Our blogs about
America's Wars
War on Iraq
War on Drugs
War on Afghanistan
War on Columbia
War on Philippines
War on Venezuela

MORE
Matrix Masters
Blogs
World Events
Katrina's Aftermath
US News
Bush Crime Family News
Science & Health
Earth News
Free Speech
News from Africa
News from Palestine
Bill of Rights Under Attack

Support Bloggers' Rights!

Lorenzo's
Random Musings
. . . about Chaos,
Reason, and Hope

Al Jazeera (English)
    Baghdad Burning Blog (by Riverbend, an Iraqi civilian girl)
            Dahr Jamail's Blog from Baghdad
                Imad Khadduri's blog "Free Iraq" (scroll down for English version)

Iraqi Civilian Deaths ... caused by Bush's unprovoked war

 

Guantanamo treatment is 'monstrous', says law lord
By Robert Verkaik Legal Affairs Correspondent - © 2003 Independent Digital (UK) Ltd
26 November 2003

One of the country's most senior judges launched an unprecedented attack on US treatment of the 660 prisoners at Guantanamo Bay last night, saying they will become martyrs in the Muslim world. Breaking with the convention that law lords do not speak out on politically sensitive issues, Lord Steyn described their imprisonment as a "monstrous failure of justice" and the military tribunals that will try them as kangaroo courts. Lord Steyn, one of 12 judges who sits in the country's [Britain] highest court, is understood to have been wrestling with his conscience for weeks. Lord Steyn said in a speech to lawyers in London last night that judges "have the duty, in times of crisis, to guard against an unprincipled and exorbitant executive response.

He described the military commissions set up to try the Guantanamo detainees as kangaroo courts. "It derives from the jumps of the kangaroo, and conveys the idea of a pre-ordained arbitrary rush to judgment by an irregular tribunal which makes a mockery of justice." The trials would be "a stain on United States justice".

He was also critical of the British policy of negotiating a separate agreement with the Pentagon so that British prisoners would not receive the death penalty. "This gives a new dimension to the concept of 'most-favoured nation' treatment in international law. How could it be morally defensible to discriminate in this way?"

posted by A Curmudgeon 10:06 AM