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.
Chrissy says all the dims have to do in '06 is run on no ss reform. tell the people that the repubs want to take it away. Jeezzzz!
One thing that Graham said was that the Congress needs get more involved, in that THEY need to decide what will be considered humane treatment, what type of hearing/trial they will get, etc...
I just don't see how it should be done in any other way than a military tribunal system...we can't try them like American citizens in OUR courts...
We should try them, like they tried detainees from WW11--Nurmenberg Trials, was it?
BUT, anyone that cares about Americans, not America's reputation, first wouldn't want them let out while we are still at war in their countries...
Quote: 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.
From what I've been reading the left only says charge them or set them free. If theya re guilty shoot them or imprison them
How long will it be before gun owners are put away for having illegal guns(not registered), or bibles etc. You are reading this as republicans will always be in power and our own citizens rights will remain status quo. . Hard to say what kind of gov't we'll have in 20 years.
I've got a solution: establish that they can be held for up to 10 years... If at the end of that time, they are no longer giving useful information, or they are perceived as no longer being a threat to American citizens, soldiers, cities or infrastructure, they can then be released back to their home countries. If not, they can be detained for another 10 years.
Seems fair to me.
I'm almost ashamed to admit watching hardball but i like to keep an eye on the msm insurgency.
Quote: 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!
I know what you are saying but i fear we are heading down a slippery slope. Their right to a trial is impeded today but ours as citizens will be tomorrow when christianity is hailed as a hate crime.
If we let the libs have THEIR way, in 20 years this country will be Islamic and MY granddaughters will be in burqas!!!
I don't care what the rest of the world thinks of us---if they are honest, they KNOW we are the most humane, caring, and financially responsible country in the world...
I think there are probably more COUNTRIES that like us, than DEMOCRATS!
You are so right. But let's go even further and give all of them the ultimate torture -- send them home.
I agree....if they are a threat, they shouldn't be let out. My only concern isn't about their treatment, per se. I am just uncomfortable with the concept of no appeal for review ever. Even the most virtuous government or person, with the best of intentions makes mistakes. I'm just not sure of the best mechanism to ensure a fair, unbiased review (free from a CYA mentality if a mistake had been made) that would also maintain the required military and intelligence secrecy.
In shark infested waters. :-)
Ummmm, they are jailed.
Let me ask you something---
WHAT has America ever done in the past, that would make you think that we would keep these people forever, without at least establishing what their intentions were, and are, and will be?
I know, the Japanese internment camps were awful (wasn't that a democrat President that did that?)---but we didn't keep them forever!!!! And, even after blowing up two of the biggest cities in Japan, we have established friendship with the country...
Bush's Doctrine is one of establishing democratic type governments in the whole world, but especially the Middle East, so I have no doubt that when the time comes, the ones that deserve to be let free, will go free...
BESIDES, we have US citizens that will be in cells for the rest of their lives, with only 1 hour of outside...I think Scott Peterson is one, at least for a while...
THESE guys are living better than the would be in Afghanistan...and it hasn't been THAT long, only a couple of years...how long was John McCain a POW, 5 years?
Well, what troubles me was reinforced by the testimony today. There is no endpoint given and when a government says that they can hold people in perpetuity without some type of review, I get nervous. And, like the Founding Fathers, I recognize human nature for what it is. They didn't trust themselves with absolute power and put strict provisions into place to try to minimize the ability of the government to accumulate power. The Founding Fathers, and many philosophers and ethicists before them recognize that even people with the purest intentions can sometimes err. I'm not saying we need to turn these people over to the International Criminal Court and Amnesty International and, in fact, would disapprove of that sort of oversight. I am not an internationalist or globalist in any sense. But I do think that there does need to be some sort of confidential review of these cases from time to time. To trust any government, even the U.S. government, with something approaching absolute power in any area just makes me take pause.
Okay---we agree to that much!
Unfortunately, the courts in the US, have made this a lot more difficult than it should be..
They are the ones that are saying that Military tribunals aren't good enough for these detaineed..
BTW, on C-span right NOW, you can see a replay of today's hearing about Gitmo!
If the choice is which government to trust in this situation, and most others involving fair and equal treatment, a large part of the world's population would elect to trust our government.
All the blather is democrats in a futile attempt to regain power. They cannot fathom the people of America spoke last November and the Republican's method of government was the favorite. May change in the future, but '06 will only confirm "who we trust."
The other thing that drives me crazy is the open-endedness of some of the definitions in laws and regulations. These thing are written in such a way as to be nearly unreadable instead of being written in plain English, they get translated into bureaucratese - references to previous rules and regulations, subsections, paragraphs, etc. And yet, when you look for definitions of simple terms, they are very open-ended. And while we might trust the current administration, there will come a time when someone less "trustworthy" or ethical may misuse what today is not misused or will use it in ways that it was never intended. RICO statutes are a perfect example. They were passed by Congress to aid in the prosecution of organized crime families. Yet 20 years later, they are being used against pro-life groups. The recently passed Real ID act contains a provision that applies to the building of that fence between Mexico and California. It states that the director of Homeland Security can void any law, statute or regulation that HE, and he alone, deems necessary to complete that fence. However, it also specifically states that his decision is not reviewable by anyone and he alone gets to make the determination about which laws are standing in his way. While I realize it's an extreme example, if he decided tomorrow to invalidate something totally unrelated like the entire No Child Left Behind bill, there is no mechanism in place to challenge it since it specifically states he alone makes the determination and it is not reviewable. A remote possibility I concede....but only because we trust them not to use it that way. The Founding Fathers knew that such trust was always misplaced. That's why they tried to give us a fixed Constitution, not a living one!
Again, I don't trust anyone...Democrats, Republicans or the French. It is human nature to acquire power. That is why the Constitution places limits on government power. We ignore them at our peril.
Where are the 9/11 families ?
I can't imagine that even the most liberal of them are pleased that so many Democrats and the usual Republicans are defending the terrorists.
I have come to the conclusion that Democrats, the UR ( usual Republicans ), Islamic terrorists and their sympathizers
( see above ) have got to be the most pampered, effeminate, easily offended, baby cats to inhabit the planet.
Anyone who has gone through BCT in any of the branches is laughing their asses off at the hysteria over rooms that are too cold or too hot.
Nevermind SEALS, RANGERS, Delta and all manner of SF.
A night in a heavily air conditioned room, even in the "unspeakable " fetal position is like being in a 5 star resort to Special Ops.
I suggest that we have a Gitmo "In " where many of us-young and old, male and female,
show up and spend the night in a hot room or a cold room to demonstrate that it is not intolerable or inhumane or a national embarrassment ( see the US Senate).
Just as long as we get our lemon fish with two fresh vegetables, rice pilaf, two fruits , a new Bible and five prayer meetings a day.
Works for me.
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