Posted on 06/15/2005 3:35:00 PM PDT by AgThorn
WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Republican senators called on Wednesday for the rights of foreign terrorism suspects at Guantanamo Bay prison to be legally defined even as the Bush administration said the inmates could be jailed there "in perpetuity."
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The prison, currently holding roughly 520 inmates, opened on the U.S. naval base at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, in January 2002 in the aftermath of the Sept. 11, 2001 attacks on the United States. Many of the detainees have been held for more than three years, and only four have been charged.
At a U.S. Senate Judiciary Committee hearing, Republican Chairman Arlen Specter of Pennsylvania said Congress should help to define the legal rights of the inmates at the prison, which the panel's top Democrat called "an international embarrassment."
Delaware Democratic Sen. Joseph Biden (news, bio, voting record) asked Deputy Associate Attorney General J. Michael Wiggins whether the Justice Department had "defined when there is the end of conflict."
"No, sir," Wiggins responded.
"If there is no definition as to when the conflict ends, that means forever, forever, forever these folks get held at Guantanamo Bay," Biden said.
"It's our position that, legally, they can be held in perpetuity," Wiggins said.
Earlier, the committee's top Democrat, Sen. Patrick Leahy (news, bio, voting record) of Vermont, said the United States may face terrorism "as long as you and I live." He asked Brig. Gen. Thomas Hemingway, who oversees military trials of Guantanamo prisoners, if that means America can hold prisoners that long without charges.
"I think that we can hold them as long as the conflict endures," Hemingway responded.
"Guantanamo Bay is an international embarrassment to our nation, to our ideals, and it remains a festering threat to our security," Leahy said.
"Our great country, America, was once viewed as a leader in human rights and the rule of law, and justly so. Guantanamo has undermined our leadership, has damaged our credibility, has drained the world's goodwill for America at an alarming rate," Leahy added.
Critics have decried the indefinite detention of Guantanamo prisoners, whom the United States has denied rights accorded under the Geneva Conventions to prisoners of war. The prison, was called "the gulag of our times" in a recent Amnesty International report.
Hemingway said the military commissions created by the Pentagon were the appropriate forum for trying Guantanamo prisoners. Human and legal rights groups have said the rules created by the administration are heavily biased toward the prosecution. The trials have been held up amid legal fights.
Navy Rear Adm. James McGarrah called "rigorous and fair" the Pentagon's annual review of the status of Guantanamo prisoners -- a process that can lead to their release. In those proceedings, detainees are prohibited from having lawyers and cannot see all the government's evidence relating to them.
Lawyers representing Guantanamo prisoners criticized their treatment and the government's system for trying them.
"The (reviews) are a sham," said Joseph Margulies, one of the lawyers. "They mock this nation's commitment to due process, and it is past time for this mockery to end."
Republican Sen. Jeff Sessions (news, bio, voting record) of Alabama said: "This country is not systematically abusing prisoners. We have no policy to do so. And it's wrong to suggest that. And it puts our soldiers at risk who are in this battle because we sent them there."
Referring to detainees, Sessions added, "Some of them need to be executed."
Republican Sen. Lindsey Graham (news, bio, voting record) of South Carolina joined Specter and others who said Congress needed to get involved to better define the process at Guantanamo.
"I think it would be tremendously helpful if the Congress and the administration came together with some general statutory language to help define what's going on at Guantanamo Bay, to better define what an enemy combatant is, to make sure that due process is affordable," Graham said.
Specter noted that legislation he introduced in 2002 on legal rights of detainees had gone nowhere.
"It may be that it's too hot to handle for Congress, may be that it's too complex to handle for Congress, or it may be that Congress wants to sit back, as we customarily do, awaiting some action with the court no matter how long it takes," he said.
The U.S. Supreme Court ruled a year ago that Guantanamo prisoners had the right to seek their release in federal court. But decisions in the lower court have been contradictory, creating what Specter called a "crazy quilt" of rulings.
Let the fight be over whether we be-head them with a rusty steak knife or whether we give them an OD dosage of barbiturate.
Okay--right before they went to commercial--the stupid AI guy said that our "values" is what keeps us "safe"? or something---
and Chrissy made a comment about the debate being about that...
If the debate is between those that think that our "reputation and values" is the most important and will keep us safer, than using interrogations techniques that just MIGHT make the prisoners uncomfortable, would...
Have they ever thought that there will BE NO AMERICA, if we don't treat these guys like prisoners...they still don't get it that these guys want to die...that keeping them locked up and taking away some of their prayer beads and oil might get them to talk....
I am so frustrated with the anti-war, anti-military, anti-American politicians, and journalists!!!
They should have the exact same meals as the three thousand innocents who were murdered on 9/11 have each day.
What would be funny to watch though is what would happen if Lindsay becomes more of a media favorite than McCain. I think it would be hilarious watching McCain start to publicly guy Lindsay for edging in on McCain's normal camera time! Of course, it also occurs to me to wonder whether Lindsay Graham is the top candidate for McCain's VP running mate.
Michael Smerconish is also a big buddy of Arlen Specter. He's your typical Philly RINO.
Nah, make 'em listen to Barbra Streisand songs 24/7 until they croak.
No they don't get it
And the sad thing is .. if (god forbid) we are ever attacked again and thousands are murdered because of the terrorists ??
These Liberal will STILL NOT UNDERSTAND
These Liberals are BEYOND Stupid
First of all, the Geneva Convention does NOT cover them. They do not wear a uniform of a Country. In any war in the past, if you were caught out of uniform by the opposing forces, you were excuted as a "spy" and there were NO questions asked.
So why all of the fatherly protections for these terrorist now? This is just another avenue for the socialist left in this Country to take down the Administration, and give this Country another black eye.
Start excuting these terrorist, and the socialist left will only scream and cry louder until they get what they want.
In fact, nothing this Administration does, or will do will satisfy the left, so why even try?
Get on with the war on terror and stop trying to coddle these socialist idiots! They attempted to make this an issue during the election, and they lost! I eman what does it take to wake up Americans to the real issue here? The left hates Bush, the war on terror, and this Country, and will do anything to bring them down, and not necessarily in that order!
Yea .. I know
But when it comes to the WOT .. he's not a RINO
I know! I shed no tears for these bararic savages! An interviewer the other day asked Arrianna Huffington what her solution was . Her ''intelligent'' answer was ''We should transfer them here to the mainland so they could at least have access to more social services.'' The interviewer than asked ''But what if they escaped and started lopping off heads here in the United States.?'' She then laughed and said ''Well then that is the administrations fault.!!! AAAAAHHHHHHHHHH!
They were actually glaring at the DemonRat committee members especially when it was intimated that the military was violating the Geneva Conventions and the U.S. Constitution.
Other thinly-veiled 'Rat insults and slander against the military were par for the course today during the hearing.
Good thing these fine officers have nerves of steel and years of training in self-discipline. I would have jumped over the table and throttled Spectre, Durbin, Feingold and Company with their own ugly ties.
Well, that's only dreaming on my part.....and that's why I'm not a general in our military.....only a foot-soldier in the FR trenches.
Leni
If I'm not mistaken, a lot of the reason for these people just sitting in Guantanamo without a trial of some kind is that the various "human rights watchdogs" have sued to grant them full American legal rights. They don't want them tried under a military tribunal system and so the cases are winding their way through the courts. So a large part of the delay is due to that....we can't try them in either venue until the decisions come down. That being said, it needs to be firmly established, and restated time and again by the Bush Administration (which they just do not do very well, in my opinion - instead of making this central point, they will argue all these minutia) that these people do not qualify for the rights and guarentees accorded to Prisoners of War and so do not fall under the Geneva Conventions. On the other hand, the libertarian in me is very uncomfortable with imprisoning anyone without some type of mechanism for at least periodic review and evaluation. That's not to say that they are entitled to the full legal rights of American citizens, but I'm also somewhat uncomfortable with the thought that any government is so infallible that they don't occasionally imprison someone under false pretenses. My fear is that, with no defined mechanism for review, that a "Cover your A**" mentality could result in someone spending years in Guantanamo when they weren't necessarily a bona fide threat. I'm not sure, however, how that review would necessarily be set up to ensure that military secrecy be maintained while achieving a measure of independence that would allow for a realistic assessment of whether the person is, in fact, a threat.
As for interrogation procedures, I would definitely intensify them. We need to fight this war to win it, not to make the rest of the world like us.
True enough. He's as impatient as Ann Coulter is with the TSA. I haven't heard him enough to know what his opinion of the border situation is, though.
They won't understand anything but that it is Bush's fault!
I missed a few minutes of the program and walked back in, just as Chrissy was saying that the dems were going to have it easy in 2006!!! WTH, does that mean? Why does he think the dems will have it easy in 2006?
Exactly!
Holding them without trial is ridiculous, especially considering the way many of these were nabbed ("They must be guilty, or why else would their rival tribesmen have turned them over to us for the bounty?!") We've admitted they were not all guilty, not all terrorists (quietly releasing those we can determine).
I don't want these scum to drag the USA down toward their level of barbarity. Perpetual imprisonment without trial is not the American way.
agree 100% with your post
AND...... your tag line.
NOT while we are still at war!
We didn't let POWs go in the other wars while the wars were still being fought, I don't think!
Smerconish and Specter also have matching hairdos, now!
The trial of Major André in the Revolutionary War is a sad tale. Washington wanted to spare the man, and he requested a firing squad, but he couldn't in good conscience do it..and hanged him as a spy.
oh! those detainees.
darndest thing. it was the worse case of suicide i have ever seen in all my life. they all beat themselves to death with a trash can lid.
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