Some Guantanamo observers are telling investigative reporter Jason Leopold that the ethical breaches that have surfaced in the military tribunals over the past three months may actually be intentional: Nearly a dozen years after terrorists guided commercial jets into the Pentagon and the World Trade Center, the prosecution of the alleged masterminds of the 9/11 [...]
Based on recent statements made by Kuwait Ambassador Sheikh Salem Abdullah Al-Jaber Al-Sabah, it is clear that the Government of Kuwait is accepting of the US position that they can hold any Kuwaiti for however long and for any reason or for no reason at all. On June 29, 2012, the United States dismissed allegations [...]
The eyes of the world were on Guantánamo, as Khalid Sheikh Mohammed and four other men accused of planning and facilitating the terrorist attacks of September 11, 2001 — Ramzi bin al-Shibh, Ali Abd al-Aziz Ali, Mustafa Ahmed al-Hawsawi and Walid bin Attash — appeared in a courtroom for the first time since December 2008. [...]
When something is irredeemably broken, the sensible course of action is to get rid of it. However, when it comes to military trials for terror suspects in the Bush administration’s “war on terror,” however broken the system is, government officials and lawmakers have repeatedly gathered round to put it back together again, and continue to [...]
Since May 2009, when President Obama first bowed to Republican pressure on national security issues, and abandoned a plan by White House Counsel Greg Craig to rehouse on the US mainland a couple of cleared prisoners at Guantánamo who were at risk of torture if repatriated, it has been apparent that no principles are sufficiently [...]
A number of commentators have replied to Attorney General Eric Holder’s announcement today that five suspects in the 9/11 attacks, including alleged Al Qaeda mastermind Khalid Sheikh Mohammed, will not be tried in civilian courts for the terrorist attacks almost ten years ago, but will be tried by President Obama’s revamped military commissions tribunals. What [...]
Long ago, individuals from around the world came to America to escape kings and monarchs that had the power to treat people with utter distain, sending their children to wars on a whim, and imprisoning people without charge or judicial review, sometimes for life. For many, the behavior of these rulers became so intolerable that [...]
Those of us who have been studying Guantánamo closely were not surprised when, on March 7, President Obama announced that he was lifting a ban on trials by Military Commission at Guantánamo, which he imposed on his first day in office in January 2009, and also issued an executive order establishing a periodic review of [...]
For those of us seeking a grown-up debate about Guantánamo in the two years since President Obama came into office, the most troubling development has been the retrenchment of Republican opposition to the closure of the prison, backed up by alarming support for the pro-Guantánamo position by members of the President’s own party. Like a [...]
A Florida congressman is hoping to drive the last nail into the coffin of the U.S. justice system for Guantanamo detainees. Republican Representative Tom Rooney, a former military prosecutor, this week introduced a bill mandating that the detention facility at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, “remains open indefinitely” and requiring that “individuals detained at the facility be [...]
