By Kate Randall:
A Guantánamo detainee has charged that he was tortured into confessing to a role in the 2000 bombing of the USS Cole.Detainee Al-Rawi free at last: here.Abd al-Rahim al-Nashiri, 41, a Saudi national of Yemeni descent, said he faced years of torture following his arrest in 2002 and that he fabricated stories to satisfy his captors.
By Peter Symonds:
The sham trial of Australian detainee David Hicks at the Bush administration’s prison camp at Guantánamo Bay is drawing to a close.Free speech in Australia on Hicks issue? See here.Yesterday presiding judge Colonel Ralph Kohlman formally convicted Hicks on one charge of “providing material support for terrorism”, and released the details of a plea bargain that will return Hicks to Australia to serve his jail term.
The deal provides for a maximum of seven years, but all but nine months have been suspended.
The strenuous efforts to dress up proceedings cannot disguise the fact that the entire affair is a legal charade designed to justify the Bush administration’s phony “war on terror.”
The plea bargain itself smacks of a dirty deal between Washington and Canberra. One of its key aims is to bolster the fortunes of the Howard government in upcoming national elections later in the year by wiping the issues of David Hicks and Guantánamo Bay off the political agenda.
Dear Avaaz Member,
Bush’s top advisors are divided over whether to close Guantanamo prison forever. A massive global outcry could tip the balance. Sign the petition below - we will publish it in key US papers next week:
Take Action Now
Adel Hamad grew up in a small village in Sudan. Through hard work, he became a schoolteacher and hospital assistant. To support his family he took a better job at a community hospital in Afghanistan. Then late one night he was torn from his bed and sent to hell, as Guantanamo Bay Detainee #940.
Adel Hamad has had no trial. He has seen no family members for four years. Even US military officers reviewing his situation have called his detention “unconscionable.” But he and nearly 400 other prisoners are still trapped at Guantanamo. Last week US Defense Secretary Robert Gates finally said Guantanamo should be closed. President Bush’s advisors are split down the middle on this issue — a massive global outcry could tip the balance, and push Bush to close Guantanamo forever. Click below to sign the Close Guantanamo petition, and we’ll run ads next week in major US papers announcing the number of signatures:
http://www.avaaz.org/en/close_guantanamo
It’s now clear that many of the detainees are simply innocent people caught in the wrong place at the wrong time. Guantanamo’s former commander General Jay Hood has admitted, “Sometimes we just didn’t get the right folks.” This is what happens when people are held without charge or trial.
After being held for five years, last week Australian David Hicks was finally charged — and sentenced to just 9 months in an Australian prison. This hardly looks like the “worst of the worst” - words the Bush Administration used to justify ignoring basic standards of justice. Meanwhile, as regimes around the world use Guantanamo to excuse their own human rights abuses, international law keeps taking a beating.
Sign the petition calling on the US government to close Guantanamo , and for its inmates to be tried in a legitimate court or set free. Let’s run ads in Washington DC and show that citizens from every country on earth want this injustice to end:
http://www.avaaz.org/en/close_guantanamo
In hope,
Ricken, Milena, Tom, Graziela and the Avaaz Team
Comment by Administrator — April 4, 2007 @ 9:01 am