Alleged British Hacker Fears Guantanamo 661
Magnifico writes "The BBC is reporting that Gary McKinnon, a British man accused of breaking into the U.S. government computer networks, could end up at Guantanamo Bay. His lawyer is fighting his extradition to the United States arguing, 'The US Government wants to extract some kind of species of administrative revenge because he exposed their security systems as weak and helpless as they were.'"
Re:At least he gets a trial... (Score:5, Informative)
The problem is that the people held at Guantanamo Bay weren't simply captured on "the field of battle". According to information released under court order last month, fewer than half of the detainees were actually captured in battle against US forces. The majority were turned over by Pakistan, often for a cash bounty.
Few of these "combatants" are even accused of having fought; most simply lived in a house or worked for a charity associated with the Taliban or Al-Qaeda. And you would propose that we have the right to indefinitely detain these people, held only on the grounds of a suspicion, without a fair trial? What, again, are these freedoms and principles that we are fighting so hard to defend in this "war on terror"?
Amnesty International (Score:5, Informative)
Unless you call three squares a day and 5 prayer breaks torture.
Sorry, but Amnesty International [amnesty.org] disagrees with you. OK, maybe I exaggerated, Guantanamo isn't one of the worst prisons in the world. It's one of the worst AMERICAN prisons in the world. According to Amnesty Intl, "Guantánamo Bay has become a symbol of injustice and abuse in the US administration's 'war on terror'. It must be closed down".
There, happy now?
Re:How would he like it.... (Score:5, Informative)
Re:How would he like it.... (Score:5, Informative)
The fact that the U.S. of A. even has to make such a promise, puts them out of step with regards to the human rights most other 1st world countries take for granted. I'm not saying that people don't get dissappeared in other countries, just that the option isn't official public policy.
I read another article about the guy off that site, and found this bit of information very interesting: http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/uk_news/4721183.stm [bbc.co.uk]
Re:We're talking about torture here, dumbass. (Score:3, Informative)
How, exactly, does that preclude torture? If somebody gave his kid three squares a day, let him pray whenever he wanted, and kicked him in the head with steel-toed boots every time the kid talked back to him, would you hold the guy up as a paragon of good parenting?
OK, there has been some sleep depravation and one prisoner there did flush a Koran.
There's more. One detainee had his head and mouth duct-taped. Another was "short-shackled" to the eye-bolt in the floor of the interrogation room. Detainees were subject to 16-20 hour interrogations plus sleep deprivation and isolation for up to 54 consecutive days. Strip searches were used as an interrogation technique. Detainees would be locked in a refrigerated room known as the "freezer" for extended periods of time. In the course of interrogation, a detainee was told that his family had been captured by the United States and that they were "in danger". Barking, growling, teeth-baring military dogs were used in interrogations.
Go read the declassified FBI report. [defenselink.mil] Note how many things were authorized by SECDEF after the fact; note, too, how the report finds that nothing they found rises to the level of "torture or inhumane treatment".
This is but one investigation, and it turns my stomach to read about some of the behavior in which my country is engaged. This is simply not how a nation built on the rule of law and respect for fundamental human rights should act. Three squares and five prayers is an empty defense of this truly reprehensible behavior.
Re:At least he gets a trial... (Score:3, Informative)
You can't be this [latimes.com] dumb [bbc.net.uk]. Learn to use Google.
Re:We're talking about torture here, dumbass. (Score:3, Informative)
Just "panties on the head", eh?
Abu Ghraib torture and prisoner abuse [wikipedia.org]
More photos [antiwar.com]
Beatings, electric shocks, dog maulings, physical and psychological abuse.
Or, maybe you like to refer to them by their more "patriotic" name: "Freedom tickles"?
Re:At least he gets a trial... (Score:5, Informative)
No you are only not entitled to being a protected person, who is granted additional rights to a mere civilian.
So if you're a combatant, but you don't follow the laws and customs of war or you don't identify yourself as the enemy, then you don't get Geneva protection.
Which again, makes you a mere civilian, or more specifically, a civilian criminal.
That's what "unlawful combatants" are.
See above. That would make them criminals to be tried in a civilian court, and afforded all the same rights as any other civilian accused of a crime.
They're people who are participating in an armed conflict who aren't eligible for Geneva protection because of how they are conducting their combat operations.
That only removes their "protected persons" status, not their rights as civilians.
Re:At least he gets a trial... (Score:2, Informative)
In Ex parte Quirin, 317 U.S. 1, which was decided by the Supreme Court in 1942, the Court recognized the presidents power to try enemy combatants in military tribunals instead of civil courts. This was the case, where the FBI caught a group of German guys who came to long island in a submarine. They were going to sabotage various parts of the American infrastructure.
Basically what it all comes down is whether or not you believe that the United States should be considered at war when you think of "The war on terror." If you think that we are at war, then looking at our previous jurisprudence the president would be able to keep these people out of the American civil Courts. (not that i'm saying that his hacker is a terrorist) Here is an excerpt of that case:
"By universal agreement and practice, the law of war draws a distinction between the armed forces and the peaceful populations of belligerent nations and also between those who are lawful and unlawful combatants. Lawful combatants are subject to capture and detention as prisoners of war by opposing military forces. Unlawful combatants are likewise subject to capture and detention, but in addition they are subject to trial and punishment by military tribunals for acts which render their belligerency unlawful. The spy who secretly and without uniform passes the military lines of a belligerent in time of war, seeking to gather military information and communicate it to the enemy, or an enemy combatant who without uniform comes secretly through the lines for the purpose of waging war by destruction of life or property, are familiar examples of belligerents who are generally deemed not to be entitled to the status of prisoners of war, but to be offenders against the law of war subject to trial and punishment by military tribunals." Id. at 30.
And for my second point.....
For what its worth, every person who is brought to gitmo has an opportunity to challenge the factual basis for their labeling as an enemy combatant before a tribunal. "...due process demands that a citizen held in the United States as an enemy combatant be given a meaningful opportunity to contest the factual basis for that detention before a neutral decisionmaker." Hamdi v. Rumsfeld, 542 U.S. 507, at 509 (2004).
Re:How would he like it.... (Score:3, Informative)
Re:How would he like it.... (Score:3, Informative)
He obviously hopes for a lighter sentence from a UK trial.
Re:Amnesty International (Score:3, Informative)
Cuba? It was great, say boys freed from US prison camp
James Astill meets teenagers released from Guantanamo Bay who recall the place fondly
Saturday March 6, 2004 The Guardian
Asadullah strives to make his point, switching to English lest there be any mistaking him. "I am lucky I went there, and now I miss it. Cuba was great," said the 14-year-old, knotting his brow in the effort to make sure he is understood.
http://www.guardian.co.uk/guantanamo/story/0,13743 ,1163435,00.html [guardian.co.uk]
Re:0% Chance of McKinnon ending up in Guantanamo (Score:1, Informative)
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/europe/4555660.stm [bbc.co.uk]
http://www.cnn.com/2005/POLITICS/12/06/cia.rendit
Re:How would he like it.... (Score:3, Informative)
1)the false premise that the President made a unilateral decision to invade Iraq, against the wishes of the US Congress but the 'Joint Resolution to Authorize the Use of United States Armed Forces Against Iraq' was passed by both the House and the Senate in 2002.
and
2)that the United States can take no military action without a formal declaration of war. That argument is ridiculous on it's face, as it would require a formal declaration of war any time that NATO or the UN or any of the many countries America has some mutual defense pact with, were in need of military assistance.
No matter how you try to spin it, this was not a case of the President's 'circumvention of Congress', this was a clear cut case of a President following the accepted method to take military action against a perceived threat to the United States. People may not like the result but the fact of the matter is Congress gave him their blessing and as you said, "If it looks like a duck
And from my understanding, the originalists interpretation of the constitution is to not read into it additional powers and protections that are not clearly stated (the right to privacy, 'seperation' of Church and State, etc..). According to the originalist view of the Constitution any rights or powers not directly assigned to or protected by the Federal government by the Constitution are the domain of the individual States, a view I happen to hold.
Either way, I wouldn't see this as a violation of that interpretation as the President did indeed request Congress's approval before taking action, how they chose to give it is left up to them. By adding a stipulation that a formal declaration of war be made every time a military action is taken it is you that is creating a new requirement under the Constitution where none previously existed, in clear opposition of the originalist philosophy.
One name (among many) (Score:2, Informative)
Take a look at this page too: http://web.amnesty.org/pages/stoptorture-050406-f
And let me say 3 more things.
One. If you think everyone in Guantanamo was an armed irregular in afghanistan or Iraq you are a fool. People have been shipped there from lot's of other places, like pakistan, bosnia, etc.
Two. When you capture an enemy soldier it hardly matters if he has a uniform, there are international conventions on how you should treat prisoners, and none of them consider torture acceptable.
Three. One of the things distinguishing a democracy from a dictatorship is the fact that when someone is arrested, his family is allowed to know that he is being detained and on what accusation. It is only dictatorships that make people just disappear.