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US PRESIDENT BARACK Obama vowed to renew a push to close the US military prison in Guantanamo Bay, amid a growing hunger strike by inmates at the controversial jail.
Calling the prison a legal “no man’s land”, Obama told a White House news conference he did not want any inmates to die and urged Congress to help him find a long-term solution that would allow for prosecuting terror suspects while shutting Guantanamo.
“I continue to believe we have to close Guantanamo. I think it is critical for us to understand that Guantanamo is not necessary to keep America safe.
It is expensive. It is inefficient. It hurts us in terms of our international standing. It lessens cooperation with our allies on counterterrorism efforts. It is a recruiting tool for extremists.
“It needs to be closed,” he said.
His tough words were the most extensive the president has delivered on Guantanamo for months and reflected his frustration with Congress, which he blamed for blocking his efforts to shut the jail during his first term.
A spreading hunger strike among inmates, who are protesting their indefinite detention without charges or trials, has put Guantanamo back in the headlines and placed Obama in a difficult position.
The US president said it was “not a surprise to me” that there were “problems” at Guantanamo.
Growing hunger strikes
Out of 166 inmates held at the prison at the remote US naval base in southeastern Cuba, 100 are on hunger strike, according to the latest tally from military officers. And of those, 21 detainees are being fed through nasal tubes.
“I don’t want these individuals to die.
“Obviously, the Pentagon is trying to manage the situation as best as they can, but I think all of us should reflect on why exactly are we doing this,” he said.
Obama has long argued for prosecuting enemy combatants in civilian courts and transferring those cleared of wrongdoing to their home countries.
Past promises
As a candidate in 2008, Obama pledged to close the jail and announced plans to close Guantanamo immediately after entering office in 2009.
But a majority of lawmakers, particularly Republicans, have insisted the jail should stay open, that the detainees are too dangerous to hold on the US mainland and that the suspects should only be tried before military tribunals.
Obama said he would try again to persuade Congress to find a way to close the Guantanamo prison, which was set up by his predecessor, George W. Bush, to hold those captured in Afghanistan and elsewhere after the attacks of September 11, 2001.
“I’m going to re-engage with Congress to try to make the case that this is not something that’s in the best interest of the American people. And it is not sustainable.”
Obama warned the situation would only get worse and said it made no sense to hold more than 100 people in a “no man’s land” indefinitely – even after the withdrawal of US forces from Iraq and soon in Afghanistan.
It is “contrary to who we are and our interests and it needs to stop,” Obama said, adding: “It is a hard case to make.”
Rights groups, which have long branded the prison as a legal “black hole”, welcomed Obama’s remarks.
“The writing is on the wall. It’s time for the failed Guantanamo experiment to end and for our nation to return to the values that have kept us strong,” Daphne Eviatar of Human Rights First said in a statement.
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The rule of law and due process are the cornerstones of any democracy, to abandon either means that democracy is weaken and undermined.
Is a crime what happens there but also in my home land.
“The rule of law and due process”, so if a country is attacked surely it has the right to defend itself and fight back, what if it’s several countries who are allied? The problem, as we know, is that no sovereign state attacked America, or the UK or Spain etc. so the traditional rules we would normally apply to this situation can’t be applied here.
We know a group of organized extremists have attacked these countries and their allies and in the years since all others must be vigilant as we know they are likely to attack again. The attackers have used our rule of law and democracy against us and to their advantage, they believe in neither. In the Second World War certain rules of law and civil liberties were suspended for the common good, these were restored when the war was won. This situation is similar as these countries and their allies are under attack by extremists and therefore certain rules of law may have to be suspended in order to defeat an unusual enemy. This is not undermining or weakening democracy, rather it illustrates how it can adapt to defeat an enemy.
Not really, you can’t “save democracy” by discarding your democratic principals.
Jed,
The enemy is fiction and its and just war. over 140,000 civilan in iraw alone have been killed. If IRAQ spoke English they wouldn’t have attacked.
If they werent terrorist before this, they’ll certainly be terroists afterwards and who would blame them.
If this has prevented another 9/11 then it is worth it.
But it hasnt.
By denying people human rights without even charging them with any crime?
This will cause another 9/11,if I was held there for 10 years for no reason and then I was released I would be extremely pissed off and would be looking for revenge.
Bear in mind many of those who were in Guantanamo Bay and released have then turned up again around the world up to their previous occupation, terrorism.
I’m sure many will use the argument that it was their experience at the hands of the evil Americans in Guantanamo Bay that drove them to terrorism, but if this were the case why didn’t the Birmingham Six or the Guilford Four or others do this?
The fact is Guantanamo Bay is an extreme answer to extremists, their victims have human rights too, those innocent people never committed any crimes. These lunatics attack a country, it fights back, they whinge about their rights, as soon as most are released they do the same thing again.
You will find that very few have been charged with ANY crimes and some have even been found innocent. I think 3 have any conviction. One man was found innocent 10 years ago and is still waiting to be released. How do you justify holding innocent men for this long.
I referred to those who had been released from Guantanamo Bay, claiming to be innocent, only to return to their previous occupation as terrorists. Its quite a long list…
“returned to the fight” or were convinced to join by their Guantanamo experience? Interesting question, isn’t it.
I don’t use Wikipedia as a reliable source and if you read that article properly the first two lines were enough for me “In 2004, the US government claimed that newly released captives from Guantanamo Bay detainment camp “returned to the battlefield”"
It say the us gov CLAIM , where is the evidence, the us gov claim a lot of things( Iraq weapons of mass destruction FALSE CLAIM, thousands dead and still dying) have you any other links with proper evidence.
Very interesting, I can just imagine if it was me locked up their innocent for years would that make someone who had no problem with the US now have a problem. If it was my brother I would hate the US so you have angry family members too. Imagine the hatred towards the us from the mother and father who’s sons and daughters have been killed at the hands of america in Iraq based on false claims.
America seems adamant on making more and more enemies.
To be fair I suspect Reaper drones took a snaps of many of them, then blew them to Hell. Be reasonable there isn’t much chance of evidence to be had there.
Why is there no chance of evidence?How do you believe something so much when there is no evidence, look at the political history of the US they lie all the time. I don’t understand your response. Don’t get me started on drones which in most cases kill more innocent people than militants. To be honest us foreign policy has got out of hand if you ask me.
It depends on your point of view I imagine. Without doubt any innocent casualties or deaths should be avoided, I think we can all agree on that. Using a drone to target terrorists as precisely and accurately as possible is better than carpet bombing the entire area. With these sorts of things we never get to hear of the success stories that likely happen every day, and in due course save lives, we only hear of the failures.
You ask me do I think the US lie? Of course they do, but at the same time put a dedicated extremist terrorist in Guantanamo Bay, would he lie? Damn right he would, and the evidence shows, despite what you may chose to ignore, that many of them have done exactly that.
Drones target precisely and accurately some guy with a joystick behind a computer screen. They do not hit precisely and accurately and many experts say the same thing but I guess you choose to ignore them. They kill mostly civilians many studies have proven. Is that another claim or have you evidence to prove that they hit precisely and accurately?
What am I choosing to ignore ?
Put an extremist terrorist into Guantanamo and will he lie, the men in there are innocent most of them. Innocent until PROVEN guilty, you cant just make assumptions and claims and lock a man up because of that. You can’t even no for sure that any of the men released from Guantanamo ever went on to commit crimes. I’m sure if the Americans had them locked up and released them they would have some organisation like the CIA or FBI watching them and would have been able to produce plenty of evidence to support their “claims”. Yes they have lied and they have lied A LOT and caused a lot of deaths. Can I ask you what is your definition of a terrorist ?
Two wrongs making a right school of thought there.
Perhaps in world politics and diplomacy, sometimes two wrongs ‘do’ make a right..?
The Guilford Four and Birmingham Six at least had trials, even though the trials were flawed because of coerced confessions, cooked evidence, etc. The prisoners in Guantanamo have had no due process and to be held in detention for twelve years without being founf guilty of any crime is unconscionable and a blot on America’s justice system.
That was for Jed I Knight
@Jed I knight…..A government that denys the right to a fair trial is not democratic. What if you were arrested merely on suspicion of terrorism and packed off to an Island where the rule of law is suspended, a place where you could not defend yourself or prove your innocence. Might you change your position then I wonder.
The real reason a lot of people support this place is based on a dislike and distrust of all muslim people nothing more.
Jed, notice the term alleged. if I was kidnapped from my country, flowm half way across the world and subjected to the treatment that they were, you may be sure I would look to extract revenge on my capturees.
According to Jed every democratic country (if one still exists) in world has right and a duty to retain any or all US citizens for being American. As suspects in crimes against humanity hold them indefinitely without trial on set up bases on bases they will go home participate in atrocities by voting, signing up under people known to have participated in atrocities on innocent world citizens. Never never look at root cause as a diplomatic next step ever to see why American might be doing this. Certainly dont bother finding out why these citizens would invade countries that are nowhere connected next to anything connected with a terror attack on America and leave those responsible countries not on any attack list not even objected to. . Leaving the reason for all this somewhere out there unanswered.. I’m just confused myself now to follow this logic.
hard to get accurate information on what’s happening down there, as no source can be trusted. Wikipedia is the last place to find empirical information…
Rt I know may be bias and have their own interest but they have interviews with many of the lawyers for the men on hunger strike. One man was representing and inmate that had been given a trial and found innocent 11 years ago and is still waiting to be released, he said he has lost one third of his body weight and he could but his hands around the mans waist.
This is a very interesting read…
I thought Obama nailed it when he said that Guantanamo was a recruiting ground for terrorists. And not just for the people inside. I’m (nominally anway) a Christian and even I feel pretty angry at what’s happening there. I can see parallels between it and Bobby Sands and the hunger strike. I just cannot see how this helps America’s security or reputation in any way.
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