Posted on 01/17/2002 1:11:53 AM PST by Cincinatus' Wife
GUANTANAMO BAY NAVAL BASE, Cuba -- They are men without countries from a war that has never been declared. They are prisoners defined as ``detainees,'' caged up by the U.S. military on a slice of territory that is technically not American soil.
The 80 al Qaeda and Taliban captives being housed in six-by-eight-foot chain-link cells at this terrorist detention center are in a legal netherworld -- so far denied lawyers and awaiting the first visit by the Red Cross, expected today.
``We are determining their status. Their status is being determined by Washington, D.C.,'' said Marine Brig. Gen. Michael Lehnert, commander of the prison project.
GENEVA CONVENTION
The detainees' incarceration is being guided, though not dictated, by the Geneva Convention rules that govern prisoners of war, Lehnert said.
Yet, while U.S. officials decide whether to charge them in specially designed military tribunals, the circumstances of their detention are becoming a concern to human rights activists.
``It is not the prerogative of the Secretary of Defense or any other U.S. administration official to determine whether those held in Guantanamo are POWs,'' Amnesty International said in a statement. ``An independent U.S. court, following due process, is the appropriate organ.''
Human Rights Watch, meanwhile, issued a statement of concern that their open-air, cage-like cells and other details of their incarceration are not in keeping with international norms.
An example: The camp warden, Army Col. Terry Carrico, said last week that given the chain-fenced nature of their incarceration, captives could get wet by the rainstorms that sometimes roll through this corner of the Caribbean. But the Geneva Convention specifically spells out that POWs not be held in damp conditions.
CONCRETE FLOORS
The cells have concrete floors and are roofed with pressure-treated wood and corrugated metal. Based on a site tour before the prisoners' arrival, the cells are adjoining and prisoners will likely be in sight of each other. It was unclear Wednesday whether they were kept in adjoining cells but officers reported last week that the first arrivals, numbering 20, were chatting among themselves.
Moreover, complications for their legal status are plentiful, given the extraterritorial nature of this U.S. Navy base on Cuba's southeastern tip.
Miami immigration attorney Ira Kurzban recalled an earlier 11th Circuit Court ruling that placed Haitian and Cuban refugees outside the district. Its ruling said that the base ``is just foreign territory, and the U.S. is free to do what they want, even when it comes to refugees.''
No legal counsel has been available to the men, described by Lehnert as Arabic and English speakers representing ``an international community of suspected terrorists from all over the world.'' He would not provide prisoners' names, ages or their countries of origin but said they were ``a very broad representation from nations throughout the world.''
Some were picked up with passports, he said, to assist in identification.
Representatives of the International Red Cross and Red Crescent were expected to arrive on the base Friday, military commanders said, and would likely get to meet with the prisoners face-to-face, one at a time. Lehnert said the Red Cross role would be ``to act as an independent observer,'' of conditions which he described as ``humane . . . but not comfortable.''
`WAR OF IDEOLOGIES'
``It is a war of ideologies. It is a fight between free and civilized society and those who would control their societies and make them afraid,'' the general said Wednesday in his first political remarks in a series of straightforward clipped, Marine-style briefings to the media that began a week ago.
In Geneva, spokeswoman Macarena Rodríguez Aguilar said the International Red Cross team would be headed by Urs Boegli, the organization's representative in Washington, and would include ``around five persons.''
There had been no urgency to visit earlier, she said, because the team wanted to observe as many prisoners as possible to check out their conditions.
``I guess there is a bit of everything in there in that sense that they could be foreigners, not all Afghan citizens,'' she said. ``We don't have any exact list of where they come from.''
`TO THE FULL EXTENT'
Whatever the United States decides to do, said Michael Posner of the Lawyers Committee for Human Rights, it should ``use the law to the full extent'' and be ``as aggressive as we can'' to prosecute people directly tied to the atrocities of Sept. 11. But, he warned, the world is watching and the United States must establish a clear formula to process, charge, and eventually try suspects on specific crimes.
Finding them lawyers, however, may be difficult to do. ``They are unpopular cases,'' said Cheryl Little of the Florida Immigrant Advocacy Center, who was uninterested in extending the nonprofit's portfolio into the potential criminal cases. But she added: ``They are entitled to due process.''
While many Cuban exiles in Miami have expressed support for the operation in the prison framework of Washington's worldwide war on terrorism, refugee activist Ramón Saúl Sánchez said he disapproved of Cuba being put to such use.
``We refuse to be considered the Dumpster of the world, where they are going to bring all the undesirables of the world,'' Sánchez said. ``If the United States is not willing to open a single cell that Castro has built, why should they build another prison in Cuba?''
I know it was coincidence, but I found that phrasing very amusing...
Now, as to the Bad Guys' status, I don't think that they are POWs and should NOT be treated as such. If their "army" hadn't deliberately attacked civilians in New York on 11 September 2001, then I might think they were entitled to POW status.
Maybe after the Afghanistan government gets itself set up, we can repatriate these Bad Guys there for Afghani justice?
That is an excellent suggestion!!
What, they should have air conditioned cells, cable TV, and workout centers. Oops, that's a typical US Prison.
The U.S. does the same and is visited with microscopic critiques of human rights violations.
The difference? Singapore has already proven that it will not be cowed by international pressures.
Also, these Guatanamo spokepersons should stop talking to the press. Just gives them more ammo.
Was it international norms that prevented the over-throw of the prison in Afgonistan where the CIA agent was killed??????
< / sarcasm >
Except in Maricopa County, AZ. They're put on chain gangs and can't smoke. The horror of it all.
The LIBERAL media considers us evil.
I think these do-gooders should be asked to go in and massage the prisoners' feet.
Now that is just beyond the pale. Those prisoners are probably walking Superfund sites; even lower forms of life like Human Rights Watch deserve better than to be exposed to toxins like that...
I changed my mind about sending the prisoners back to Afghanistan for justice. Let's just send them back so they can star in a buzkashi match.
Let's send them where they'd feel welcome: THE BLEEDING HEART LIBERAL DEMOCRAT PAGE
Buzkashi: Rugby, played on horseback, with a dead goat as a ball. (grin) Send the prisoners back to Afghanistan to be the ball.
I am not even going to touch THAT one...
If they were truly POW's they wouldn't/couldn't be charged
with murder even though they had killed the enemy in battle.
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