Posted on 09/11/2005 8:34:19 AM PDT by jmc1969
The latest: Scores or even hundreds of inmates at the U.S. military base in Guantanamo Bay are entering the second month of a hunger strike that has led to the hospitalization of at least 15 prisoners, according to the Pentagon and defense lawyers.
Many detainees and their lawyers believe some fasters may starve to death to protest conditions at the controversial military outpost in Cuba. Thirteen inmates are being force-fed intravenously.
"People will definitely die," detainee Binyam Mohammed, an Ethiopian-born British resident, said in one of several statements from inmates that defense lawyers recently declassified.
"Bobby Sands petitioned the British government to stop the illegitimate internment of Irishmen without trial," Mohammed continued, referring to a famous Irish Republican Army inmate who died during a hunger strike in a British prison in 1981. "Nobody should believe for one moment that my brothers here have less courage."
• : The Pentagon denied wrongdoing and said that it is "constantly looking for ways to improve conditions" for detainees.
Defense attorneys said more than 200 inmates are fasting but some are accepting small amounts of liquid or occasional meals to prolong the strike.
• "Dire situation": Prisoners are demanding trials in U.S. courts, as well as such improvements as better food, bottled drinking water, more reading materials and greater religious freedoms.
"It's a dire situation because the military is refusing reasonable negotiation," said Clive Stafford Smith, a prominent British attorney representing several detainees.
• Grisly scene: The detainees' statements paint a scene of gruesome desperation during the previous hunger strike, with prisoners vomiting blood or collapsing in their cells.
Detainee Omar Deghayes, a Libyan-born British resident, adding that he felt "like dead" from fasting. "... I think things are getting worse and it will go out of control," he added.
(Excerpt) Read more at startribune.com ...
boo F'in hoo
That's nobody's fault but theirs if they want to starve themselves to death.
One of their lawyers was on the BBC/NPR the other day, wailing over their clients' plight and lying through his teeth.
The title is most certainly wrong: not "deaths feared", but "deaths hoped for" - the lemon chickens used there could more gainfully be fed to more deserving recipients. Why waste food?
This will not bode well for the US. One more thing for the international community to bash us with.
"• Grisly scene: The detainees' statements paint a scene of gruesome desperation during the previous hunger strike, with prisoners vomiting blood or collapsing in their cells."
What, no webcam?
Not feared by me.
Good! Serves the Al Qaeda and Taliban vermin right...
I read it twice. I must have missed the downside..
sniffle
We love life they love death.
If they choose to starve instead of eating almond-crusted salmon on a bed of rice pilaf, it's hard to get all teary-eyed.
"Deaths feared..."?
HA! They'll just free up space for more interrogations. Letting these COMBATANTS see lawyers was the worst thing the gov't did. Who do you think gave them the idea to fast in protest?
Conditions in Gitmo are perfectly fine and these freaks live better than most soldiers in our military. Notice how once Bush started flying all the congress down there for tours all the bashing stopped......
....let the a$$holes die from starvation, at least they won't be released so that they can go back to the battlefield to try to kill more US soldiers.
Prepare the panty death masks.
bump
Muslim logic never fails to amaze me.
Threaten to sprinkle them with pig blood when they die, that will stop'em.
On second thought, don't...
I'm trying to actually give a damn but I just can't seem to muster any sympathy. Just as those 19 hijackers decided that they hate America so much that they would die so that they can take others with them I have no sympathy for muslims slowing committing suicide by starving themselves. It's their choice.
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