Guantanamo Hearings Delayed as Legal Files Vanish 170
A user writes "The defense lawyers of Guantanamo prisoners have been ordered to stop using government computers for sensitive information due to security and confidentiality concerns. One News from New Zealand says 'In another case, system administrators were searching files at prosecutors' request and were able to access more than 500,000 defense files, including confidential attorney-client communications.' Due to all this, hearings were postponed."
What kind of moronic "defense" lawyer... (Score:5, Interesting)
Re:What kind of moronic "defense" lawyer... (Score:5, Funny)
the lawyer was working for the government.. (Score:5, Insightful)
..in the first place. why do you think they were using government computers? thus the problem isn't really that system admins of the defense attorneys lawyers were able to access the files. of course they were. but the problem is that the prosecutors are full of bullshit and are asking them to do that. of course, the whole court situation in gitmo is fucked up in the first place which is why it's in gitmo and not even at a federal secret court and prison inside usa.
so the problem is that the prosecuting and court handling site was not going to go about it fair and square in the first place. not that computers were used.
Most intelligent points by gl4ss (Score:2)
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so the problem is that the prosecuting and court handling site was not going to go about it fair and square in the first place.
Makes me wonder whether this is what Bradley Manning has to look forward to. Based on past actions, I'd bet yes.
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Do *you* really think we're "the home of the free"?
I dont remember saying that.
And WTF is "iteration of category" supposed to mean?
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Iteration [wikipedia.org]
Re:What kind of moronic "defense" lawyer... (Score:4, Insightful)
There is no requirement for fair trials for those captured in a war.
Yes there is... it's called the Geneva Convention. Yet the US have said "it doesn't count, because they're not proper soldiers", which surely means civilian law applies... in the country they offended in. Guantanamo is an illegal abomination, recognising neither military nor civilian law.
The hearings should not have been postponed -- the hearings should have been dismissed. If any other prosecutor had been caught looking at confidential defence documents, it would be immediately classified as "mistrial" and the accused would have walked on a technicality.
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There is no requirement for fair trials for those captured in a war.
There is no requirement in nature for a fair trial anywhere. But in civilised societies we have invented this thing called justice.
If you want the law of the jungle, fuck off to Somalia or somewhere.
willing to take the released prisoners? (Score:5, Informative)
There are plenty? Citation please?
I remember reading that finding countries willing to take them in was indeed a problem.
Countries to take them (Score:4, Informative)
Finding countries to take certain of them is a problem. The big problem, though (the real bar to closing Guantanamo) is the people who we know are guilty but can't legally prove are guilty because the evidence of their guilt was obtained unconstitutionally.
As a result, we have a class of people who are effectively permanent detainees.
Re:Countries to take them (Score:5, Insightful)
What is the legality of keeping them without trial indefinitely ? The right to a fair trial is one of the inalienable fundamental rights [wikipedia.org], to which the USA is a signatory. If they can't prove it, then the guys must be let go.
Pragmatically speaking: how many of these still incarcerated are a real risk ? (If they were in the first place.) I suspect that by no means all. So what is the purpose of continuing detention? I suspect some notion of revenge -- which belittles the concept of the USA being a humane and moral nation.
Citizens of the USA: what is being done in your name ?
Re:Countries to take them (Score:5, Insightful)
If it cannot be proven, they are innocent. What is being said here is that certain people are above the law and can decide without a court that someone must be held for life. That is a very dangerous precedent. If there is no evidence they may be wrong. In most of the cases that I have read, they were wrong. I accept that as we get nearer the end there are a higher percentage of true cases but it is the Bush witch hunt that has caused this situation, not the people in Guantanamo. If any one should be on trial is Bush.
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If it cannot be proven they are not guilty. They may or may not be innocent.
how can we take you seriously (Score:2)
Answer: ALL of them. That's why they're at Gitmo. These guys weren't picked up because they were jaywalking.
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They may have been picked up for loitering with a name similar to a known terrorist's.
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I ask because the other side has lots of evidence that these guys were/are doing bad things and trying to kill Americans. Drone video may not be admissible in court but common sense can pretty easily see bad guys doing bad things.
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What is the legality of keeping them without trial indefinitely ?
Who cares? [wikipedia.org]
The right to a fair trial is one of the inalienable fundamental rights [wikipedia.org], to which the USA is a signatory.
So fucking what? [techdirt.com]
If they can't prove it, then the guys must be let go.
Who's going to make them release them? You?
Pragmatically speaking: how many of these still incarcerated are a real risk ?
To the national security of the country? None.
To the corrupt people that run it? All of them.
So what is the purpose of continuing detention?
To protect the guilty.
I suspect some notion of revenge
Sure, why not...
the concept of the USA being a humane and moral nation.
PPPFFFFFFTTTTTTT.....
You, sir, owe me a new keyboard!
Citizens of the USA: what is being done in your name ?
You might as well asked the USSR the same question.
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What is the legality of keeping them without trial indefinitely ? The right to a fair trial is one of the inalienable fundamental rights [wikipedia.org], to which the USA is a signatory. If they can't prove it, then the guys must be let go.
I'm going to take a different tack than the rest of your replies, I think.
The problem you have is that while the right to a trial is fundamental for criminal accusations and punishment, it's NOT fundamental for 'enemy combatant' status, which allows us to hold them as POWs for the duration of the conflict. IE as long as Al Qaeda and such are still fighting, we can keep holding them prisoner. The standard of evidence to say that they're associated with said groups is a lot lower than criminal prosecution a
Re:Countries to take them (Score:5, Insightful)
"we know are guilty" often refers to people from places like the Yemen, where after US offered $1000s reward for any Al Qaida members of the local law enforcement could write their own evidence and name the husband of some woman they wanted. The whole system was broken from the start. A few thousand $$$ is a lot of money to a policeman in Yemen or Warizistan.
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They are **INNOCENT** until PROVEN guilty!!
If you can't (constitutionally) prove their guilt then let them go!!!
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Presumption_of_innocence
Oh, you are so archaically 20th-Century. Next thing we know you'll be demanding the right to apply for a job without taking a drug test. Or citizenship papers. Or all of those other pre-Reagan ideas.
Re:willing to take the released prisoners? (Score:4, Insightful)
Most of them did nothing wrong and are welcome back to their own country or any country with a valid arrangement. Some have been demonised to the extent that their country is willing to ostracise them in order to curry favour with the US and a small minority are genuine criminals that are not welcome home but are not the responsibility of US and should not be in US custody.
If you really want to read about it, I would suggest you start with those that have already gone home. One of the guys that went back to the UK had been held because his passport had been stolen, reported stolen and turned up in Afghanistan (he was not in Afghanistan) so he was a victim that was held for years. Most are just foot soldiers that defended their country, I suppose you think that no Americans would defend their country if invaded? If it is OK for Americans to defend then it is OK for these guys to defend and just as many Americans would want to kill Chinese if China invaded America, it is perfectly normal for these guys to want to kill us.
Very nice... (Score:2)
Most of them did nothing wrong and are welcome back to their own country or any country with a valid arrangement. Some have been demonised to the extent that their country is willing to ostracise them in order to curry favour with the US and a small minority are genuine criminals that are not welcome home but are not the responsibility of US and should not be in US custody.
Very nice post, except that it doesn't do the one thing I asked for - a citation that says that there are 'plenty' of countries willing to take them in.
As I understand it, while there are countries willing to take 'their own' back, and there's countries that are willing to take limited exceptions, there are a few that, for whatever reason, have either had their own country disclaim them or so muddled the issue of their own citizenship(Afghanistan not being great on records) that they can't prove their own n
Re:willing to take the released prisoners? (Score:4, Interesting)
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"Most of them did nothing wrong" citation pls?
Also at least 18 prisoners that were released from Guantanamo participated in attacks after release.
The point is that if it could have been proved they did something wrong, they should have been tried and sentenced accordingly.
Meanwhile, you are innocent until proven guilty. In a civilised society, if you can't find someone guilty of a crime, you should not be allowed to hold them indefinitely in the hope that they will eventually crack under torture.
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Geneva conventions covers flagged soldiers and non-combatants. These guys were neither.
The constitution covers U.S. territory, Guantanamo is in Cuba. Furthermore even within the U.S. armed combatants don't get habeas corpus or any other constitutional protections. Lincoln arrested and imprisoned thousands.
They are in a legal no mans land, uncovered by treaty or U.S. law.
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Geneva conventions covers flagged soldiers and non-combatants. These guys were neither. The constitution covers U.S. territory, Guantanamo is in Cuba. Furthermore even within the U.S. armed combatants don't get habeas corpus or any other constitutional protections. Lincoln arrested and imprisoned thousands.
They are in a legal no mans land, uncovered by treaty or U.S. law.
These guys where not picked up in Cuba, they where apprehended all over the place. 92% of them where not armed combatants, actually 86% where turned in against bounty money which explains that there is no evidence (hey, take about as much money as a local lottery for turning in that annoying neighbour!).
If they are in no mans land it's because the US has attempted to create such a notion, don't think the rest of the world can't see through it.
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Geneva conventions covers flagged soldiers and non-combatants. These guys were neither.
But they had not illegally entered US territories or bases during a state of war. No, they were at worst domestic criminals in their respective countries (and therefore subject to local domestic law there) or at best innocent nobodies who got kidnapped by a hostile alien military force.
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Geneva conventions covers flagged soldiers and non-combatants. These guys were neither.
During the Troubles, Britain had a long struggle with how to deal with terrorists, and made mistakes such as internment without trial. But captured terrorists were basically tried as criminals through the criminal justice system.
We didn't just round up anyone in a green t-shirt and shoot them in the back of the head, however tempting it must have been to the British army once they had identified someone as a probable terrorist.
So the idea that the US has discovered some magic new category of wrong-doer
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Please. From the article you cite:
"Spies and terrorists may be subject to civilian law or military tribunal for their acts and in practice have been subjected to torture and/or execution. The laws of war neither approve nor condemn such acts, which fall outside their scope."
According to the article you cite: They need a fair and regular trial. They can be held. They can be tortured. They can be executed. They just need a fair and regular trial. What that means is never defined.
Face it, there are no establis
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Please. From the article you cite:
"Spies and terrorists may be subject to civilian law or military tribunal for their acts and in practice have been subjected to torture and/or execution. The laws of war neither approve nor condemn such acts, which fall outside their scope."
According to the article you cite: They need a fair and regular trial. They can be held. They can be tortured. They can be executed. They just need a fair and regular trial. What that means is never defined.
Face it, there are no established laws or norms for these situations.
There are no established norms on how to handle kidnapping civilians from a foreign country? You speak as if all the people held where actually terrorists...
Some numbers released by ACLU after guatanamo had been in use for 10 years: http://www.cairchicago.org/2012/01/11/marking-10-years-since-guantanamos-opening-the-aclu-releases-report-on-guantanamo-detainees/ [cairchicago.org] - 779 detained - 92% where never Al-Qaida fighters - 5% where caught by US military - 86% where turned over to coalition forces for a bounty offer
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According to the article you cite: They need a fair and regular trial. They can be held. They can be tortured. They can be executed. They just need a fair and regular trial. What that means is never defined.
*Which they are not getting*
Face it, there are no established laws or norms for these situations.
Brilliant! Then anything we do is ok!
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If you seriously think it is ok to hold, torture and execute them, your morality is that of the Nazis. People like you and Bush are the ones who should be put on trial for crimes against humanity.
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Re:What kind of moronic "defense" lawyer... (Score:5, Informative)
You haven't really been following this story, have you?
The defense attorneys aren't military and some of them are quite outspoken against their client's treatment.
Not only the defense lawyers... http://harpers.org/blog/2008/02/the-great-guantanamo-puppet-theater/ [harpers.org]
"Davis submitted his resignation on October 4, 2007..."
"Colonel Davis is not just any JAG officer. He was an up-and-comer widely viewed in his peer group as someone in line for a star, and ultimately perhaps, to be the Air Force’s Judge Advocate General. He is also no whining civil libertarian, but rather a no-nonsense conservative, whose prior scraps with civilians in the Pentagon came over the restraints they put on his ability to charge forward and prosecute cases."
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Some of them aren't, but largely they are, hence why TFA indicates that the order not to use government computers for defense information came from "Col. Karen Mayberry, the chief military defense counsel".
Some of the most outspoken, from the beginning of the military tribunal system, have been the military defense counsel. (Also, some of the military judges. And, IIRC, even some of the military prose
Re:What kind of moronic "defense" lawyer... (Score:5, Insightful)
Much like the people IN Guantanamo, you're assuming that they were given a choice in the first place. They weren't. The US decided to imprison them indefinitely without a trial, what made you think that they'd start playing fair if a trial actually came about?
I have to wonder just how much of the military budget in that fading republic is alloted toward sheer propaganda. The fact that americans are allowing their elected officials to redefine the word "torture" so that they can commit it...it's baffling in comparison to the picture of the US I grew up with. I can only assume that whoever is doing PR for the military is a fucking legend because this kind of shit was what ended Vietnam, but now it doesn't seem like anyone cares.
RTFA: Defense lawyers are government (military) (Score:3)
> [What kind of moronic "defense" lawyer...] ...would use government (prosecution) computers in the first place?
There's a pretty big clue in the second paragraph of TFA: "The breach prompted Col. Karen Mayberry, the chief military defense counsel, to order all attorneys for Guantanamo detainees to stop using Defense Department computer networks to transmit privileged or confidential information until the security of such communications is assured."
The defense lawyers are, largely, like the prosecutors, U
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While I don't argue that what's happening at Gitmo is a serious problem, I often wonder how many people who label the US a dictatorship have actually lived under one.
Forgive me if you are one, but I've read that people who have lived in real dictatorships scoff at the accusations of dictatorship in the US. These are people who have come from places where speaking out against the regime results in prison time if not outright execution or disappearance; where entire families of criminals--sometimes crossing
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I often wonder how many people who label the US a dictatorship have actually lived under one.
Anyone raised in a patriarchal household (almost everyone) has experience with a dictatorship. Or are you saying that three children and Mom and Dad should vote on dinner with equal votes? Ice cream for everyone.
Just because the dictatorship is self-aware and knows it has little direct power doesn't mean that the decisions are anything other than unilateral. A dictatorship doesn't have to be malevolent.
These are people who have come from places where speaking out against the regime results in prison time if not outright execution or disappearance; where entire families of criminals--sometimes crossing generations--are punished for one person's wrongdoing;
And I know someone who came from that under a democracy. Of course, the democracy was false (armed me
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The presence of an election does not remove the circumstances of a dictatorship. Dictators often "win" elections with 75% or more of the vote (IIRC, Saddam Hussein won his last election with 99% of the vote). The presence of free and clear elections makes for a democracy. That country's government was not.
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Forgive me if you are one, but I've read that people who have lived in real dictatorships scoff at the accusations of dictatorship in the US. These are people who have come from places where speaking out against the regime results in prison time if not outright execution or disappearance; where entire families of criminals--sometimes crossing generations--are punished for one person's wrongdoing; where trials are conducted in closed court and often without the benefit of a defense attorney; where the military takes a position equal to or higher than the civilian government; and/or where a cult of personality that dwarfs the Obama followers ensures that the people not only obey but worship the current leader, sometimes under formal links to the national deity.
There are certainly issues with the US (and a lot of Western countries), but most of them are a long way from being true dictatorships.
... but sadly getting closer every day. "The true price of freedom is eternal vigilance," and when you see the enemy on the horizon you make steps to warn them off -- you don't wait till they're standing at the gate....
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You could use a bloody crayon and napkin instead of using the computers. This isn't their fault though the prosecution should be on trial for those tactics.
Lose lose for prisoners (Score:5, Insightful)
So now prosecutorial misconduct that would get any civilian prosecutor disbarred is going to indefinitely delay the release of any prisoners who happen to be innocent.
Wow. Only in America... err... Cuba.
Re:Lose lose for prisoners (Score:5, Interesting)
Well, the Obama administration has made the actual policy on Guantanamo prisoners very clear indeed several months ago: None of them will ever be released under any circumstances. Even those who are known to be innocent of any crime or terrorism. Even those who present (or at least presented before they went in) no threat whatsoever to the United States.
The reason we know this is that they shut down the office that was in charge of arranging releases of Guantanamo prisoners. Everything else is window dressing.
Re: Lose lose for prisoners (Score:5, Informative)
It's not entirely fair to blame Obama. CONGRESS told him in no uncertain terms he could not hold civilian trials. And Congress told him he could not close a "secret base" in spite of the fact that the previous president NEVER ASKED to use Gitmo in this manner.
For all the posturing in the media, the GOP LIKE the way things are. They LIKE the Drone bombing campaigns, they have the military ranks packed well enough all the Top brass is loyal to the GOP first because they keep funding coming.
Re: Lose lose for prisoners (Score:5, Interesting)
While the GOP certainly has created obstacles to the token efforts Obama has made toward cleaning up this mess its precisely because its in military courts we can hold the president almost completely accountable. The cynic in my thinks Obama wanted this moved into the civilian courts so he could duck responsibility .
Whatever happens in civilian courts the president could have simply said, its a judicial matter and I can't as the executive interfere. As it is he is the Commander and Chief, its certainly is within his power to insist the military tribunals be conducted quickly and fairly, rather than let the be the kangaroo courts they have become. It is within his power to move or remove any military personnel that interfere or obstruct that agenda. In either military or civilian courts its within his power to pardon; the ones he believes to be innocent could certainly be freed if he wanted to do so.
So I think we can conclude one more of the following is true:
1. Obama really does not care about the issue, it was all just sound bites to help win an election.
2. Obama does not think these victim's lives are worth the political capital it would cost him to see justice served.
3. Obama does not want them release now because of what they may now do, now that we have 'radicalized' them.
4. Obama does not want them release because as bad as holding people indefinitely without or with obviously sham trials does not make his and the previous administration look nearly as bad or as lawless what these folks may reveal if released.
5. Obama believes them all to be guilty and that justice is being served; independent of the integrity of the trial process.
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I'm going to suggest option 6: These people would prove to be very damaging witnesses to a war crimes tribunal.
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It's way more than mere embarassment.
Imagine this scenario if you will: These guys go to Geneva and explain to the International Criminal Court exactly what George W Bush had troops do to him. Germany is now obligated by treaty to arrest and extradite the troops (who are deemed war criminals) and send them for trial, which they can do because they happen to be on leave from the US base in Germany and are thus on German territory. The troops then (to save their own necks) explain to the courts the orders the
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Two, three, and four.
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You might want to fix your cognitive biases there. Saying the GOP is bad doesn't reduce the blame from Obama at all. He is the one who expanded drone attacks, clearly he likes things the way they are too. Obama had given up trying civilian trials a year before congress passed the bill stopping it (and in any cas
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I think he was very good at not pointing out that it was GWB who began all kinds of anti-constitutional , and yes, high treason policies as "torture is not torture", thus undermining our entire system of government.
That said, let's simplify this: considering the rules of courts make all evidence questionable in all cases, I call for people serving as jurors to first consider whether the preponderance of evidence indicates guilt, and then consider whether there is any way that there can not be doubt far beyo
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It's not entirely fair to blame Obama.
Yes it is. He had an office that was handling the release of Guantanamo prisoners. He made the unilateral decision to shut that office down, knowing that there were 86 people determined to be completely innocent by the kangeroo court system they'd concocted for those prisoners. So yes, I'm going to blame Obama for doing that, because he in effect announced that innocence or guilt doesn't matter, and the people there were going to be locked up forever.
Congress said they couldn't bring the prisoners to the ma
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WAIT WAIT HOLD UP DAWG
When we had a Democrat majority Congress and a Republican President, this was a REPUBLICAN problem.
Now with a Democrat majority Senate, a Republican Majority house, and a popular two-term Democrat President.... this is a REPUBLICAN problem.
Bull. Fucking Shit. You just want to suck blue dick because you are on team blue. Get it through your head- both sides want this. If either didn't, IT WOULD NOT BE A THING!
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So now prosecutorial misconduct that would get any civilian prosecutor disbarred is going to indefinitely delay the release of any prisoners who happen to be innocent.
Wow. Only in America... err... Cuba.
No, it's not really prosecutorial misconduct. (At least the email thing isn't.) It's more a question of technical incompetence. Prosecutorial misconduct would imply they were doing it deliberately in order to get the emails; the disclosed searches, at least, were *disclosed*--the attorneys acted ethically when they were told the IT guys had done overbroad searches.
Hunger Strike (Score:2)
Half [guardian.co.uk] of them may soon be dead anyway. With no chance of release, what good is life in prison as a PoW?
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Its actually not yet clear that the leakage of information (which appears to have gone both ways) was "prosecutorial misconduct" so much as poor isolation of IT systems which are used by both the prosecution and the defense.
"searching files at prosecutors' request" (Score:3, Funny)
So now the prosecutors are facing jail time for contempt of court, correct?
you can't handle the truth (Score:3)
and people who think like that get a code red.
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According to the story the prosecutors were the ones who informed the defense counsel that they had found the emails, and said they stopped reading once they realized what they were.
It seems the system administrators' procedures were broken, as they allowed the lawyers to perform discovery and access to information in a scope outside their legal authority to do so.
It is the system administrator's duty to ensure that the scope of any search request is limited such that the data that can be retrieved w
Re:"searching files at prosecutors' request" (Score:4)
Where do you think you are? Some country where "do as I say don't do as I do" doesn't apply?
A classic case of a kettle calling the pot black (Score:5, Insightful)
If these incidents happened in the so called "third world" or even in other jurisdictions, folks in the mighty USA would be saying somethig to the effect: -
"We're are better than them..."
"We've got more mature credible sysytems and established procedures..."
That's the beauty of living in a country like America..."
Plus all the rest of the verbiage that normally follows...
Question is: Am I wrong?
Re:A classic case of a kettle calling the pot blac (Score:5, Insightful)
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If another country had been willing to claim these guys and take responsibility for the future actions, they would have been released years ago.
Nobody wants these dudes.
Re: A classic case of a kettle calling the pot bla (Score:3)
Pakistan has repeatedly offered to take the prisoners.
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I actually think the nobody wants them argument is one of the only really reasonable excuses for the situation. Suppose the president decided to pardon some of the detainees he thinks are innocent. Where could they go? You can't repatriate them to a nation that does not recognize them as citizens any more. They'd probably just wind up right back in a cell somewhere, or killed.
You can't bring them to this country; it would violate immigration laws, and no-way is this congress going to give you a special
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but if you're holding someone with no intention of doing ANYTHING other than holding them indefinitely without trial or publicly presented evidence, it just makes you an asshole.
lol the 'asshole theory of foreign relations.' You should write a thesis. I'd love to see how that new innovation alters the balance of powers.
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lol the 'asshole theory of foreign relations.' You should write a thesis. I'd love to see how that new innovation alters the balance of powers.
I like the Ding Chavez quip from the Jack Ryan books: "International relations is two countries fucking each other." Or something like that.
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Slashdot doesn't use BBcode at all, it uses (restricted) HTML.
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If another country treated an American citizen like this, it would be regarded as a hostage crisis.
They aren't hostages - you missed that completely. I'll give you a hint.
They are Prisoners of ___.
Three letters, starts with a "W". Any guesses?
The Law of ___ (see above) allows prisoners to be held until the end of the conflict - no requirement for charges or trials at all.
John McCain was held as a Prisoner of ___ for 5.5 years by North Vietnam.
I think it is an interesting comment on your thought process that you might consider Khalid Sheikh Mohammed, plotter of 9/11 attacks that killed 3,000 people and
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They are not granted the rights of prisoners of war. The entire justification of their treatment is that the US does not consider them prisoners of war, and therefore they are not protected by the laws and treaties dealing with prisoners of war. If they had been they would be treated much much better and probably released by now.
Not that I disagree with you. They are prisoners of war, but somehow I doubt you would be able to accept what that means.
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The administration who had them rounded up in the first place created all sorts of legal fictions to make sure that they weren't treated as prisoners of war complete with the rights that accompany that classification in international law. The current administration just wants to sweep this whole embarrasment under the carpet.
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Don't worry. The rest of the world has been saying that about the US for a long, long time now.
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"We're are better than them..."
Well, that certainly does sound like something that certain people from the US might say.
They are being killed (Score:3, Insightful)
The US gov know they can not release these men. Not because of what the prisoners supposedly have done, but because of what the US gov has done to the prisoners and the effect their release and statements in free media will have.
Non of these prisoners will be released. Gitmo can not close until the last prisoner has died in captivity, and this is the beginning of the US push to reach this end.
Don't worry (Score:2, Funny)
Under Obama's policy, he just has to grant them citizenship, release them, then gun them down with drones.
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That may seriously be what happens at some point in the future. They all get tossed out the back of a truck in the Afghanistan/Pakistan border region, right before some drones show up. A few more unnamed "suspected militants" dead around the same time wouldn't raise a single eyebrow.
Re:They are being killed (Score:4, Insightful)
What is this "free media" you talk about, and can I get them here somehow?
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suw74isz7wqzpmgu.onion
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The US gov know they can not release these men. Not because of what the prisoners supposedly have done, but because of what the US gov has done to the prisoners and the effect their release and statements in free media will have.
Non of these prisoners will be released. Gitmo can not close until the last prisoner has died in captivity, and this is the beginning of the US push to reach this end.
But they have let some prisoners go, and those prisoners' stories have been reported in the media. But maybe not in the "free" US media?
It's not a secret what's been going on, except apparently to most US citizens.
Don't worry about the missing files (Score:2)
Missing the point... (Score:4, Insightful)
So, you're the prosecution and you're trying to build a case against a defendant. As the government's counsel, you have system administrators do a search for files that relate to that defendant. ...and discover that the defense has been using the same systems.
Do you:
A) Ignore the discovery, take the files, and use them to help build your case...
B) Tell the sysadmins to quietly stop searching those files, which MAY be discovered later...
or C) Tell the sysadmins to stop searching those files and tell the defense to stop using government computer systems, as they're leaking privileged information to the prosecution.
IMO, the ethical thing to do is C, since you want to make sure it's as fair a trial as you're capable of having, both as the defendant's rights require and to help allay issues arising in the court of public opinion. Personally I think the prosecution did the right thing in forcing the defense to take their files and go use a different system.
Keep in mind that the specific attorneys with the prosecution may well not have finished their JD by the time these people were put in Gitmo, so don't blame them for the slow government response and delaying tactics.
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A) Give them a fair trial in front of an impartial civilain judiciary?
or B) illegally bug their interrogation rooms, snoop confidential files, and hamper the defense at all opportunities, and hold the hearings before a non-impartial military tribunal?
Arguing what "should be" done for a detail under B is
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They may not get the same treatment if found guilty - some could get the death penalty.
B) illegally bug their interrogation rooms, snoop confidential files, and hamper the defense at all opportunities, and hold the hearings before a non-impartial military tribunal?
Good grief - you really believe that BS? I'll sort it out for you. Bugging the rooms would have been done by the intelligence agencies with no feedback to the prosecution unless it was in reaction to things like this [reuters.com]. The "snooping" probably happened as described - no doubt the systems were built and manned by the lowest bidder. It is the defense that has been hampering the movement of the cases with all manner of l
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C) Tell the sysadmins to stop searching those files and tell the defense to stop using government computer systems, as they're leaking privileged information to the prosecution.
If you don't want the case thrown out of court and face charges and disbarment you do "C". Anything else is idiocy, including the other options you listed.
Doesn't really matter. (Score:3)
These are kangaroo courts anyway. Real Federal trials take place before real Federal judges who are members of the judiciary, not military officers who are functionaries of the executive branch.
In This Thread: (Score:2)
ITT: People newly added to the terrorist watch list...
Obama (Score:2)
How's all this "hope and change" bullshit working for you Obama supporters? He was supposed to close Gitmo within a year of taking office. He promised. I guess he's not a different kind of politician after all.
Now he has expanded his war on terror, crossing boarders, using more drones, signing terrible NDAA's, etc. How is this any different from Bush, other than the fact that the US media refuses to report on it? The media no longer notifies of us soldier or innocent civilian deaths. How convenient.
Bu
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The CIA is not incompetent. It is malevolent.
Re:GITMO is an embarrassment and a tragedy (Score:4, Insightful)
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The funny thing about the CIA is that only their failures become public knowledge. Their successes remain very well kept secrets, by default.
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