Guantanamo Bay is compliant with Geneva Convention
So says a report by the New York Times.
A Pentagon report requested by President Obama on the conditions at the Guantánamo Bay detention center concluded that the prison complies with the humane-treatment requirements of the Geneva Conventions.
Does this mean we can cancel the silly Presidential decree to close the prison that was issued BEFORE anyone bothered to check to see if we were compliant?
It is amazing that an important decision like this was made without facts. Sounds like it was made for political reasons.
3 Replies to “Guantanamo Bay is compliant with Geneva Convention”
“complies with the humane-treatment requirements of the Geneva Conventions”
This seems to contradict a recent report about the torture of former Guantanamo Bay detainee Binyam Mohamed:
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/uk_news/7908481.stm
And even if these allegations by Mohamed (and scores of other detainees) are false, the fact is that Gitmo represented a black hole in American justice and a black eye for our American ideals of “justice for all.”
Innocent or guilty, criminal or enemy, every human being deserves their day in court, even if it’s a military tribunal.
I don’t believe that the Geneva Convention discusses the timeliness of court decisions of detainees. I may be wrong on that as it is a long and complicated document and I am definitely not a qualified interpreter of international law. However, from a layperson perspective, all I see regarding judicial action in the Geneva Convention is how a detainee is tried and the various punishments on him/her if needed. I see no requirement on a swift trial and in fact it appears that a detainee can be kept indefinitely without trial or release as long as hostilities continue.
I am well aware that there are claims of torture but it is not clear to me that this torture is is occurring at Guantanamo. If Guantanamo is simply a prison that is conforming to international law then why close it?