From ABC News:
The United States should close its prison at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, and avoid using secret detention facilities in the war on terror, the U.N. panel that monitors compliance with the world’s anti-torture treaty said Friday.
The Committee Against Torture also said detainees should not be returned to any country where they could face a “real risk” of being tortured.
The criticism, contained in an 11-page report, followed a hearing in Geneva this month on U.S. adherence to the 1984 U.N. Convention Against Torture. The criticism carries no penalties beyond international scrutiny, but human rights observers say it could influence U.S. public opinion and hence the government.
The committee said it was worried that detainees were being held for protracted periods with insufficient legal safeguards and without judicial assessment of the justification for their detention.
“The state party should cease to detain any person at Guantanamo Bay and close the detention facility,” the panel of 10 independent experts said.
The White House noted Friday that President Bush said earlier this month he would like to close the Guantanamo detention center, but he was waiting for a U.S. Supreme Court ruling on whether inmates can face military tribunals.
“I very much would like to end Guantanamo; I very much would like to get people to a court,” Bush said in an interview with ARD German television.
U.N. investigators were invited to inspect the facilities at Guantanamo but chose not to, White House press secretary Tony Snow said.
[my emphasis]
Well, leaving aside how so august a panel would presume to condemn a facility they haven’t bothered to visit, what is interesting to me here is that the UN committee, in recommending no “secret” detention facilities, a closure to non-secret detention facilities like those at Guantanamo Bay, and no return of captives to their native countries, is leaving us with very few war-time options.
As the Moussaoui debacle showed us, enemy combatants simply don’t belong in our domestic criminal justice system.
And though the UN panel, in its wisdom, may be comfortable proposing that we put these combatants up in, say, a Best Western in Reston, Virginia, I for one wouldn’t feel comfortable with such an arrangement.
Perhaps we can just bus them all to the estates of UN panel members and let those defenders of freedom figure something out…?
****
update: ACLU applauds UN committee’s recommendations (h/t STACLU)
“U.N. Urges U.S. to Shut Guantanamo Prison”
Meanwhile:
“U.S. Urges U.N. to Shut The Fuck Up!”
oh, wait.
TW: wrong. heh.
Agreed. So why is it, do you think, that Bush “very much” wants to apparently repeat the Moussaoui debacle many times over.
Oh, and the UN can go fug themselves.
Gitmo constitutes a POW camp.
Keeping men there indefinitly under a POW-type status constitutes cruel and unusual punishment.
Close it down!
***
As to the so-called “Moussaoui debacle” what exactly do you mean?
What debacle?
The jury system did what it was supposed to do; consider guilt or innocence and decide on the punishment of the accused.
No debacle at all; the jury system made the right decision.
Yeah, I say turn Guantanamo into a casino and watch all of those UN fucks beat a path to its door. God, was there ever such a colony of useless fucking parasites?
:peter
Just what in the hell do you think you’re supposed to do with POW’s, Carl?
Maybe if we fashioned gitmo more like the north korean prison system they’d leave us alone?
Just a thought
Perhaps Carl has a spare bedroom for a few years. And maybe his lawn needs mowing….?
Carl,
Gitmo constitutes a POW camp.
We are at war, and they are prisoners from the enemy side. Thus, they are POW’s. What’s the problem?
Keeping men there indefinitly under a POW-type status constitutes cruel and unusual punishment.
So, you’d rather we let them go so they can attack our soldiers on the battle field again? Or, much worse, attack US interests at home and abroad? That’s kind of stupid, don’t you think?
As to the so-called “Moussaoui debacle†what exactly do you mean?
What debacle?
The debacle refers to the fact that Mossaoui was treated as though he deserved constitutional rights, despite the fact that he was an enemy combatant. The whole trial was a joke. I’m glad that at least he’s permanently out of circulation as far as jihadi’s go, but it could have been handled much better.
Carl: Please. It’s certainly not “cruel.”
And, the longer we do it, the less “unusual” it is. BONUS!
TW: “He carried the intellectual water for the coddler crowd.”
Moussaoui used the trial as a PR stage. As instructed by his jihadi trainers. All good jihadists will, as they have been taught, utilize a domestic criminal trial as a platform to continue to wage a PR and propoganda war. I didn’t say the jury system was broken, Mr. Goss. I said it was an inappropriate tool in this instance. As are American penitentiaries for incarceration of these enemy combatants.
If Gitmo is a POW camp, then the detainees most certainly do not deserve an American criminal trial. And they can be kept there until the cessation of hostilities. Given al qaeda’s “fight to the death” mentality, that could be a while.
“That eighth amendment is total bullshit unless it’s inclusive of barbary pirates and their descendants. I say junk the whole fuckin’ thing if we’re just limiting it’s protections to citizens.”
Stuff Jefferson Said, Vol 3, pg 261
I guess you have no problem with the last sentence, Jeff?
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/americas/4387460.stm
UN invited to inspect Guantanamo
The US says it has nothing to hide
The Pentagon has invited UN officials to visit the Guantanamo Bay prison camp, more than three years after first receiving the request.
Three human right monitors will be allowed to observe the facilities and question military officials but will not have access to detainees.
They better not send those terrorists to Reston.
Now Herndon, that’d be OK.
You know, there are other prisoners on the same island as Guantanamo. Doctors and librarians and so forth. Why don’t we propose a trade? Then the Enemies of the People would be forced to endure the diet-appropriate meals, recreation areas, and mail exchanges of the feared and hated Guantanamo Bay, while the freedom fighters of Islam could enjoy the finest prison facilities Communism has to offer.
If Castro locked up jihadists, would the left complain? Even a little?
bgates, Castro is an asshole and a dictator who persecutes dissenters. Given his treatment of homosexuals, shouldn’t you be his butt-buddy?
That said, he cares more about Cubans than Bush cares about Americans.
Because the UN folks would be dumb enough to believe every word of the detainees?
Nah, they’re not that dumb. They’re not even dumb enough to believe the Bush administration. Now, that’s DUMB.
WOW!
Oh? Give me some old fashioned NOT-FUCKING-CARING then, everyday of the week and twice on sunday.
leeds man is right. The UN refused to visit Gitmo after they were told they wouldn’t be granted access to the detainees.
Rather than, you know, compromise their principles by talking to Bush’s lying lackeys, they refused to visit at all, and issued their pre-formed conclusions anyway.
Color me unimpressed with the UN’s principled stance with regards to, well… anything.
But is that smarter than believing that the 30yr dictator of Cuba, who…
whom he imprisons, and whose people leave the country by the rickety boatload, who has seen his nation become one of the poorest in the Western Hemisphere, who operates gulag archipelgos in the traditional G.U.L.A.G. style, seen even Cuban cigars become cheap and worthless in the market, and operates a gangster regime, that said el jefe actually cares about his people.
Because that would be pretty fucking stupid.
“Give me some old fashioned NOT-FUCKING-CARING”
Vercingetorix, you have that in spades, mate. No need to ask for it.
Nice Gaulish name you have there, too. You sorry French bastard, you.
Sure, unless they’re caught reading the wrong newspaper. Then it’s fourteen years in a sheetmetal box.
So Leeds man, you want to apologize for Pol Pot while you’re at it?
:peter
Hey, Leeds man, tell us the story about universal healthcare again. Please.
Actually, chap, this blue blood is a bit more Engrish than than Gallic (as in half and none), but since my ancestors had the good sense to leave the peasantry behind where they belong, in the Old World, I can appreciate your provincial boorishness towards your fellow EUtopians.
Just saying is all.
Ask him about the dental part.
“30yr dictator of Cuba”. Try 40yr, you’d be closer, but still not that close.
Colombia, Chile, Costa Rica and Cuba are rated highest among the Latin American nations – 22nd, 33rd, 36th and 39th in the world, respectively
http://www.who.int/inf-pr-2000/en/pr2000-44.html
Can you guys get any facts right?
Well, lookie here, Jeff got some preening Brit leftie to sneer at us today.
Hey, Leeds man, isn’t time you got some sun down by the equator in the Worker’s Paradise?
Highest in what? Drug killings?
Bonus points if you can work in some sneering points about Maggie and Ronald today.
Wanker.
Peter Jackson (if that’s your real name), I’d love to apologize for Pol Pot. Unfortunately, I’m not Kampuchean. But thank God for the Vietnamese, who put this f**ker in his place.
Fidel does care about Cubans more than Bush cares about Americans.
He cares what they read, he cares what they say, he cares where they go, and what they do when they get there. He cares where they work, and what they do, so he tells them what that’s going to be. He seta their pay, he controls all of their purchases, and lest the left momentarily let us forget, he cares about their health care, except for when he’s killing them. Fidel really, really, really cares about Cubans.
Um, Kelly, why don’t you read the linked page to find out “Highest in what?”. Or is that too much to ask? Literacy is a lot to ask for, but I have every confidence that you are up to the task.
Maggie who?
Yours wankishly,
Wanker W. McWankerton
Hmmmm.
Fuck.
If we can’t keep the bastards in secret detention AND in non-secret detention. That pretty much means we can’t keep them in detention period.
So WTF? Are we supposed to immigrate the bastards now and give them a fucking green card?
Well I suppose we could give them a couple jugs of water and a ride to the Mexican border. At the rate the senate is going, we fucking might as well.
Hmmm. Quoth PunkAssBlog:
Quoth Leeds man:
Either “PunkAssBlog†and “Leeds man†are pseudonyms for the same guy, or they’re both synonyms for “hapless fucktard.â€Â
T/W: “blood.†A little too obvious, really. Anyway, I’m sure LM has some ultra-clever argument explaining how the blood shed at Gitmo is a million, zillion times worse than the blood shed in the prisons run by Castro and Saddam Hussein.
BECAUSE MONDAY IS RICE PILAF DAY!!
I have a counter-offer to the UN.
When the UN was formed by the Allies after WW II, it was standard practice to summarily execute the Axis’ unlawful combatants (spies, saboteurs, etc.).
So: instead of housing the suspected terrorists and giving them Korans, we’ll just shoot them all in the head, like the UN’s founders would have done.
BECAUSE NO ONE SHOULD HAVE TO EAT RICE PILAF EVERY MONDAY!!
Except what was Cuba ranked 50 yeas ago under Fulgencio for Health Care, child mortality,etc? Right, one of the highest in Latin America. And that has not improved, but actually atrophied over the years.
All these old lies and wives’ tales about Cuba’s happy place, you do know that they are not true, right, Leed’s man? Of course you don’t. How’s Blair’s universal Healthcare going, btw? Up in the frozen tundra of Canuckistan they are having fits with it too.
Odd that the Cubans are so much brighter than the English and Canadians, et al. And to be even nearly par, and yet have an economy of just $38 billion, $3300 per head. Or it would be, if it was even remotely true.
Let me know when the facts have finally wriggled through your brain housing group, tough guy.
Leeds man, I’m surprised at you. I didn’t bother to hit your link from the NYT(“We Are The World” edition) because I’m a lazy Yank. And Apathetic. And Narrow-minded. Or maybe I don’t give a shit about opinions from dictator-fellating lefties.
Take your pick
I’m going with choice “B.”
I guess if we had incarcerated some young nubile African females and traded them their meals each day for sex, Gitmo would be entirely satisfactory. Or maybe some realll young boys.
Isn’t that the UN standard?
Thanks, RR. Anyone else?
TallDave is right: by all the traditional laws of war, we have the right to simply execute any unlawful combatant (spy, sabateur, assasin, terrorist, etc.) we get our hands on – end of story. They are not POWs, they are unlawful combatants that we haven’t gotten around to executing.
In an act of remarkable forbearance and kindness, we instead house them in Club Gitmo, supply them with culturally appropriate food, religious books and better food than most of the inmates of the neighboring prison (Cuba). For this we are, of course, condemned by the world’s “human rights” organizations.
Good point, rls.
Note the moonbat methodology in the WHO rankings leeds man linked.
It’s what science ought to be. People get so stuck on empirical evidence, eh leeds?
utron, no no, I am the fucktard. Why else would I be here (punk whatever can speak for him/herself)?
“ultra-clever argument”. Here it is; the bloodshed due to Castro and Saddam is theirs to answer for. Gitmo is all yours. No, it’s not a zillion times worse. But it is yours. You’re not lowering yourself to their standards are you?
Vercingetorix, I’m not sure what you’re babbling about, but you seem to think I’m defending Castro. I’m not. I’m condemning Bush. Can you tell the difference? Also, I don’t think that Canadian or British health care is as good as it should be. But it beats your medieval system by a country mile. “brain housing group”? Translate, please.
“tough guy”. No, I’m not so tough, but I never claimed to be. Gad, you Yanks have a real inferiority complex.
the experts estimate to be the upper limit of what can be done with the level of resources available in that country.
Gah, that’s like saying “People with very little food ate extremely well, considering how little food they had.”
Here it is; the bloodshed due to Castro and Saddam is theirs to answer for.
Hmm, maybe someone could DO something about MAKING them answer for it. Of course, that might involve putting them in prison and serving them Rice Pilaf. OH GOD THE HORROR!! Well, maybe not.
Bloodshed at Gitmo? Are talking about the blood tests that are part of their routine health examinations?
I don’t, personally. I just detest smug condescension from anyone but especially Eurolefties.
Says it all, really.
“Peter Jackson (if that’s your real name), I’d love to apologize for Pol Pot. Unfortunately, I’m not Kampuchean. But thank God for the Vietnamese, who put this f**ker in his place.”
Put this fucker in his place…yep, before they removed him cause he got uppity on them.
TW: Things: Things the Ho Chi Mihn apologists would like to forget.
TallDave sez:
And it’s how the US winds up at #37 on the list with the highest per capita spending in the world.
Hail Fidel, and the revolutionary new science!
Oh so ironically named Scott Free; all Gitmo inmates were “unlawful combatants”? So you disagree with your own government?
Pablo, I suspect you may have a point, but for the life of me I cannot discern it (put it down to my moonbatness).
Kelly, “Or maybe I don’t give a shit about opinions from dictator-fellating lefties”. Yeah, but you just love you some dictator-fellating righties, dontcha?
Uh, Leeds man, our government has designated them as “unlawful combatants.â€Â
Yeah, but you just love you some dictator-fellating righties, dontcha?
Care to explain?
Kelly, if you don’t want smug condescension, get your country to stop acting like a spoiled infant.
If it were up to me, Gitmo would never have opened. But that’s because the sort of folks that went there, I’d have had them shot long before they had the chance to travel, in accordance with the Geneva Conventions.
As it stands, we won’t even let them kill themselves. We’re such bastards.
Sorry, mate. I’ve really got to look to IQ here. Occam’s Razor and all.
tw: period
Leeds,
You might want to take another look at that National Health Care System you have there. Through the eyes of a health care professional.
I’ll take Gitmo. You have a problem with it because…..? Maybe you ought to take a look at the prisons in Britain. I’ll match you Gitmo to yours meal for meal, accomodation to accomodation and of course, brutality to brutality.
Don’t feed the trolls.
Let me get this straight.
You know that everyone in Guantanemo is a dangerous, unlawful combatant. Everyone. No one deserves to get out.
Then why aren’t you more angry with the Bush administration for releasing hundreds of them so far?
If you’re not angry with the Bush administration for releasing so many hundreds of “the worst of the worst”, who were “battlefield captures”, how do you know there aren’t still more innocent people held?
The detainees deserve a fair, open hearing to determine their status; those that are held for no good reason should have been released a long time ago. Because they have not had those hearings, their human rights have been violated… no matter how nice the menu sounds. I find it amazing that there are Americans who claim that loss of freedom is so meaningless that we don’t even need to show that there’s a damn good reason to hold them.
Now, as for the UN refusing to visit… what good would a visit do, if they weren’t allowed to talk to the inmates?
If there was no human rights violations occurring, they wouldn’t see any evidence of any.
If there were human rights violations occurring, what would they learn, if they couldn’t talk to the prisoners? Would the soldiers confess to criminal acts because the UN is visiting? I don’t think so!
So, whether there are human rights violations occurring or not, the UN won’t find any evidence. So why would they visit? It’d be a waste of time.
Riiiight. No reason at all, ‘cept for being the brownish Other.
Their status is “alive and well”, by the way.
I’ve had enough. Five of you hammering away; I’m outwitted 2.5 to one. I know when I’m beaten.
They are getting a fair open hearing. Each one has an opportunity to present their case before a military tribunal. Some refuse to do so. Should we just release them? Some that we have released from Gitmo have returned to the battlefield and have been recaptured or killed. And , whether you want to admit it or not, there is a “damn good reason to hold them” – they were apprehended on the battlefield, bearing arms against US citizens.
There is no proof that their human rights have been violated. That you claim their detention is a violation of their human rights does not make it so. They are held in accordance with United States and international standards regarding “unlawful enemy combatants”.
If you are suggesting that we release all of them because there may be one or two or five or ten that were caught up in the net – I say sorry about your damn luck. They can participate and present their case for release to the tribunal.
Leeds, if Castro is wrong for his treatment of homosexuals, why is it ok to use a homophobic slur against me?
No offense taken, though, I get that a lot. I chalk it up to my tolerance of people of different sexual stereotypes, a slight lisp from childhood, and being frankly pretty for a man. But I’m not gay, honest – ask your wife or your mother.
Why am I the first to suggest to Leedsman the fact that the inmates held at GITMO have better health care than Cuban citizens?
Riiiggghhht
Leeds man gives himself one wit? I think he missed the decimal point. It’s .1, if any
Of course not, LM, since we’re not jailing intellectuals and dissidents (àla Castro) or hacking off limbs and feeding people into woodchippers (àla Hussein). In fact, as several commenters have noted, by not summarily executing non-uniformed combatants, we’re not even lowering ourselves to your standards.
Incidentally, I notice that Cuba is estimated to have a prison population of something like 55,000. Guantanamo holds less than 480 un-executed illegal combatants, housed under conditions infinitely less brutal than those enjoyed by any prisoner for any crime whatsoever under Castro’s caring regime. You’ve been yammering on this thread for nearly two hours now. Wherever do you find the other 220 hours in a day to lecture Cubans on the appalling way they’ve debased themselves into moral equivalence with the US? Moral equivalency being what you’re all about, apparently. You leftard.
A helpful guide from the people at something awful
Leeds Man pulls off a classic MENSA troll FTW!
What do the judges think?
Kelly, if you don’t want smug condescension, get your country to stop acting like a spoiled infant.
Leeds man,
Explain that Monarchy thing to me again, and how there should beno class differences, that is if you truly are a leftie….God giving right my ass……Privalege maybe
UN Speaks.
Nobody Cares
Film at 11:00
Thanks for the elucidation, leeds.
I’m willing to make a deal, since I’m a fair guy: I’ll do my part on my end to get my country “to stop acting like a spoiled infant” when you get your country to stop acting like the sole arbiter of morality and quit appeasing radical Islamic terrorists.
Deal?
Great link, SGiC! I’ll have to peruse it at length.
“So, whether there are human rights violations occurring or not, the UN won’t find any evidence. So why would they visit? It’d be a waste of time.”
Dude, its the UN. It goes without saying that it would be a waste of time.
But it would be good for the sake of appearances if they at least took the time to visit the site they are complaining about before condemning it.
Damnit, Jeff, me and the boys are going to organize and form a union until you can deliver us better trolls.
NO FLAME WARS, NO PEACE!!!
Meh.
Carl said, “Keeping men there indefinitly under a POW-type status constitutes cruel and unusual punishment.”
Yes, Carl, the cost to these men in terms of anguish and suffering is incalculable. We cannot put a price on the damage done to their spirit and sense of self as a result of long-term incarceration. We should be more caring.
That said, I would offer this cost comparison as well:
Cost to Operate Gitmo for 1 year: $95,000,000
Cost of Moussaoui trial: $2,000,000+
Cost of One M-16 bullet: 35 cents.
So in the final analysis it’s far better, in terms of suffering for the prisoners and monetary cost to the American taxpayer, to avoid capturing terrorists by simply killing them on the battlefield in the first place.
It’s really a win-win situation any way you look at it.
BINGO!!!!!!
AP:
Seton Hall Law School:
Do you Gitmo apologists honestly trust the authoritarian Pakistani government and Northern Alliance warlords to tell us who is a terrorist and who is not? Because that is essentially what you guys are doing.
AJB
What?
AJB, you’ve got to be kidding.
Certainly, that’s all scientifical and whatnot. After all, it’s a report and there are lawyers involved.
The so-called analysis of the Guantanamo Bay detainee reports has been long discredited.
As for Cuba’s healthcare statistics, WHO admitted a few years ago that Cuba’s official statistics were obviously faked but that they printed them anyway.
Interesting to note that the recent spate of attempted suicides at Gitmo, which our military guards were incredibly insensitive enough to prevent, were provoked by the prisoners belief that they were to be removed from Gitmo and sent back to other nations, including Saudi Arabia.
That’s right, these POW’s would rather DIE by their own hands than leave Gitmo’s horrific torture and humiliation to be returned to the custody of their Moslem brothers.
This is interesting:
And here’s the right-wing rag, the Guardian:
YOU HEARTLESS BASTARDS! HAVE YOU NO SHAME?!
TW: “moral” as in I’m pretty sure there’s a moral lesson in there somewhere.
Hmmm.
What a peculiar set of comments by “Leeds man”.
AJB said, “Do you Gitmo apologists honestly trust the authoritarian Pakistani government and Northern Alliance warlords to tell us who is a terrorist and who is not?”
Given the circumstances, yes. Or would you prefer we take advice from the child-raping, women groping, aid stealing, genocide ignoring, refugee abandoning , corrupt and flacid morons at Turtle Bay?
Would that make you feel better?
“Now, as for the UN refusing to visit… what good would a visit do, if they weren’t allowed to talk to the inmates?”
I think the UN reps weren’t allowed contact with the inmates because we were afraid that said reps would throw the prisoners to the floor and try to fuck them.
The UN is the most painful joke in the universe, and the lefties have gotten the population just about dumbed-down enough to believe these troglodytes who run it are somehow angelically noble.
Oh. And Leeds Man – You are quite entertaining. You should work for the UN yourself. I can tell you would fit right in. I have a friend who spent three years in a Cuban prison, and he seems to take exception to the “People’s Paradise” and the oh-so-caring Fidel.
Wanker doesn’t begin to cover it…
I have a question for those who would shut down Gitmo. Please remember that these are very dangerous individuals. If you don’t believe that, at least accept the the government does. We aren’t going to let them or others captured under the same conditions go. We aren’t going to capture al Qaeda front line troops to give them all civil rights. It just isn’t going to happen.
Unless facilities like Guantanamo exist we are going to have to stop capturing them. So, your choice, a prison that offends some of your fine sensabilities or raise the black flag and kill them all. Al Qaeda declared a war of no quarter some time ago. You want to emulate them?