http://reuters.com/newsArticle.jhtml;jsessionid=QBJUQRNQLUYTSCRBAEKSFEY?type=topNews&storyID=5184177
U.S. to Begin Guantanamo Inmate Reviews Within Weeks
Tue May 18, 2004 06:30 PM ET
By Will Dunham
WASHINGTON (Reuters) - The United States plans within weeks to begin annual
reviews of whether or not to release foreign terrorism suspects held at
Guantanamo Bay, but the entire process will be closed and the prisoners will
have no right to a lawyer, the Pentagon said on Tuesday.
Each of the roughly 600 non-U.S. citizens imprisoned at the U.S. naval base
at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, will be given a chance to appear once a year before
a board of three U.S. military officers to explain why he no longer poses a
threat to America and its allies, the Pentagon said.
A prisoner will not have the right to be represented by a lawyer or any
other independent adviser, the proceedings at the remote Guantanamo base
will be closed to the public and media with transcripts kept secret and no
public announcements will be made on the disposition of cases, officials
said.
"The problem with transparency is that a lot of the information that will be
presented at the hearing will be classified, which imposes restrictions on
public access," said a senior Pentagon official, briefing reporters on
condition of anonymity.
The entire process is kept within the Defense Department, with no review
from any U.S. court. The review boards will make only nonbinding
recommendations, with an unspecified high-ranking Pentagon official, to be
named by Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld, given the final say on who is
released and who is not.
"If a person is not a threat to the United States, we don't want to hold
them any longer than is necessary," said the Pentagon official, adding the
hearings will begin within weeks.
"It's an administrative burden and cost. And we don't want to (hold them) as
a matter of humane treatment of people."
'VENEER OF LEGALITY'
Human rights activists, who have criticized the U.S. policy of holding
Guantanamo prisoners indefinitely without charges, called the review process
hollow.
"This is an attempt to place a veneer of legality on a policy that is
otherwise unchanged and remains deeply flawed," said Wendy Patten, Human
Rights Watch U.S. advocacy director.
"Because they plan to do these reviews on an annual basis going forward
after having held some people for more than two years, what this tells us is
that the Pentagon plans to hold some of the detainees at Guantanamo for
possibly many, many years," Patten added.
The United States has held non-U.S. citizens caught in what President Bush
calls the global war on terrorism at Guantanamo since January 2002. Most
were caught in Afghanistan.
The United States has refused to classify them as prisoners of war, denying
them rights afforded to POWs under the Geneva Conventions, and terms them
"unlawful enemy combatants."
Rumsfeld announced plans for the review panels on Feb. 13, and draft rules
were unveiled in March.
Under an order issued by Deputy Defense Secretary Paul Wolfowitz, each
Guantanamo prisoner will get a chance to appear in person before a
three-member board to argue for release.
A military officer will be assigned to assist the prisoner in making his
presentation, but this officer will not take his side. Another U.S. officer
will present evidence of any continuing threat posed by the prisoner. The
review board will accept written information from a prisoner's family and
the government of his home country.
The Pentagon official said separate procedures are being drafted for
reviewing whether to release U.S. citizens held as enemy combatants without
charges at a military brig in South Carolina.
C Reuters 2004. All Rights Reserved.
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