Friday, January 11, 2013

All Roads Lead to Guantánamo

All Roads Lead to Guantánamo
Friday 11 January 2013 marks the 11th anniversary of the opening of the illegal prison camp at Guantánamo Bay. Out of the 779 prisoners known to have been held at Guantánamo since January 2002, 166 remain. After eleven years, there is little awareness about the issue and the plight of the prisoners held in legal limbo on an island far away… The bottom line remains that everyone has the right to justice and fair and due process and to know the reasons for their detention. There are exceptions where torture is permitted.

As campaigners in Europe, the London Guantánamo Campaign is marking this sombre anniversary with a series of walking tours around London, covering the stories of five prisoners, and taking in the embassies of states involved in their journey to Guantánamo, to highlight international collusion in the torture and arbitrary detention there. Many prisoners were never in Afghanistan or Pakistan fighting the Americans in the first place but were kidnapped elsewhere and no one was taken directly to Guantánamo. Join us this afternoon to find out more…
The tours will take in the journeys of British residents Shaker Aamer (http://www.reprieve.org.uk/cases/shakeraamer/) and Ahmed Belbacha (http://www.reprieve.org.uk/cases/ahmedbelbacha/), both cleared for release almost 6 years ago, Omar Khadr, a child prisoner (www.freeomarakhadr.wordpress.com),  Abd El-Nashiri, a victim of “extraordinary rendition” tortured and imprisoned in three continents before being taken to Guantánamo (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Abd_al-Rahim_al-Nashiri) and Adnan Abdul Latif, a Yemeni prisoner who died in dubious circumstances at Guantánamo in September 2012 (http://www.nytimes.com/2012/09/16/opinion/sunday/death-at-guantanamo-bay.html).

No comments:

Post a Comment