A death at Gitmo (5)
HealthyLiving: By Marc Falkoff
September 20, 2012
On Sept. 8, one of my nightmares came true. Adnan Farhan Abdul Latif, a client of mine who had been held at the Guantanamo Bay detention facility in Cuba for more than 10 years, died alone in his cell. His tragic death will surely be greeted with a shrug by some, but it should prompt all of us to reconsider our decision to continue the operation of our infamous offshore prison camp.
Adnan was brought to Guantanamo in January 2002 on suspicion of being associated in some manner with enemy forces in Afghanistan. It's hard to say exactly what the U.S. military thought Adnan had done. Over the years, the government made allegations and then abandoned them.
At one point, the government accused Adnan of "associating" with Al Qaeda. But the military never produced any credible evidence to sustain the charge, so the government dropped it. More recently, the government argued that it was lawful to detain Adnan for 10 years or more at Guantanamo because it believed he had served as a Taliban foot soldier for a few weeks before the U.S. began bombing Afghanistan.
But even this diminished allegation could not be proved, as U.S. District Judge Henry H. Kennedy Jr. determined in 2010. Adnan's story was that he went to Afghanistan in late 2001 to receive charitable medical treatment for a head injury from an auto accident he had suffered in Yemen several years earlier. He had hospital records to corroborate his story.
In contrast, the government produced a single, error-ridden, hearsay report, drafted by an unnamed government agent in the fog of war, stating that Adnan had "confessed" to working with the Taliban. Kennedy found the document unreliable and ordered the military to release him.
The judge's decision shocked few. Indeed, the grimmest fact about Adnan's death is that since early in his detention, no one really thought he should be at Guantanamo at all. During the Bush administration, the military recommended Adnan for transfer at least three times — in 2004, 2006 and 2008.
Then, when President Obama came into office, a task force reviewed all the evidence in Adnan's case and again recommended him for repatriation to Yemen in 2009. We lawyers who represented him weren't allowed to reveal that information to the public until now. It was protected as a state secret until after Adnan's death.
The real shock was that Obama chose to appeal the district court's order to release a prisoner whom his own task force had (privately) already designated for transfer home. Why the appeal? To all appearances, the new administration, like the old one, was chiefly concerned with limiting the power of the courts in wartime. The president's challenge went to the Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit, which had been openly hostile to claims from war on terror detainees and which had been reversed in Guantanamo cases three times in the last decade by the Supreme Court.
The result was that last year the appeals court, in a widely criticized 2-1 ruling, vacated Kennedy's order and remanded the case for a do-over. The dissenting judge criticized the majority for "moving the goal posts" in the government's favor.
Read the rest here:
September 20, 2012
On Sept. 8, one of my nightmares came true. Adnan Farhan Abdul Latif, a client of mine who had been held at the Guantanamo Bay detention facility in Cuba for more than 10 years, died alone in his cell. His tragic death will surely be greeted with a shrug by some, but it should prompt all of us to reconsider our decision to continue the operation of our infamous offshore prison camp.
Adnan was brought to Guantanamo in January 2002 on suspicion of being associated in some manner with enemy forces in Afghanistan. It's hard to say exactly what the U.S. military thought Adnan had done. Over the years, the government made allegations and then abandoned them.
At one point, the government accused Adnan of "associating" with Al Qaeda. But the military never produced any credible evidence to sustain the charge, so the government dropped it. More recently, the government argued that it was lawful to detain Adnan for 10 years or more at Guantanamo because it believed he had served as a Taliban foot soldier for a few weeks before the U.S. began bombing Afghanistan.
But even this diminished allegation could not be proved, as U.S. District Judge Henry H. Kennedy Jr. determined in 2010. Adnan's story was that he went to Afghanistan in late 2001 to receive charitable medical treatment for a head injury from an auto accident he had suffered in Yemen several years earlier. He had hospital records to corroborate his story.
In contrast, the government produced a single, error-ridden, hearsay report, drafted by an unnamed government agent in the fog of war, stating that Adnan had "confessed" to working with the Taliban. Kennedy found the document unreliable and ordered the military to release him.
The judge's decision shocked few. Indeed, the grimmest fact about Adnan's death is that since early in his detention, no one really thought he should be at Guantanamo at all. During the Bush administration, the military recommended Adnan for transfer at least three times — in 2004, 2006 and 2008.
Then, when President Obama came into office, a task force reviewed all the evidence in Adnan's case and again recommended him for repatriation to Yemen in 2009. We lawyers who represented him weren't allowed to reveal that information to the public until now. It was protected as a state secret until after Adnan's death.
The real shock was that Obama chose to appeal the district court's order to release a prisoner whom his own task force had (privately) already designated for transfer home. Why the appeal? To all appearances, the new administration, like the old one, was chiefly concerned with limiting the power of the courts in wartime. The president's challenge went to the Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit, which had been openly hostile to claims from war on terror detainees and which had been reversed in Guantanamo cases three times in the last decade by the Supreme Court.
The result was that last year the appeals court, in a widely criticized 2-1 ruling, vacated Kennedy's order and remanded the case for a do-over. The dissenting judge criticized the majority for "moving the goal posts" in the government's favor.
Read the rest here:
So sad. Just shows that irrespective of whether its a Republican or Democrat Govt in US, the Billionaire Club with vested interests always wins and spells doom on the non-white world.
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harry_bahrain: the Billionaire Club with vested interests always wins
Somewhere in the past Warren Buffett stated something like this:::: ""In a fight between Billionaires and the poor,Billionaires always win"".------- This thread is Archived ------
The best example of denial of the right to a fair trial: imprisoned without charges or prisoners of war without the rights of international conventions.
------ This thread is Archived ------
GUZMAN1: The best example of denial of the right to a fair trial: imprisoned without charges or prisoners of war without the rights of international conventions.
I suppose they threw away the Geneva Convention?
They have passed laws giving them the right to detain U.S. citizens without charges, indefinitely, too!
What a sad bunch of Beasts!
I'm talking about OUR Representatives and that man living in the White House and those before him.
HL
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September 20, 2012
On Sept. 8, one of my nightmares came true. Adnan Farhan Abdul Latif, a client of mine who had been held at the Guantanamo Bay detention facility in Cuba for more than 10 years, died alone in his cell. His tragic death will surely be greeted with a shrug by some, but it should prompt all of us to reconsider our decision to continue the operation of our infamous offshore prison camp.
Adnan was brought to Guantanamo in January 2002 on suspicion of being associated in some manner with enemy forces in Afghanistan. It's hard to say exactly what the U.S. military thought Adnan had done. Over the years, the government made allegations and then abandoned them.
At one point, the government accused Adnan of "associating" with Al Qaeda. But the military never produced any credible evidence to sustain the charge, so the government dropped it. More recently, the government argued that it was lawful to detain Adnan for 10 years or more at Guantanamo because it believed he had served as a Taliban foot soldier for a few weeks before the U.S. began bombing Afghanistan.
But even this diminished allegation could not be proved, as U.S. District Judge Henry H. Kennedy Jr. determined in 2010. Adnan's story was that he went to Afghanistan in late 2001 to receive charitable medical treatment for a head injury from an auto accident he had suffered in Yemen several years earlier. He had hospital records to corroborate his story.
In contrast, the government produced a single, error-ridden, hearsay report, drafted by an unnamed government agent in the fog of war, stating that Adnan had "confessed" to working with the Taliban. Kennedy found the document unreliable and ordered the military to release him.
The judge's decision shocked few. Indeed, the grimmest fact about Adnan's death is that since early in his detention, no one really thought he should be at Guantanamo at all. During the Bush administration, the military recommended Adnan for transfer at least three times — in 2004, 2006 and 2008.
Then, when President Obama came into office, a task force reviewed all the evidence in Adnan's case and again recommended him for repatriation to Yemen in 2009. We lawyers who represented him weren't allowed to reveal that information to the public until now. It was protected as a state secret until after Adnan's death.
The real shock was that Obama chose to appeal the district court's order to release a prisoner whom his own task force had (privately) already designated for transfer home. Why the appeal? To all appearances, the new administration, like the old one, was chiefly concerned with limiting the power of the courts in wartime. The president's challenge went to the Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit, which had been openly hostile to claims from war on terror detainees and which had been reversed in Guantanamo cases three times in the last decade by the Supreme Court.
The result was that last year the appeals court, in a widely criticized 2-1 ruling, vacated Kennedy's order and remanded the case for a do-over. The dissenting judge criticized the majority for "moving the goal posts" in the government's favor.
Read the rest here: