Leninite-Uberperven

LOL

A bsolute
C laptrap
L oony
U dders

A nimal
C rud
L icking
U sers

[MeekOneGOP]