Begging the European Community

For those of you who have been wondering what else I have been doing to help secure the release of Mr. Al-Ghizzawi you can listen to this interview.


http://download.omroep.nl/rnw/smac/cms/tswi_080315_rendition1_mp3_en_080315_44_1kHz.mp3

The Government's Response

The government filed its response last week. They continue to claim that Al-Ghizzawi does not want medical help... and anyway he isn't that ill anyway! (The fact that he can't swallow the pills because they won't give him warm water is further evidence, according to these war criminals, that Al-Ghizzawi is refusing medical care....)
I don't know when the judge will rule but I will post something when he does.

Withholding medical treatment

This story was sent to me yesterday and today I received the actual underlying court order... what it shows is that the medical treatment that is being withheld from Al-Ghizzawi is U S government policy.... whether you be at guantanamo or on the mainland....

Click on the title to read the story...

Amnesty report on military commission hearing for Mohammed Jawad

Click on the title to review the report from Amnesty International from the Military Tribunal Hearing on March 12, 2008 for Mohammed Jawad. Jawad, like Khadr, should be protected under international law, as he was only 16 years old when he was arrested and sent to Guantanamo.

TROUBLE AT GUANTANAMO'S HOME AWAY FROM GUANTANAMO

Pulicharkhi is the old russian prison outside of Kabul where the american's opened up their own wing. Most of the afghani prisoners that were released from Guantanamo have been held there...another attempt by the US to avoid the US federal courts...


Afghanistan: Riot in US-run prison

Kabul, 13 March (AKI) - By Syed Saleem Shahzad - Prisoners held in Kabul’s controversial Pul-i-Charkhi jail rioted late on Thursday when NATO forces tried to shift Taliban inmates for interrogation.

Unnamed sources told Adnkronos International (AKI) that inmates in block 4 of the prison resisted their removal by NATO personnel, alleging that NATO officials wanted to carry out an extrajudicial killing.

The protest soon spread all over the jail. Inmates in another part of the prison (block 7) turned violent and around five were wounded when NATO personnel opened fire on the prisoners, according to AKI's sources.

Pul-i-Charkhi, where political prisoners are held, is located outside the Afghan capital. Most Taliban prisoners are currently held there.

The prison gained notoriety for its treatment of prisoners as long ago as during the Soviet occupation of Afghanistan (1978-1989).

Experts have said the prison is one of several around the world holding repatriated Afghans detained by the United States including former inmates from the notorious US military prison camp at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba.

Mistreatment of prisoners at Guantanamo has caused international concern and prompted calls for its closure.

On Salon Today.

Please read my opinion piece on Salon today by clicking on the title. I did have a bit of a misunderstanding with Salon about how Seth Farber who helped me draft this initially would be credited and I thank Seth for his help on this.
That being said I do want to thank Salon's Mark Follman who had a keen understanding of the issues and worked hard to get this on-line in a timely fashion.

Mother Jones on another innocent detainee

Writer Mariah Blake does an in-depth look at the plight of German detainee Murat Kurnaz in an article on line at Mother Jones. (click on the title to go straight to the article) Like Al-Ghizzawi the evidence showing Murat's innocence was ignored and Murat languished at Guantanamo for five years.... unlike Al-Ghizzawi he finally was released. Kudos to Blake for unraveling the story made complicated by the attempts of two governments (US and German) to hide the truth.

SUPPLEMENTAL MEMORANDUM FILED WITH JUDGE BATES 3.7.08

For completeness I am putting this on the blog... click on the title to view....

Yes, I think it is fair to say I am Mad and I will not take it any longer

ok... I no longer have a tv... so I cannot throw it out the window....

however...

I do not know why I have to beg the courts of the United States of America to provide life sustaining medical care to a man we are holding in our gulag...

but beg I continue to do...
and of course I will continue until his dying breath...
(which will most likely be sooner rather than later)

I guess it is because I am a lawyer
and remarkably
I still (kind of) believe in the rule of law.....

(perhaps because there is no other reasonable substitute)

today my notes were "cleared" from the military censors
and I can share with you
what I shared with Judge Bates on Friday...
the most up to date medical condition on my client Mr.Al-Ghizzawi:

read it and weep ...
or laugh..
or whatever it is you do when you see how a country ...
my country
(and maybe yours...)
treats its fellow human beings

Is this torture?
Or do we have some new word for this that somehow explains what we are doing?
Do you you feel safer?

.....
So click on the title and read what it is that we have become...

U.S. Hiding its Malfeasance behind the Cloak of ICRC Visits

As many of you know I have given lots of public talks both in the US and in Europe on the interference by the US with the ICRC mission at Guantanamo especially as it relates to the lack of medical care for my Client Al-Ghizzawi. Many of you have asked me to put my speech onto my blog. As I just had reason to put some of this information into writing I decided to complete the project.

(Click on the title to go to the rest of the article....)

Meet me in Guantanamo

If you are in the mood for a short tune and some facts about guantanamo click on the title.

Arresting the Criminals for Their Crimes Against Our Constitution

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Voters in two Vermont towns on Tuesday approved a measure that would instruct police to arrest President George W. Bush and Vice President Dick Cheney for "crimes against our Constitution," local media reported.

The nonbinding, symbolic measure, passed in Brattleboro and Marlboro in a state known for taking liberal positions on national issues, instructs town police to "extradite them to other authorities that may reasonably contend to prosecute them."
Vermont, home to maple syrup and picture-postcard views, is known for its liberal politics.
State lawmakers have passed nonbinding resolutions to end the war in Iraq and impeach Bush and Cheney, and several towns have also passed resolutions of impeachment. None of them have caught on in Washington.
Bush has never visited the state as president, though he has spent vacations at his family compound in nearby Maine.
Roughly 12,000 people live in Brattleboro, located on the Connecticut River in the state's southeastern corner. Nearby Marlboro has a population of roughly 1,000.
(Writing by Andy Sullivan, editing by David Wiessler)

FROM ROGER FITCH AND OUR FRIENDS DOWN UNDER

(Click on the title to go to the original)

Roger Fitch Esq • March 4, 2008

Our Man in Washington

If Gitmo closes what becomes of the inmates? Refoulement is the answer, i.e. even worse US prisons in Afghanistan … Lawyers who advised the administration on torture now under (soft) investigation … Bush lawyers at DoJ advising Iraqis on “justice and the rule of law”

It’s been a bruising fortnight for the dwindling tribe of military commission supporters.

First, Col. Morris Davis, the former Chief Prosecutor at Guantánamo, wrote “Unforgivable Behavior, Inadmissible Evidence”, an op-ed about torture, in The New York Times.

Soon after, Davis announced he would be a witness for the defence at Salim Hamdan’s military commission.

Next, Col Davis gave an interview with Ross Tuttle of the Nation in which he tipped on William “Jim” Haynes, the notorious Pentagon general counsel who has been the stationmaster for military commission railroading.

Harper’s Scott Horton has more on these events.

Within days, Haynes – after seven years on the Bush barricades – abruptly quit his job for private life, perhaps to enter corporate law.

If so, his options would seem pretty limited. Haynes (pic) already has been charged once with war crimes in Germany, and he could still lose his law licence – two penalties beyond the reach of a presidential pardon.

The resulting confusion at the Guantánamo commission circus was summarised by Andy Worthington.

Adding to the noise, Mother Jones just published a Torture Playlist comprising the appalling music used at Guantánamo and elsewhere to “prolong capture shock and drown out screams”.

* * *

All this has led to renewed talk of closing Guantánamo, bolstered by a manifesto from many of the world’s leading legal professional bodies, but not the American Bar Association, which now seems minded to collaborate with the commissions.

Yet if Gitmo closed, what would become of the inmates? One answer, of course, is repatriation, or, as also happens, refoulement – the internationally forbidden practice of forcibly returning refugees or prisoners to countries where they are in danger of mistreatment or death.

Literally, refoulement is “driving back”. Recently, however, we have learned of a practice that could be called “circular cycling”.

An Afghan, seized in Afghanistan, is taken to Guantánamo for no particular reason and then, also for no particular reason, returned to Afghanistan, only to disappear into the US-Afghan internment camp outside Kabul, the dreaded Pol-i-Charkhi, for further unlimited detention.

Pol-i-Charkhi is a former Russian prison. Eric Lewis (pic) is a lawyer for one of the Guantanameros who was sent to this supposedly “Afghan” prison, and he’s written in Slate about P-i-C and its new “national defence” wing built by the US government and staffed by US jailers and interrogators.

Joanne Mariner has also written about the P-i-C wing, called the Afghan National Detention Facility (ANDF).

The notorious US prison at Bagram Air Base in Afghanistan could be an additional destination for “released” Gitmo inmates. It’s been a dumping ground for prisoners since 2004, when the US stopped sending detainees to Guantánamo.

It was Bagram where, in 2002, US soldiers beat to death two Afghan prisoners, including the innocent taxi driver Dilawar whose story is told in this year’s Oscar-winning documentary, Taxi to the Dark Side.

The International Justice Network, an offshoot of the Center for Constitutional Rights, is fighting for the release of all civilians in Bagram, some of whom have filed habeas actions in Washington, as the Legal Times reports.

After years of buzz about Bagram and its abuses, The New York Times has lately decided to report on the problem.

* * *

You may recall that Attorney General Michael Mukasey told Congress he could not investigate government officials who had “harshly interrogated” prisoners in the “war on terror” as his department’s Office of Legal Counsel had issued opinions purporting to bless waterboarding and other practices as legal.

Harper’s blogger Scott Horton was quick to point out that, in that case, the real objects of investigation should be the lawyers who gave the torture advice.

Now it turns out that the Office of Professional Responsibility at DoJ is in fact investigating the OLC opinions.

According to Slate’s Emily Bazelon (pic), OPR is the wrong watchdog for an investigation: it has neither bark nor bite.

* * *

More motions have been filed in the Omar Khadr military commission, including two that deal with the failure of the US to comply with the fair trial requirements of the Geneva Conventions’ Common Article Three – a specific requirement of the Supreme Court in the Hamdan case – and with the Bush administration’s bizarre claim that killing US soldiers in a war is somehow murder in violation of the law of war.

The Miami Herald’s Carol Rosenberg is one of the few journalists to examine the Pentagon’s expansive definition of war and war crimes.

As for the “murder” charge, a new law review article by David Glazier of Loyola University (LA) points out:

“The flaw in the US approach is that it wants to have it both ways, treating its adversaries as being both subject to being killed wherever found like traditional combatants, yet also denied legal authority to fight, as are non-combatants. If upheld, Khadr would have the legal status of a deer during hunting season – fair game for coalition forces to kill at will yet possessing no right to fight back.”

Moreover, Glazier says:

“By electing to conduct military commission trials failing to meet international due process standards, the government places participants, including judges, prosecutors, trial panel members, and those involved with post-trial review at risk of subsequent prosecution for war crimes themselves. Although the actual likelihood of such prosecution may be remote, it provides another basis on which the tribunals may be criticized and any remaining moral high ground surrendered.”

* * *

None of this, of course, cramps the style of the Bush Gang. Without a trace of irony, the Bush lawyers at DoJ are solemnly advising the Iraqis on “justice” and the “rule of law”.

Meanwhile, the Justice Department is planning a spring seminar on Investigating and Prosecuting Human Rights Violators in the United States.

Bookings should be heavy: it could prove a useful tool for aspiring prosecutors in a new administration.

The Hippocratic Oath Dies in Gitmo

I have been representing Abdul Al-Ghizzawi, one of my Guantánamo clients, for two and a half years. The day I took on his case, I knew little about him other than he was seriously ill. My goal from that day forward has been to ascertain what is wrong with Al-Ghizzawi and get him the medical care he needs.

In the fall of 2006, Dr. Jürg Reichen, a respected liver specialist at the University of Bern in Switzerland, filed an affidavit in which he testified that, based on the symptoms described by Al-Ghizzawi and based on my own observations of Al-Ghizzawi, it seemed likely that he was suffering from hepatitis B and perhaps liver cancer. Reichen would have been able to make a more conclusive diagnosis with my client’s medical records, but the government has refused to turn them over.....

To read the rest of this article click on the title....

Reply brief on medical records and treatment

I am in route back from the base after having seen Mr. Al-Ghizzawi and my other client Mr. Razak Ali. Yesterday the government finally got around to "clearing" my reply brief that was filed with the court last thursday. As you can see the government has been caught in a major (and unforgiveable)lie.
I will update everyone on Mr. Al-Ghizzawi's health when my notes clear. Hats off to Seth at the talking dog (http://thetalkingdog.com/) for his edits and insight.
Click on the title to read the reply.