Thursday, May 21, 2009

CLOSE GUANTANAMO ! Close it ! Close it ! Close it !

Those suspected of a crime are to be tried before a fair and impartial court and judged by a jury of their peers. It says so in the constitution and all laws of jurisprudence in the US. Even the Magna Carta granted the right to a trial and to hearing the evidence against you. So, try them if their is sufficient cause and evidence, otherwise release them. That is the price of a free society. And yes, if they are not guilty of any crime, they should indeed be admitted to the states. I believe they've already been held long enough on US controlled territory for them to qualify for naturalization. Besides, Hillary has asked other countries to accept some of them because they are not dangerous. So what are we supposed to think in Europe this time?
KEEP YOUR PROMISE MR. OBAMA.
Close Guantánamo even without funds. Perhaps some human rights groups would be glad to provide boats to ferry the illegaly held out of that Cuban swamp!

Obama moves to regain initiative on Guantanamo closure - Los Angeles Times

Funds to Close Guantánamo Denied - The New York Times
By DAVID M. HERSZENHORN, May 20, 2009, WASHINGTON

The abrupt decision by Senate Democratic leaders to strip out the money for closing the Guantánamo detention center amounted to a strong rebuke of the Obama White House, which lawmakers in both parties have criticized for not providing a more detailed plan for what will be done with the 240 detainees currently held in the prison.
Senate Democrats had initially hoped to preserve the financing for closing the prison. House Democrats, however, had already stripped the money from their version of the military spending bill, saying they could not authorize funds without first reviewing Mr. Obama’s plans for the prisoners.
Mr. Obama is scheduled to outline some of those plans in a speech on Thursday in Washington.
Robert S. Mueller 3d, the director of the F.B.I., told a House panel on Wednesday that he is concerned that Guantánamo detainees could foment terrorism if they are sent to the United States. On Tuesday, a federal judge ruled that the United States could continue to hold some detainees at the base indefinitely without charges.
Even so, Mr. Obama has faced growing demands in recent days, from both parties but particularly from Republicans, to spell out in detail how he plans to close the Guantánamo detention center and to provide assurances that detainees would not end up on American soil, not even in maximum security prisons.
The move by Senate Democrats to bar, for now, any transfer of detainees to the United States, raised the possibility that Mr. Obama’s order to close the camp by Jan. 22, 2010, may have to be changed or delayed.
“Guantánamo makes us less safe,” the Senate majority leader, Harry Reid of Nevada, said on Tuesday at a news conference where he laid out the party’s rationale for its decision. “However, this is neither the time nor the bill to deal with this. Democrats under no circumstances will move forward without a comprehensive, responsible plan from the president. We will never allow terrorists to be released into the United States.”

Human rights and principles of justice are in danger for each of us if they are not available and applicable to all of us.

2 comments:

  1. I don't know if you keep up with them, but your old friend John Green is also keeping up with global injustice!

    http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QnlYociVXVU

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  2. Thanks. Yes, the arrest of the Burmese Nobel Peace Prize Winner Aung San Suu Kyi is very big in the news here. An American swims uninvited to her house, she doesn't throw him back in the water and is taken to jail for violating the terms of her house arrest which would otherwise have been ending in the next few days. Now she faces 5 years imprisonment.
    (Which at least is, though clearly a charade and miscarriage of justice, more framed in a legal proceeding than what the Guantánamo-ers have been facing!)

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