Guantánamo Bay
Confirmation
of the nomination of Gina Haspel as head of the CIA has raised a lot of
controversy, given her past involvement in running secret CIA prisons, in
particular the first black site in Thailand, and thus she oversaw the use of
torture at such sites. As much about the extraordinary rendition programme
remains obscure, the extent of her involvement is unknown. An arrest warrant
was put out for her by a German NGO due to her involvement in war crimes and
crimes against humanity and she is thus unable to travel to the EU. Human
rights NGOs have asked for her to be prosecuted instead and politicians in the
US have asked for full disclosure of her role.
The UN Working Group on Arbitrary Detention has declared that the US’
detention of Pakistani national Ammar Al-Baluchi, one of five defendants
accused of involvement in the September 2001 attacks in New York, is “arbitrary, breaches international
human rights law and has no legal basis”. In a written statement by five independent
experts, his detention was called “discriminatory” and the legal process he and
his four co-defendants are subject to before the military commission system was
slammed for not granting the defendants the same facilities to prepare their
case as the prosecution, denying them a fair trial on the basis of nationality
and religion. The experts stated that his detention “contravened at least 13 articles
of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights and International Covenant on
Civil and Political Rights”. The Working Group further stated that “systematic imprisonment in
violation of the rules of international law may constitute crimes against
humanity”.
The
reason that led three civilians lawyers to leave the USS Cole bombing case at
Guantánamo in October last year, throwing the military commission system into
further disarray, was disclosed in a 15-page prosecution file to the court
obtained by the Miami Herald newspaper in early March, which stated that
the lawyers discovered “a microphone in their special client meeting room and
were denied the opportunity to either talk about or investigate it”. The court
filing to the US Court of Military Commissions Review was signed by the chief
prosecutor, with the prosecution claiming that the microphone had been placed
there previously but was not in use. The case is aimed at getting a review
panel to order the resumption of the case and was brought by the defendant Abd
Al-Nashiri’s sole remaining defence lawyer at the end of last month. The case
was adjourned in February when the judge asked for a higher court “to clarify
his authority as a judge in the Guantánamo war court.” The resignation of the
lawyers left Yemeni Abd Al-Nashiri without a capital defender in a case where
he faces the death penalty for his alleged involvement in the death of 17 US
soldiers in a suicide bomb attack in 2000 off the Gulf of Aden. However, lawyers
and NGOs have questioned that if the issue was simply an error, then why has it
been kept as a national security secret for months, and has prompted them to
ask what else is being kept secret. The resigning lawyers were not allowed to
reveal why they had resigned, and they claim that there is more to the issue
than has been revealed.
Two of the defence lawyers have
stated that several important details were missing from the account given in
the court filing. They said that there was no sign that the microphone was no
longer connected and contended that the government has never previously
provided that explanation in the five months since they resigned. One of the
lawyer, death penalty-specialist Richard Kammen stated, “This was the first we
heard the claim, and that’s part of the reason we don’t believe it’s true”. He
also stated that the defence team was already suspicious that its communication
with its client was being monitored following a previous incident, which is
also classified. At one stage, the judge dismissed the lawyers’ concerns about
monitoring and snooping into their communications as “fake news”.
In the case
involving five men accused of involvement in the 2001 attacks in New York, the
judge in the case said that he would “order Secretary of Defense Jim Mattis to
explain in writing why he suddenly fired the top official overseeing the war
court”. The reasons for the 5 February dismissal of Harvey Rishikof, the
Convening Authority for Military Commissions, and his legal advisor Gary Brown
were not disclosed. The judge stated that “We simply need to know why they were
terminated”. There is concern that Rishikof was fired for attempting to
negotiate a deal for the five defendants.
The Pentagon is planning to
demolish Camp X-Ray, the long emptied notorious camp from which images of
prisoners kneeling and behind fences in orange jumpsuits emerged in the early days
of Guantánamo. Controversy has arisen over this move with some claiming it
should remain open as a testimony to this sinister chapter of US history. The
Justice Department, however, claimed in a letter to Guantánamo lawyers that “the
FBI has created an interactive, simulated three-dimensional, digital virtual
tour of Camp X-Ray that shows all areas of the camp where detainees were held,
interrogated, or otherwise present."
The prison opened on 11 January
2002 with the arrival of the first 20 prisoners and was declared closed in late
April 2002, however since then several prisoners have since reported being
abused there after that date. One prisoner, Saudi Mohammed Al-Qahtani, who
could not be prosecuted because of the torture he was subjected to said “he was
tortured at Camp X-Ray with sleep deprivation, growling dogs, sexual abuse,
forced nudity, harsh shackling and beatings”.
Saudi prisoner Ahmed Al-Darbi who pleaded guilty to war crimes in a
secret plea deal following years of torture, and more recently provided
recorded evidence in two cases against other prisoners, was due to be returned
to Saudi Arabia by 20 February under the terms of the plea deal, however he
remains at Guantánamo to date. In a letter, he hit out at the Saudi government
for delaying his release, claiming that it has never done anything to help him
and did not even provide him with a lawyer. He stated, “And now
my own government is an obstacle to my repatriation. What kind of country
abandons its citizens in the custody of another government for 16 years? My
country won’t take a step that was agreed on four years ago so that I can
finally go home. It’s been my daily dream for four years to see my wife and
children”. According to his lawyer, Al-Darbi submitted his transfer request
shortly after he was sentenced in August 2017 and the terms for his
repatriation had been negotiated after he pleaded guilty in 2014.
Following a visit to Washington by
Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed Bin Salman, the Pentagon announced that the
repatriation process was on track, yet he remains at Guantánamo.
In 2014, Al-Darbi, following years of physical, sexual and psychological torture at Guantánamo and elsewhere pleaded guilty to a small role in a 2002 attack against a French-flagged oil tanker of the coast of Yemen. He agreed to cooperate with the US authorities on the basis he would be repatriated after 4 years. In 2017, he was sentenced to 13 years in jail, the remainder of which he is due to serve in Saudi Arabia.
Lawyers for Yemeni prisoner Moath
Al-Alwi were at a federal appeals court on 20 March to deal with the issue of
the indefinite detention of prisoners at Guantánamo Bay, more than 15 years
after the war in Afghanistan began. Al-Alwi previously posed the question to
the courts under the Obama administration where the judge responded that the
question of when the war ends, or has ended, is at the discretion of the
president; in 2014, Obama had declared the end of hostilities in Afghanistan,
although the warfare continued. With Trump’s stated plans to keep Guantánamo
open and possibly expand it, the case has new importance.
The arguments in the case hinged on
whether the conflict in Afghanistan now is still the same one Al-Alwi was
captured in over 16 years ago and whether the US government can still hold him
legally.
The arguments in the case can be
read and listened to here: https://lawfareblog.com/summary-courtroom-al-alwi-v-trump-oral-argument
The Ghanaian Parliament has
ratified the signing of a Memorandum of Understanding between the Ghanaian and
US government on defence cooperation which will allow the US military to open a
military base in the country and operate on a tax-free basis. The Ghanaian
government claims the deal is beneficial for the country and has denied that it
is in any way linked to the agreement made with the US to accept two former
Guantánamo prisoners, although it is not unknown for the US to offer trade
deals and funds to poorer countries that agree to host Guantánamo prisoners who
have no safe country to return to. In January, the Ghanaian government granted
the two Yemeni prisoners it accepted in 2016 refugee status.
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Extraordinary Rendition
In a case that will have serious repercussions for the prosecution of
European states for the use of torture, and possibly their involvement in
extraordinary rendition, in a review of the key 1978 case UK v Ireland,
in which the European Court of Human Rights deemed detention practices, such as
hooding, stress positions, sleep deprivation, etc. carried out by the British
military against Irish republicans in Northern Ireland were inhuman and degrading
treatment but not torture, the Court once again upheld this decision. It
decided that new evidence presented by the Irish government was not tantamount
to torture. These torture techniques have since been used by the US and British
armies in Iraq, Afghanistan and elsewhere. They were later banned in the UK.
The decision was a blow for survivors, many of whom continue to suffer as a
result of the treatment they received when detained without trial by the
British army in the 1960s and 1970s.
Confirmation
of the nomination of Gina Haspel as head of the CIA has raised a lot of
controversy, given her past involvement in running secret CIA prisons, in
particular the first black site in Thailand, and thus she oversaw the use of
torture at such sites. As much about the extraordinary rendition programme
remains obscure, the extent of her involvement is unknown. An arrest warrant
was put out for her by a German NGO due to her involvement in war crimes and
crimes against humanity and she is thus unable to travel to the EU. Human
rights NGOs have asked for her to be prosecuted instead and politicians in the
US have asked for full disclosure of her role.
LGC Activities:
The LGC held its first monthly Shut Guantánamo! demos outside the
new Nine Elms US Embassy in March. It was well attended in spite of the
features of the new embassy that are intended to deter protest. Our second
protest there will be in solidarity with the Iraqi people 15 years after the
war started there with the US invasion, backed by its allies, including the UK.
Please join us on Thursday 5 April at 12-2pm The address is 33 Nine Elms Ln,
London SW11 7US, nearest underground: Vauxhall. More details available at: https://www.facebook.com/events/157022028258385/
All are welcome to join us.
