Guantanamo 5 years on: Still a disgrace

The Independent reports:

"When the first prisoners arrived at Guantanamo in January 2002 they were handcuffed, shackled and wearing hoods. The reason for these exceptional measures, explained the then chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, General Richard Myers, was that the prisoners were highly dangerous. "These are the sort of people who would chew through a hydraulics cable to bring a C-17 [transport plane] down," he claimed. "They are very, very dangerous people."

Five years later none of these "worst of the worst" have been brought to trial. Just 10 have been formally charged while hundreds of others have been returned to their own countries and released. Meanwhile, three have committed suicide, at least 40 others have tried to do so and there are concerns about the mental health of most of the 400 or so remaining prisoners.

"It is remarkable that Guantanamo still exists five years on," said Clive Stafford Smith, legal director of the British group Reprieve, which represents three dozen inmates. "But what is also remarkable is that Guantanamo has distracted attention from other secret prisons the US has. As of August last year we know there are 14,000 prisoners in US custody around the world."

David Hicks still languishes in Guantanamo - with no end in sight for him. What is "happening" to him can only be described as a disgrace and totally unacceptable. However A-G Phillip Ruddock tries to explain the situation both he and John Howard, as lawyers [did they ever actually practice?] can't conceivably accept, whatever their public pronouncements, that how Hicks is being treated is other than a scandal and against all notions of justice and fairness.

Lex Lasry QC ventures his views on the Hicks case and the way the Government has dealt with it in this op-ed piece in The Age.

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