Thursday, May 15, 2008

A NEW LOW (Updated)

Yesterday I (and other gitmo counsel) learned that the security clearance for one of our regular arabic translators was revoked without prior notice to counsel. The military is not accusing the translator of any wrong doing ...they apparently just randomly pulled his security clearance in the middle of a visit to the base that had been scheduled for months. Particularly disturbing to me on a personal level is that the attorney who was visiting the base with this translator was performing a favor for me in that he agreed to visit with Mr. Al-Ghizzawi. As many of you know I try to visit with Mr. Al-Ghizzawi every other month to monitor his health but for personal reasons I cannot go back to the base until July. The translator is one of the 3 or 4 that regularly go to guantanamo to translate for gitmo counsel... he, like the other translators is a top notch interpretor who has always displayed the highest level of professionalism and integrity. This is clearly just the governments latest ploy to interfere with our relationships with our clients.

Update: The court decided it doesn't have jurisdiction over this... screwing the attorneys once again.