Rights groups slam Hamdan verdict
Human rights groups say the trial of Salim Hamdan has exposed fundamental flaws in the extra-legal processes used to prosecute terror suspects.
Jennifer Daskal, a senior counter-terrorism lawyer at Human Rights Watch, said that the military commission which tried Hamdan “handicapped” the defense and that flaws in the system “won out”.
Daskal said there was no excuse for failing “to close Guantanamo Bay prison, try those accused of terrorist acts in a fair process, release or resettle the others, and finally put an end to this black spot on America’s reputation”.
The White House has said that Hamdan received a “fair trial” after military jurors at Guantanamo Bay delivered a split verdict on terrorism charges against him. Hamdan faces a possible maximum sentence of life in prison.
In an interview with Press TV, Andy Worthington from the rights group Reprieve described the military tribunal as a “flight from the norms of domestic and international law.”
Military commissions, set up by President George W. Bush’s administration in the wake of the September 11 terror attacks, were invalidated by the US Supreme Court in 2006 and they were only pushed through Congress by the administration a few months later.
“The poor man [Hamdan] must have absolutely no sense of where justice is,” Worthington said.
“Even if anyone was to be cleared after a trial by military commission they could be held forever as an enemy combatant anyway,” he continued.
Worthington described the prosecution as “what happens when a rogue administration tries to set up its own laws.”
SG/WY/RE
Press TV - Rights groups slam Hamdan verdict
August 7th, 2008 | Category: Guantanamo, Kangaroo Kourt
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