Guantonamo Bay

Magnolia_Fan

So the answer to my question is yes it is legal!?...all the answers have been very vague, I'll assume it is legal but you all disagree with it except Wrestlemania. I think its unfair to say prisoners are being tortured and put in front of a firing squad there..nobody knows whats going on there and that is the problem with it..As for Taliban being recognised as the Afghans army, The Taliban was trained by Usama Bin Laden in "Terrorist Camps" so I would label them potential terrorists. They were not trained as a normal military they had evil objectives to terrorise people. Well that might just be me

Magnolia_Fan

And I was born in the U.S.A And though I wouldn't vote for Kerry, Bush doesn't get my full backing I feel his intentions are admirable but he has made some mistakes such as the motive for war being WMD instead of just the E.U regulations being broken, his lack of communication with American citizens (leaving people in the dark about almost everything he does) and the fact that it seems he has a holiday every 3rd week...Anyone notice the majority of posters are Liberal..or just big time Bush Bashers and some just very anti American

Wrestlemania

We are truly speculating about GTO, no-one knows what goes on in there TBH.

Trail yes but for security reasons in GTO rather than Mainland USA.

bonkey

Originally posted by Magnolia_Fan
So the answer to my question is yes it is legal!?

...all the answers have been very vague, I'll assume it is legal but you all disagree with it except Wrestlemania.

Its not quite as simple as that.

Its legality is questionable, but no-one is willing to resolve it.

According to the Geneva Convention, you are either a combatant or non-combatant. There is no other option. If your classification is in doubt, your classification cannot be arbitrarily decided by one of the parties "in the field", but has to go to some form of independant panel for a ruling.

Now, clearly, the US has not done this. It has decided to create a third category which the Geneva Convention doesn't recognise, which means that according to teh Convention, these people are still either combatants or non-combatants, and neither classification's requirements are being met by the conditions in Gitmo.

YOu can go further. Amnesty International and others have claimd that there are basic Human Rights abuses in the prison. The US flatly deny this, but won't allow in sufficiently neutral observers who can openly report what they find to prove their innocence.

So is the US guilty? Well not in the sense that it hasn't been proven in a court, no. It is ensuring that the questions which would determine guilt or innocence remain unanswered, so that it cannot be found guilty.

Therefore, can we say whether or not the actions are legal, with respect to International Law? No, we can't. The requirements which would need to be met are not possible to meet without the US' consent, and it ain't giving it, and no-one wants to (or can) push the issue against the US in the UN.

That leaves national law. There have been some questions as to whether or not the actions in Guantanamo are legal under US law. To date, I think the answer has been "not applicable, as its not US jurisdiction", unless certain conditions are met. e.g. I think the US Supreme Court did pass a judgement which would make it illegal to hold an American there (or possibly anyone who had travelled through the US on the way there) for an indefinite amount of time without charge....but this was either a case that didn't exist, or if it did, it was one the US Administration rectified as soon as the ruling was made.

So is it legal? Undetermined by any people responsible for making the actual decision. Will we get a decision made? Probably not...not without some major policy shift on someone's part.

jc

gandalf

What I love about Guantonamo Bay is the excuse being used for these abuses is that "we are protecting our way of life". But you are doing everything that is contrary to your way of life.

And then the answer is "but we are protecting it!!"

The thing is Osama and his ilk have already won. They have changed America and diminished the freedoms (Patriot Acts I & II) that her citizens have enjoyed and most of them have been cheering from the sidelines as its been done.

Orion

Originally posted by Wrestlemania
Hitler and Bush the same or similar man you got a problem.

Bush has many bad points but has not set out to wipe out millions of Jews,Gipsys,Poles, Russians, Homosexuals and whatever did not meet his criteria.

Correct - he doesn't persecute Jews, Gypsys, Poles or Russians - only Iraqis, Afghans, Muslims in general (except the ones that pay his daddy), Iranians, Syrians, Koreans.....

Orion

Originally posted by Gurgle

Bush cheated. [/B]

Ah lets be fair - he didn't cheat. It was his brother and his cousin who did the cheating...;)

Zulu

Originally posted by Wrestlemania
What Children??

To me these people are locked up there should stay there apart from the persons who were picked up in error.

Do I think the likes of Sadam of Osama should have Human Rights the Answer is no, as much as Hitler should have been tortured. Murphys Law.

How do you find out if they are there in error, when they don't have access to a fair trail. This is the very reason that human rights are created!

Orion

Originally posted by Magnolia_Fan
Anyone notice the majority of posters are Liberal..or just big time Bush Bashers and some just very anti American

[rant] I really hate that crap. Since when is being Anti-War the same as being Anti-American? There have been Americans protesting against the war - are they Anti American? It's a bloody catchphrase used by Bush and his lapdog Blair to ignore antiwar protesters by saying they have a different agenda. I was out last May protesting along with 1-2 hundred thousand other people. Part of that protest was at the our government allowing use of Shannon Airport by US troops. Does that make me Anti-Irish as well. [/rant]

Zulu

Originally posted by Wrestlemania
Whilst I agree Bonkey there are some and I will say some merits to having "SOME" of these people in detension.

What merits? If they don't know anything - what possiable good? ...other than a few more rag-head off the street :rolleyes:

Orion

Originally posted by Magnolia_Fan
As for Taliban being recognised as the Afghans army, The Taliban was trained by Usama Bin Laden in "Terrorist Camps" so I would label them potential terrorists. They were not trained as a normal military they had evil objectives to terrorise people. Well that might just be me

Is this the same Osama Bin Laden who was trained by the CIA? So maybe they're just American secret agents then?

Zulu

Originally posted by Magnolia_Fan
And I was born in the U.S.A And though I wouldn't vote for Kerry, Bush doesn't get my full backing I feel his intentions are admirable but he has made some mistakes such as the motive for war being WMD instead of just the E.U regulations being broken, his lack of communication with American citizens (leaving people in the dark about almost everything he does) and the fact that it seems he has a holiday every 3rd week...Anyone notice the majority of posters are Liberal..or just big time Bush Bashers and some just very anti American

Bush wasn't after WMD for a start - if he was he could have looked a little closer to home.

ppffftttt Liberal :rolleyes:
What wrong with Liberal?
Do you not agree with equal right for everybody?
Do you not agree with free trade?
Do you not agree with helthcare for sick people?

Gurgle

Macros42:
Ah lets be fair - he didn't cheat. It was his brother and his cousin who did the cheating...

lol

bonkey

Originally posted by Magnolia_Fan
.Anyone notice the majority of posters are Liberal..or just big time Bush Bashers and some just very anti American

Which makes it sound like Liberal is somehow close to the other two, and equally a bad thing.

Strange that, I can't actually see the relevance of whether or not people are Liberal, nor what Liberal and "anti-American" have in common (although I can understand Liberal and Bush-Bashers being put together).

jc

Victor

The Phoenix has an interesting piece on Shannon - just how many of the 3,000-4,000 American military / para-military flights have been conveying prisioners to Guantanamo? Hmmm, interesting banner to do for the end of the month.

"One-way ticket for G.Bush to Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, direct flights available from Shannon to Jose Marti Internation (HAV) via Aeroflot of USNS Guantanamo via Air America.

Originally posted by Magnolia_Fan
Anyone notice the majority of posters are Liberal..or just big time Bush Bashers and some just very anti American

Anyone notice some posters are right-wing, reactionary, Judaeo-Christrian, anti-Irish, pseudo-facist name callers?

Hobbes

Originally posted by Wrestlemania
We are truly speculating about GTO, no-one knows what goes on in there TBH.

From the hundreds released (after 1-2 years living in a cage) as innocent there is well documented information of exactly what has and does go on there.

bonkey

Originally posted by Hobbes
From the hundreds released (after 1-2 years living in a cage) as innocent there is well documented information of exactly what has and does go on there.

No no. You can't say that. Those people are inherently untrustworthy, are Really Bad Men [tm], anti-American, and George Bush Haters to boot. They'd make up all sorts of lies to explain why they were held for up to two years and then released without charge.

No, really. None of them are trustworthy, and every bad thing they say about Gitmo is false.

"Trust us" says the US, "because we won't actually let you see for yourself, but hey - we're trustworthy....unlike those guys".

Yeah

jc

Magnolia_Fan

Originally posted by Macros42
[rant] I really hate that crap. Since when is being Anti-War the same as being Anti-American? There have been Americans protesting against the war - are they Anti American? It's a bloody catchphrase used by Bush and his lapdog Blair to ignore antiwar protesters by saying they have a different agenda. I was out last May protesting along with 1-2 hundred thousand other people. Part of that protest was at the our government allowing use of Shannon Airport by US troops. Does that make me Anti-Irish as well. [/rant]

Were there any signs at those protests and how many of those signs said something along the lines of "No to War" or "Give peace a chance" and now how many had a picture of Bush beside a bomb or something like that?...Going by the 4 or 5 protests I saw almost every sign was Anti-Bush...not Anti-War. There is a difference.