NEWS:
Guantánamo Bay
Pre-trial hearings in a number of cases continued at Guantánamo as it entered
its 17th year of operation, and with 41 prisoners remaining. In the
case of Abd Al Hadi Al Iraqi, a closed national security session, to discuss
secret evidence, was held in a conference room near the Pentagon and not at
Guantánamo. The hearing took place over two days in Alexandria, Virginia,
without the prisoner or the public being allowed to attend or watch, and was
held to discuss the evidence from a possible cross-examination of Saudi
prisoner Ahmed Al-Darbi, who gave testimony against him last year as part of
his plea deal which could see him released. The move is a first, as such secret
sessions are usually held at Guantánamo and alongside ongoing hearings.
Al Iraqi is currently recovering from surgery on his back and his next
two-week hearing is scheduled from 29 January.
Pre-trial hearings resumed in the case of the five men accused of
involvement in the September 2001 attacks in New York. Lawyers for the
defendants asked for the hearing to be suspended immediately as meetings in
December between military lawyers and their clients were cancelled. One was
allowed only 4 hours of meetings out of a scheduled 16 as the Defence Secretary
Jim Mattis was visiting at the same time, and others were not allowed to meet
clients at all.
In addition, when asked if they understood that they could waive
attendance of the 7-day hearing, the defendants told the judge that they had
been subject to intrusive groin searches prior to being allowed to enter the
courtroom. The defendants called it “sexual harassment”. One defendant asked if
he could leave the court immediately and was allowed to. The judge was told that
8 January was the date chosen “to implement an approved Standard Operating Procedure that
permits physical groin searches”. Such searches have been carried out in the
past.
As a
result of these intrusive searches, two of the prisoners did not attend the
hearing on Wednesday when an army major testified to the court that following
the protest by the prisoners earlier in the week, the prison had stopped doing
this. Only one prisoner attended this hearing. Other issues considered during
the week-long hearings included the defence trying to retrieve government
laptops issued to the prisoners to help them prepare for their hearings. The
prosecution demanded that they are never given back to the prisoners.
In a later hearing, lawyers for the 5 defendants stated that their
essential duty to their clients is compromised by “a prohibition against fully
investigating the clandestine CIA prison network where the alleged terrorists
were tortured.” Without knowing what actually happened to their clients, and
being able to back that up with evidence, it is almost impossible for them to
challenge the government’s narrative, particularly on the issue of torture. The
prosecution claims that allowing defence lawyers to investigate could
compromise the case.
In a separate ruling in the same case, on
19 January, the judge in the case, Army
Col. James L. Pohl, ruled that he and the prosecution “did nothing wrong
in authorizing the destruction of a former CIA “Black Site” prison without
advance notice to defense attorneys.” Although the country the prison was located
in is unspecified, “from 2002 to 2006, agents kept their captives naked,
or in diapers, waterboarded some, rectally abused others, and used cramped
confinement boxes and hot and cold temperatures to break the men in their
pursuit of al-Qaida secrets — techniques that the Senate Torture Report mostly
described as ineffective.” Defence lawyers have asked for him to stand
down and for the prosecutors to be removed.
In the ongoing pre-trial hearing of
Abd Al-Nashiri, his civilian lawyers who quit the case last year over an
ethical conflict again refused to attend court; this was the third time that
Rosa Eliades and Mary Spears refused to either attend the war court at
Guantánamo or the Military Commissions headquarters in Virginia. Al-Nashiri was
instead accompanied by a single defence lawyer, Navy Lieutenant Alaric Piette,
who has no death penalty trial experience. As a result, a week-long hearing
concluded much faster, and the judge told his sole lawyer that he should seek “self-help”
and attend training to learn how to deal with capital cases where
the death penalty may be applied.
On 6
January, the two-year period during which two former
Yemeni prisoners, who cannot return to their country due to the war there, were
authorised to stay in Ghana expired. The Ghanaian government has acknowledged
that the two men were never accused of links to any terror groups and that they
have caused no problems since their entry to the country, as well as it having
strengthened ties with the US government through the agreement made to
accommodate them.
The Ghanaian government presented a report to parliament stating that
the two men, Mahmud Umar Muhammad Bin Atef and Khalid Muhammad Salih Al-Dhuby,
should be allowed to stay as they pose no threat. The Ghanaian parliament is
due to make a decision on the men remaining there. An August 2017 Supreme Court
ruling stated that their stay in Ghana without parliamentary approval is
unconstitutional.
Governmental financial assistance for 6 men who were sent to Uruguay in
2014 ends in January 2018. A two-year agreement made by the Uruguayan
government and the men saw them paid a meagre stipend and rent for their
accommodation until they find work. Finding steady work has proved difficult in
the country where costs are high, they do not speak Spanish and there is much
media scrutiny of their lives. Negotiations are under way and due to conclude
by the end of January to decide whether the support provided will be extended for
another year.
The Center for Constitutional
Rights (CCR), Reprieve and others used the 16th anniversary of
Guantánamo’s open on 11 January as an opportunity to file a collective case on
behalf of 11 remaining prisoners to challenge their continued detention at
Guantánamo on the basis that Donald Trump’s statement against releasing anyone
from Guantánamo, regardless of their circumstances, “is arbitrary and unlawful
and amounts to “perpetual detention for detention’s sake.”” The CCR stated:
“The filing argues that continued detention is unconstitutional because any
legitimate rationale for initially detaining these men has long since expired;
detention now, 16 years into Guantánamo’s operation, is based only on Trump’s
raw antipathy towards Guantánamo prisoners – all foreign-born Muslim men – and
Muslims more broadly. CCR notes that Donald Trump’s proclamation that he will
not release any detainees during his administration reverses the approach and
policies of both President Bush and President Obama, who collectively released
nearly 750 men. Trump’s blanket policy guarantees three, or even seven, more
years of imprisonment unless the courts intervene now.”
As a result of this challenge, a
week later, on 18 January, a court order the federal government to provide
information on its Guantánamo policy. In response, the CCR stated: “We welcome
the court’s prompt response to our collective action, and its order to the
administration to state its plan and intentions for the prisoners being held
without charge, including those previously approved for transfer by the
government. However the Justice Department may respond in court, the
administration’s actions and stated intentions have already spoken loudly.
President Trump has declared that no detainee should be transferred from the
prison. Accordingly, there has been no forward movement on Guantanamo for a
full year. Men approved for transfer are still languishing with no prospect of
release. Offices of special envoys tasked with negotiating transfers with
foreign governments are officially or effectively defunct. And the Periodic
Review Boards, while continuing in form, are devoid of real substance.
"As we’ve said before, context also
matters. The President has demonstrated, through vulgar words and deeds, his
animus toward Muslims and non-white foreigners. With respect to suspects of
terrorism in particular, he has gone so far as to call for overt torture.
It is plain to us that Trump has no intention of moving any detainee out of
Guantanamo, and won’t, without the intervention of the court. The only
acceptable position at this point is for the prison to close and for the men
who remain detained to be charged or released.”
LGC Activities:
Two events took place in London on 11 January to mark the 16th
anniversary of Guantánamo Bay. At 12-3pm, the Guantánamo Justice Campaign led a
vigil in Trafalgar Square that helped to raise awareness with the public of the
ongoing situation, particularly as no mention had been made of the anniversary
at all in the UK press.
At 6-8pm on the same evening, the London Guantánamo Campaign held a
candlelight vigil outside the US Embassy in Grosvenor Square with activists
standing in solidarity with the remaining prisoners by holding up images of the
41 men who remain. This was the LGC’s last protest outside the Grosvenor Square
site after 12 years of regular protest. The US Embassy moved to its new Nine
Elms location on 16 January.
In November, the US will vote in the
midterm elections, the first opportunity the US public will have to challenge Donald
Trump’s policies at the ballot box. Ahead of this election, we are asking YOU
to make an effort to join us, for a part or all of our demonstration, to send a
strong message that Guantánamo is not a forgotten issue and closing Guantánamo
must be put back on the political agenda.
