Guantánamo Bay
“The US Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit ruled Tuesday [9 May] that former Guantánamo Bay detainee Omar Ahmed Khadr waived his right to appeal his war crime convictions under the Military Commissions Act. Circuit Judge Karen LeCraft Henderson authored the opinion of the court.
“The court ruled that Khadr waived his right to appeal his convictions in his pretrial agreement with the federal prosecutor on his case. In the agreement, Khadr agreed to plead guilty to all his charges and waive his appeal rights for a sentence not to exceed eight years. The court ruled Khadr “knowingly, intelligently and voluntarily” waived his right to appeal his conviction. Additionally, the court decided that Khadr “expressly waived the right to appeal his conviction, sentence and detention.” The court also noted the importance of allowing criminal defendants to waive their rights to appeal as a “bargaining chip to use in negotiating a plea agreement with the Government.””
A dissenting opinion was given by Judge Robert Wilkins who said that the court did not have the jurisdiction to review the plea agreement between the military commission and the Canadian former prisoner.
In a new case before the secretive investigatory powers tribunal in the UK, lawyers for Abd Al Nashiri have argued that the UK secret services – MI5, MI6 and GCHQ – were involved in his rendition and torture by the CIA. “In papers submitted to the tribunal, al-Nashiri’s barrister, Hugh Southey KC, said: “The complainant’s case is that the UK agencies aided, abetted, encouraged, facilitated and/or conspired with the US authorities in his mistreatment.” […]The lawyers allege the UK’s involvement in al-Nashiri’s mistreatment probably included allowing Luton airport to be used to refuel a private jet used in his rendition from Thailand to Poland in December 2002.” The UK government argued that the court did not have the jurisdiction to hear the case.
The 10-year sentence for association with a terrorist organisation, involved in recruiting for ISIS, given to former Algerian prisoner Saber Lahmar in France, who was never charged or tried at Guantánamo, was upheld on appeal on 25 May. The sentence includes a 2/3 custodial sentence and a permanent ban from French territory. His lawyers have stated that the charges were based on hearsay and intend to appeal to the French Supreme Court.
A new report by Prof Mark Denbeaux and his students at the Center for Policy and Research at Seton Hall University law school, “American Torturers: FBI and CIA Abuses at Dark Sites and Guantánamo,” includes new drawings by his client “forever” prisoner Abu Zubaydah of the torture he received. These images provide “the most comprehensive and detailed account yet seen of the brutal techniques to which he was subjected. Abu Zubaydah has created a series of 40 drawings that chronicle the torture he endured in a number of CIA dark sites between 2002 and 2006 and at Guantánamo Bay. In the absence of a full official accounting of the torture program, which the CIA and the FBI have labored for years to keep secret, the images give a unique and searing insight into a grisly period in US history. The drawings, which Zubaydah has annotated with his own words, depict gruesome acts of violence, sexual and religious humiliation, and prolonged psychological terror committed against him and other detainees. They were sketched from memory in his Guantánamo cell and sent to one of his lawyers, Prof Mark Denbeaux.”
https://www.theguardian.com/law/2023/may/11/abu-zubaydah-drawings-guantanamo-bay-us-torture-policy
