By William Fisher
Indigent defendants on death row, prisoners suffering abuses, immigrants in unfair deportation proceedings, torture victims, domestic violence survivors and victims of racial discrimination -- all these groups of people are consistently being denied access to justice while those responsible for the abuses are protected, according to a new report by the American Civil Liberties Union.
Access to the courts and effective remedies for victims of civil and human rights violations have been severely curbed over the last decade, the report charges.
Jamil Dakwar, Director of ACLU Human Rights Program, told IPS, “Access to justice is a fundamental human right and bedrock tenet of American democratic system - it was even codified by the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, which the U.S. championed 62 years ago.”
He added, “Unfortunately, access to the courts and effective remedy been severely curtailed over the last decade, especially for those who need it most. It is time for our government and judiciary to recommit to respecting and promoting this essential right.”
According to the report, "Slamming the Courthouse Doors," the "actions of the executive, federal legislative, and judicial branches of the United States government have seriously restricted access to justice for victims of civil liberties and human rights violations, and have limited the availability of effective (or, in some cases, any) remedies for these violations.”
The report details how victims of human rights abuses are denied access to justice. For example, individuals convicted of capital crimes who seek to present newly found evidence of their innocence or claims of serious constitutional violations being denied recourse in the courts because of federal legislation and recent court decisions, the report says.
It charges that victims of rape, assault, religious rights violations and other serious abuses in prison are having their claims thrown out of court because of a restrictive federal law.
Immigrants who may have legitimate claims to remain in the U.S. are unknowingly waiving their opportunity to pursue these claims and are being swiftly deported because of unfair procedures, the report charges.
It says that torture victims, including survivors of the Central Intelligence Agency’s (CIA) "extraordinary rendition" program, “are being denied their day in court because the government has misused the ‘state secrets’ privilege to shield their torturers from liability.”
It also notes that victims of domestic violence are being denied the opportunity to seek civil remedy under the Violence Against Women Act because of recent court decisions.
The report also includes detailed recommendations and measures for the U.S. government to take “in order to live up to the promise of equal justice for all and comply with international human rights obligations and commitments to guarantee access to justice and effective remedies.”
For example, federal legislation, most prominently the Antiterrorism and Effective Death Penalty Act of 1996 (AEDPA), and Supreme Court decisions, has greatly limited access to federal review of state court death penalty convictions, the report says.
It charges that indigent capital defendants are often defended by appointed attorneys who are overworked, underpaid, lacking critical resources, incompetent, or inexperienced in trying death penalty cases.
The report says prisoners seeking a remedy for injuries inflicted by prison staff and others, or seeking the protection of the courts against dangerous or unhealthy conditions of confinement, also have been denied any remedy and have had their cases thrown out of court.
Similarly, victims of torture and “extraordinary rendition” have been denied their day in court. The Administration of President Barrack Obama has sought to extinguish lawsuits brought by torture survivors through use of “judicially-created doctrines such as the so-called ‘state secrets’ privilege and qualified immunity to dismiss civil suits alleging torture, cruel, inhuman, or degrading treatment, forced disappearance, and arbitrary detention, without consideration on the merits,” the report says.
It charges that by invoking the “state secrets” privilege, the Obama Administration can not only restrict discovery but can quash an entire lawsuit -- without demonstrating the validity of their claim to a judge.
Immigrants also are systematically denied access to justice, as they face monumental obstacles to obtaining review of removal orders. The U.S. government has claimed that there is no right to judicial review of diplomatic assurances when it has sought to transfer individuals to countries known to employ torture. Federal immigration officials also have used a procedure known as stipulated removal to deport non -- U.S. citizens without a hearing before an immigration judge.
“There is a lack of meaningful safeguards to ensure people with mental disabilities facing possible deportation from the United States are afforded fair hearings. As a result, legal permanent residents and asylum seekers with a lawful basis for remaining in the United States may have been unfairly deported from the country because their mental disabilities made it impossible for them to effectively present their claims in court,” the report says.
Recent U.S. Supreme Court cases have also sharply limited the ability of individuals to bring legal action for rights violations. Rights available to women victims of domestic violence have been curtailed, with the Court striking down a civil remedy under the Violence Against Women Act and finding no constitutional violation for police failure to enforce a mandatory judicial protective order.
The ACLU’s recommendations include the following:
Habeas review in death penalty cases: Congress should amend the habeas-related provisions of the Antiterrorism and Effective Death Penalty Act of 1996 (AEDPA) so that federal courts are more accessible to prisoners asserting claims of constitutional violations.
Indigent defense for capital cases: Create and adequately fund state defender organizations that are independent of the judiciary and that have sufficient resources to provide quality representation to indigent capital defendants at the trial, appeal and post-conviction levels. Require states to ensure that capital defense lawyers have adequate time, compensation and resources for their work.
Prisoners’ right to remedy: Congress should act immediately to ensure the Prison Abuse Remedies Act of 2009, (H.R. 4335, PARA). PARA reinstates the ability of prisoners to challenge conditions of confinement that violate their rights by repealing the “physical injury” requirement of the Prison Litigation Reform Act.
State secrets: Congress should pass legislation that creates procedures to prevent the abuse of the state secrets privilege and protect the rights of those seeking redress through our court
system.
Diplomatic assurances: The Obama Administration should prohibit the reliance on “diplomatic assurances” to deport or otherwise transfer persons from the United States.
Racial profiling: Congress should enact the End Racial Profiling Act, which would ban racial profiling and provide for government monitoring and documentation of racial profiling.
Frances Boyle, a legal expert familiar with the report, told IPS, “Because of the deliberate US Federal Court-Packing Scheme undertaken by the Reagan, Bush Sr. and Bush Jr. administrations, today about 60% of U.S. Federal Judges at all levels -- up to and including the US Supreme Court -- have been members of the Federalist Society, and/or were vetted by the Federalist Society.”
Boyle, a law professor at the University of Illinois, described this organization as “right wing, racist, bigoted, reactionary, elitist, sexist, warmongering and totalitarian.”
For example, he said, almost all of the lawyers involved in the Bush Jr. administration’s torture scandal were and still are members of the Federalist Society. So it is no surprise that the doors of US Federal Courts have been shut closed to the poor, the oppressed and the downtrodden of American Society by Federalist Society Judges and Justices.
ACLU REPORT: http://www.aclu.org/human-rights/slamming-courthouse-doors-denial-access-justice-and-remedy-america
Wednesday, December 15, 2010
Tuesday, December 14, 2010
Wikileaks: Yemen Diverted U.S. Aid
By William Fisher
Yemen is diverting U.S. military counterterrorism assistance to an abusive military campaign unrelated to terrorist threats, a prominent human rights group has learned from Wikileaks.
Human Rights Watch (HRW) said that U.S. diplomatic cables released by WikiLeaks this month stated that Yemen in 2009 repeatedly diverted US-supported Yemeni counterterrorism forces and possibly US-supplied military vehicles to assist the government’s fight against northern Huthi rebels.
In the cables, US diplomats complain that their requests for Yemen to halt such diversions were having little effect. Human Rights Watch has documented numerous possible violations of the laws of war by government as well as rebel forces in the Huthi conflict.
HWR said the US should also investigate reported Saudi use of US-supplied
military hardware in the Yemeni-Huthi conflict.
The leaked cables also confirm that the US, not the Yemeni government, carried out missile strikes in December 2009 in the south of the country, including one that killed 42 local residents.
Letta Tayler, terrorism and counterterrorism researcher for HRW, told IPS, “Instead of using U.S. taxpayers’ dollars for the fight against al Quaida,” Yemeni authorities diverted this support from that critical fight to potentially abusive operations against Huthi rebels.”
She added, “The U.S. should not tolerate the misuse of such resources because it could implicate the U.S. in Yemen’s abusive practices. Tolerating such misuse of military assistance for Yemen’s domestic political struggles could implicate the US in these abusive practices.”
HRW called on the U.S. Government to investigate Yemen’s apparent diversion of US counterterrorism assistance and suspend such aid unless the
misuse has stopped.
The Obama administration and the US Congress also should investigate
reported Saudi use of US-supplied ammunition in Yemen and US missile strikes in Yemen, including a 2009 attack that killed several dozen local residents.
US military assistance to Yemen more than doubled from US$67 million to $150 million in 2010 and is expected to increase to $250 million in 2011 in response to efforts by Yemen-based Al-Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula to carry out attacks abroad. Since 2002, the US has spent more than $115 million on Yemeni counterterrorism forces, including the elite Counter-Terrorism Unit that US diplomats say in cables was deployed to attack
northern rebel forces.
Human Rights Watch’s April 2010 report on the Huthi-government armed conflict in northern Yemen, “All Quiet on the Northern Front,” documents credible allegations that Yemeni government forces indiscriminately shelled and bombed civilian areas in its fight against the Huthis, causing civilian
casualties, and used child soldiers. Those practices violate the laws of war. It also found violations by Huthi forces.
US investigations should include an assessment of steps that US embassy officials in 2009 said that they would take to address shortcomings in their “End-Use Monitoring Agreement,” - a pact that allows the US to check if Yemen misused or illicitly transferred any US security assistance.
The US government should take an equally hard look at its own military’s conduct in Yemen, Human Rights Watch said. One diplomatic cable leaked by Wikileaks from December 2009 recounts how Yemeni President Ali Abdullah Saleh promised US Gen. David H. Petraeus that he would continue to falsely claim that US missile strikes against suspected AQAP targets were Yemeni operations.
Those strikes included a December 17 cruise missile attack in the southern province of Abyan that killed at least 42 people, the majority of them women and children. The Abyan strike reportedly used cluster munitions, weapons that are banned by more than 100 countries because they are unable to distinguish between military and civilian people and objects.
US officials have refused to publicly confirm media reports that the US military carried out the airstrike.
“The US should immediately conduct an impartial review of the Abyan strike to ensure compliance with international law, including the prohibition against indiscriminate attacks that harm civilians,” Tayler said. “The Obama administration has yet to clarify the legal basis for such strikes.”
Additional US cables that Wikileaks made public show that Saudi Arabia, which was a party to the Yemeni-Huthi conflict at least from November 2009 until early February 2010, sought ammunition from the US specifically for use in its military engagement against Huthi forces.
A cable from the US embassy in Riyadh dated December 30, 2009, described that the US responded “with alacrity” to the request and supplied ammunition.
The Saudi deputy minister of defense, Prince Khaled bin Sultan, on November 10, 2009, announced Saudi Arabia was establishing a 10-kilometer buffer zone inside Yemen. A Saudi official characterized the zone as “no place for civilians,” raising concerns that civilian immunity would not be respected.
Human Rights Watch in “All Quiet on the Northern Front?” reported that Huthi rebels had claimed that on December 13, 2009, multiple Saudi airstrikes had hit a public market in Bani Mu’in in Razih district in Sa’da governorate, allegedly killing 70 civilians and injuring hundreds more.
A US embassy cable from Riyadh dated February 7, 2010, voiced concern that Saudi strikes hit a “Yemeni medical clinic,” which Prince Khaled seemed to acknowledge, claiming it was used by Huthi forces. Based on Prince Khaled’s assurances that Saudi forces would take care to avoid civilian objects, the US ambassador recommended that the US also supply satellite imagery of the conflict to Saudi Arabia.
Yemen is diverting U.S. military counterterrorism assistance to an abusive military campaign unrelated to terrorist threats, a prominent human rights group has learned from Wikileaks.
Human Rights Watch (HRW) said that U.S. diplomatic cables released by WikiLeaks this month stated that Yemen in 2009 repeatedly diverted US-supported Yemeni counterterrorism forces and possibly US-supplied military vehicles to assist the government’s fight against northern Huthi rebels.
In the cables, US diplomats complain that their requests for Yemen to halt such diversions were having little effect. Human Rights Watch has documented numerous possible violations of the laws of war by government as well as rebel forces in the Huthi conflict.
HWR said the US should also investigate reported Saudi use of US-supplied
military hardware in the Yemeni-Huthi conflict.
The leaked cables also confirm that the US, not the Yemeni government, carried out missile strikes in December 2009 in the south of the country, including one that killed 42 local residents.
Letta Tayler, terrorism and counterterrorism researcher for HRW, told IPS, “Instead of using U.S. taxpayers’ dollars for the fight against al Quaida,” Yemeni authorities diverted this support from that critical fight to potentially abusive operations against Huthi rebels.”
She added, “The U.S. should not tolerate the misuse of such resources because it could implicate the U.S. in Yemen’s abusive practices. Tolerating such misuse of military assistance for Yemen’s domestic political struggles could implicate the US in these abusive practices.”
HRW called on the U.S. Government to investigate Yemen’s apparent diversion of US counterterrorism assistance and suspend such aid unless the
misuse has stopped.
The Obama administration and the US Congress also should investigate
reported Saudi use of US-supplied ammunition in Yemen and US missile strikes in Yemen, including a 2009 attack that killed several dozen local residents.
US military assistance to Yemen more than doubled from US$67 million to $150 million in 2010 and is expected to increase to $250 million in 2011 in response to efforts by Yemen-based Al-Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula to carry out attacks abroad. Since 2002, the US has spent more than $115 million on Yemeni counterterrorism forces, including the elite Counter-Terrorism Unit that US diplomats say in cables was deployed to attack
northern rebel forces.
Human Rights Watch’s April 2010 report on the Huthi-government armed conflict in northern Yemen, “All Quiet on the Northern Front,” documents credible allegations that Yemeni government forces indiscriminately shelled and bombed civilian areas in its fight against the Huthis, causing civilian
casualties, and used child soldiers. Those practices violate the laws of war. It also found violations by Huthi forces.
US investigations should include an assessment of steps that US embassy officials in 2009 said that they would take to address shortcomings in their “End-Use Monitoring Agreement,” - a pact that allows the US to check if Yemen misused or illicitly transferred any US security assistance.
The US government should take an equally hard look at its own military’s conduct in Yemen, Human Rights Watch said. One diplomatic cable leaked by Wikileaks from December 2009 recounts how Yemeni President Ali Abdullah Saleh promised US Gen. David H. Petraeus that he would continue to falsely claim that US missile strikes against suspected AQAP targets were Yemeni operations.
Those strikes included a December 17 cruise missile attack in the southern province of Abyan that killed at least 42 people, the majority of them women and children. The Abyan strike reportedly used cluster munitions, weapons that are banned by more than 100 countries because they are unable to distinguish between military and civilian people and objects.
US officials have refused to publicly confirm media reports that the US military carried out the airstrike.
“The US should immediately conduct an impartial review of the Abyan strike to ensure compliance with international law, including the prohibition against indiscriminate attacks that harm civilians,” Tayler said. “The Obama administration has yet to clarify the legal basis for such strikes.”
Additional US cables that Wikileaks made public show that Saudi Arabia, which was a party to the Yemeni-Huthi conflict at least from November 2009 until early February 2010, sought ammunition from the US specifically for use in its military engagement against Huthi forces.
A cable from the US embassy in Riyadh dated December 30, 2009, described that the US responded “with alacrity” to the request and supplied ammunition.
The Saudi deputy minister of defense, Prince Khaled bin Sultan, on November 10, 2009, announced Saudi Arabia was establishing a 10-kilometer buffer zone inside Yemen. A Saudi official characterized the zone as “no place for civilians,” raising concerns that civilian immunity would not be respected.
Human Rights Watch in “All Quiet on the Northern Front?” reported that Huthi rebels had claimed that on December 13, 2009, multiple Saudi airstrikes had hit a public market in Bani Mu’in in Razih district in Sa’da governorate, allegedly killing 70 civilians and injuring hundreds more.
A US embassy cable from Riyadh dated February 7, 2010, voiced concern that Saudi strikes hit a “Yemeni medical clinic,” which Prince Khaled seemed to acknowledge, claiming it was used by Huthi forces. Based on Prince Khaled’s assurances that Saudi forces would take care to avoid civilian objects, the US ambassador recommended that the US also supply satellite imagery of the conflict to Saudi Arabia.
Saturday, December 11, 2010
ICE Loses Another Round
By William Fisher
Commenting that “I think the government is dragging its feet,” Federal Judge Shira A. Scheindlin expressed shock at the government’s long-standing refusal to release documents relating to the Department of Homeland Security’s “Secure Communities” program.
Nearly a year after the initial request for documents to clarify the program, the government has largely failed to satisfy the requests for information. As the government has delayed, the program has dramatically expanded, prompting growing controversy about the secrecy, confusion, and mixed signals sent by Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) and chain of command with the Department of Homeland Security (DHS), of which ICE is part.
The principal issue is whether local law enforcement can or cannot opt-in or opt-out of the program, of whether it’s mandatory. ICE and other DHS officials have alternated between “yes” and “no,” sewing confusion among those police departments, and entire states and counties, that are interested in dropping out.
To find an answer, the National Day Laborer Organizing Network NDLON), represented by the Center for Constitutional Rights (CCR) and the Kathryn O. Greenberg Immigration Justice Clinic (IJC) of Cardozo Law school initially filed a freedom of information act request for files relating to the rapidly expanding deportation program that culls fingerprints from local law enforcement databases after the agency’s continuous misinformation. Due to the agency's rejection of transparency, the groups took ICE to court in litigation for the documents.
“ICE has been withholding key information from the communities its coercing into its dragnet program,” said Sarahi Uribe of NDLON. “Today, Judge Scheindlin echoed our demand and told ICE to uncover the truth.”
The judge responded to the government’s case, “I’m somewhat confused. The defense agreed to do this back in July and here we are in December,” said Judge Scheindlin. “I think the government is dragging its feet... This is serious."
Thus the NDLON moved closer to a win. A federal judge ordered the defendants in NDLON v. ICE to produce all records relevant to the opt-out issue by January 17th.
CCR staff attorney Sunita Patel told IPS, “We’re hopeful the government will finally provide documents to reveal information that will help advocates and policy makers determine how voluntary the program remains.”
She said, “As advocates across the country are pushing on the state and local levels to find a way to opt-out of Secure Communities, we are going to court to obtain information that the public and advocates need to determine how and if it's possible to opt-out. Only the government has the information everyone needs.”
Judge Scheindlin set January 17, 2011, as the new date for ICE to release the documents or explain why they must be withheld. She also set February 25, 2011, as the deadline for ICE to release a second set of documents related to other topics in the records request.
The judge noted several times that if the defendants fail to produce documents in the two upcoming hearings they will face possible contempt sanctions.
Secure Communities is a program that allows state and local police to check the fingerprints of an individual they are booking into a jail against Department of Homeland Security (DHS) immigration databases. If there is a “hit” in an immigration database, Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) is automatically notified, even if the person has not been convicted of any criminal act.
The emergency injunction specifically requests documents related to the voluntary nature of the program, which has been unclear and the subject of mixed messages thus far. Advocates and community leaders across the country have called this program “dangerous” and say it strains local law enforcement and resources while damaging already the already tenuous relationship between immigrant communities and the police.
“To keep our families together, we need to keep police and ICE separate. The Orwellian-named Secure Communities program does the opposite of making us safer,” said Sarahí Uribe of NDLON. “We see innocent people swept up in a massive dragnet sending a chilling effect through migrant communities.”
Advocates argue that ICE’S unwillingness to provide clear information about the program’s opt-out process at a time when municipalities such as San Francisco and Santa Clara in California and Arlington, Virginia voted to opt-out and numerous others localities are deliberating their participation, requires court-ordered immediate access to key documents.
The groups say immigration authorities in charge of the program, which culls fingerprint data from local jails, have been “inconsistent and dishonest in representing the relationship between local governments and the federal program.” In an email to New York Governor David Patterson, the agency said “We get it. No one will be forced.’. In a press conference two months later, ICE said, “We do not see this as an opt-in opt-out program.”
The Washington Post recently published “ICE Reversals Sowing Mistrust.” The article said, “cities worried about the program’s effects on community-policing efforts are interested in opting-out of the overly broad dragnet.” The plaintiffs maintain that “the on-going dishonesty and desire to opt-out makes gives today's injunction urgency.”
Secure Communities is one of several ICE programs that rely on continuing cooperation from local law enforcement authorities. In the 287(g) program, for example, local police and sheriffs have been recruited to help federal immigration authorities by arresting and detaining persons suspected of having committed immigration crimes.
While many local law enforcement authorities have become part of the program, many others have refused to participate. They say Secure Communities can lead to racial profiling. They also contend that enforcing Federal immigration law is the job of the federal government; that local peace officers don’t have the training and experience to enforce complex immigration law; and that existing police manpower is needed for community policing.
In addition, it has been revealed that many of those who have been deported by the Barack Obama Administration have committed only minor infractions such as broken taillights and driving without a license. ICE’s programs are supposedly geared toward deporting dangerous criminal aliens.
With thirteen states yet to join the program, New York and numerous other activated jurisdictions still trying to opt out, and with its current spokespeople unwilling to set the record straight, advocates are asking a judge to counteract the misinformation by opening the files related to the “opt-out” policies immediately.
Commenting that “I think the government is dragging its feet,” Federal Judge Shira A. Scheindlin expressed shock at the government’s long-standing refusal to release documents relating to the Department of Homeland Security’s “Secure Communities” program.
Nearly a year after the initial request for documents to clarify the program, the government has largely failed to satisfy the requests for information. As the government has delayed, the program has dramatically expanded, prompting growing controversy about the secrecy, confusion, and mixed signals sent by Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) and chain of command with the Department of Homeland Security (DHS), of which ICE is part.
The principal issue is whether local law enforcement can or cannot opt-in or opt-out of the program, of whether it’s mandatory. ICE and other DHS officials have alternated between “yes” and “no,” sewing confusion among those police departments, and entire states and counties, that are interested in dropping out.
To find an answer, the National Day Laborer Organizing Network NDLON), represented by the Center for Constitutional Rights (CCR) and the Kathryn O. Greenberg Immigration Justice Clinic (IJC) of Cardozo Law school initially filed a freedom of information act request for files relating to the rapidly expanding deportation program that culls fingerprints from local law enforcement databases after the agency’s continuous misinformation. Due to the agency's rejection of transparency, the groups took ICE to court in litigation for the documents.
“ICE has been withholding key information from the communities its coercing into its dragnet program,” said Sarahi Uribe of NDLON. “Today, Judge Scheindlin echoed our demand and told ICE to uncover the truth.”
The judge responded to the government’s case, “I’m somewhat confused. The defense agreed to do this back in July and here we are in December,” said Judge Scheindlin. “I think the government is dragging its feet... This is serious."
Thus the NDLON moved closer to a win. A federal judge ordered the defendants in NDLON v. ICE to produce all records relevant to the opt-out issue by January 17th.
CCR staff attorney Sunita Patel told IPS, “We’re hopeful the government will finally provide documents to reveal information that will help advocates and policy makers determine how voluntary the program remains.”
She said, “As advocates across the country are pushing on the state and local levels to find a way to opt-out of Secure Communities, we are going to court to obtain information that the public and advocates need to determine how and if it's possible to opt-out. Only the government has the information everyone needs.”
Judge Scheindlin set January 17, 2011, as the new date for ICE to release the documents or explain why they must be withheld. She also set February 25, 2011, as the deadline for ICE to release a second set of documents related to other topics in the records request.
The judge noted several times that if the defendants fail to produce documents in the two upcoming hearings they will face possible contempt sanctions.
Secure Communities is a program that allows state and local police to check the fingerprints of an individual they are booking into a jail against Department of Homeland Security (DHS) immigration databases. If there is a “hit” in an immigration database, Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) is automatically notified, even if the person has not been convicted of any criminal act.
The emergency injunction specifically requests documents related to the voluntary nature of the program, which has been unclear and the subject of mixed messages thus far. Advocates and community leaders across the country have called this program “dangerous” and say it strains local law enforcement and resources while damaging already the already tenuous relationship between immigrant communities and the police.
“To keep our families together, we need to keep police and ICE separate. The Orwellian-named Secure Communities program does the opposite of making us safer,” said Sarahí Uribe of NDLON. “We see innocent people swept up in a massive dragnet sending a chilling effect through migrant communities.”
Advocates argue that ICE’S unwillingness to provide clear information about the program’s opt-out process at a time when municipalities such as San Francisco and Santa Clara in California and Arlington, Virginia voted to opt-out and numerous others localities are deliberating their participation, requires court-ordered immediate access to key documents.
The groups say immigration authorities in charge of the program, which culls fingerprint data from local jails, have been “inconsistent and dishonest in representing the relationship between local governments and the federal program.” In an email to New York Governor David Patterson, the agency said “We get it. No one will be forced.’. In a press conference two months later, ICE said, “We do not see this as an opt-in opt-out program.”
The Washington Post recently published “ICE Reversals Sowing Mistrust.” The article said, “cities worried about the program’s effects on community-policing efforts are interested in opting-out of the overly broad dragnet.” The plaintiffs maintain that “the on-going dishonesty and desire to opt-out makes gives today's injunction urgency.”
Secure Communities is one of several ICE programs that rely on continuing cooperation from local law enforcement authorities. In the 287(g) program, for example, local police and sheriffs have been recruited to help federal immigration authorities by arresting and detaining persons suspected of having committed immigration crimes.
While many local law enforcement authorities have become part of the program, many others have refused to participate. They say Secure Communities can lead to racial profiling. They also contend that enforcing Federal immigration law is the job of the federal government; that local peace officers don’t have the training and experience to enforce complex immigration law; and that existing police manpower is needed for community policing.
In addition, it has been revealed that many of those who have been deported by the Barack Obama Administration have committed only minor infractions such as broken taillights and driving without a license. ICE’s programs are supposedly geared toward deporting dangerous criminal aliens.
With thirteen states yet to join the program, New York and numerous other activated jurisdictions still trying to opt out, and with its current spokespeople unwilling to set the record straight, advocates are asking a judge to counteract the misinformation by opening the files related to the “opt-out” policies immediately.
Friday, December 10, 2010
Rights Groups Take ICE to Court
By William Fisher
Prominent human rights groups went to federal court Thursday, seeking clarification of whether state and local law enforcement authorities can “opt-in” or “opt-out” of the Secure Communities program, a controversial federal-local partnership that provides prison inmates’ fingerprints and other information to a Federal database of persons wanted for immigration violations.
The action brought by the Center for Constitutional Rights (CCR) and the Kathryn O. Greenberg Immigration Justice Clinic (IJC) of Cardozo law school, seeks an emergency injunction and documents regarding the controversial Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) Secure Communities program.
The documents sought are part of a Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) lawsuit filed against the Immigration Customs Enforcement (ICE) agency on behalf of the National Day Laborer Organization Network (NDLON). ICE is a unit of the Department of Homeland Security.
“As advocates across the country are pushing on the state and local levels to find a way to opt-out of Secure Communities, we are going to court to obtain information that the public and advocates need to determine how and if it's possible to opt-out,” said CCR staff attorney Sunita Patel. “Only the government has the information everyone needs.”
The emergency injunction specifically requests documents related to the voluntary nature of the program, which has been unclear and the subject of mixed messages thus far. Advocates and community leaders across the country have called this program “dangerous” and say it strains local law enforcement and resources while damaging already the already tenuous relationship between immigrant communities and the police.
“To keep our families together, we need to keep police and ICE separate. The Orwellian-named Secure Communities program does the opposite of making us safer,” said Sarahí Uribe of NDLON. “We see innocent people swept up in a massive dragnet sending a chilling effect through migrant communities.”
Advocates argue that ICE’S unwillingness to provide clear information about the program’s opt-out process at a time when municipalities such as San Francisco and Santa Clara in California and Arlington, Virginia voted to opt-out and numerous others localities are deliberating their participation, requires court-ordered immediate access to key documents.
The groups say immigration authorities in charge of the program, which culls fingerprint data from local jails, have been “inconsistent and dishonest in representing the relationship between local governments and the federal program.” In an email to New York Governor David Patterson, the agency said “We get it. No one will be forced.’ In a press conference two months later, ICE said, “We do not see this as an opt-in opt-out program.”
At a recent speaking engagement, Assistant Director of Secure Communities David Venturella was confronted by Maria Bolaños, a domestic violence survivor whose call for help resulted in deportation proceedings under the program.
His accusation of inaccurate reporting moved the Washington Post to publish “ICE Reversals Sowing Mistrust.” Citing cases like Bolaños as a reason for concern, the article said, “cities worried about the program’s effects on community-policing efforts are interested in opting-out of the overly broad dragnet.” The plaintiffs maintain that “the on-going dishonesty and desire to opt-out makes gives today's injunction urgency.”
With thirteen states yet to join the program, New York and numerous other activated jurisdictions still trying to opt out, and its current spokespeople unwilling to set the record straight, advocates are asking a judge to counteract the misinformation by opening the files related to the “opt-out” policies immediately.
The Center for Constitutional Rights is dedicated to advancing and protecting the rights guaranteed by the United States Constitution and the Universal Declaration of Human Rights.
The mission of the National Day Laborer Organization Network is to improve the lives of day laborers in the U.S. by unifying and strengthening its member organizations to be more strategic and effective in their efforts to develop leadership, mobilize day laborers in order to protect and expand their civil, labor and human rights.
The Kathryn O. Greenberg Immigration Justice Clinic of the Benjamin N. Cardozo School of Law was founded in 2008 to provide quality pro bono legal representation to indigent immigrants facing deportation.
Secure Communities is one of several ICE programs that rely on continuing cooperation from local law enforcement authorities. In the 287(g) program, for example, local police and sheriffs have been recruited to help federal immigration authorities by arresting and detaining persons suspected of having committed immigration crimes.
While many local law enforcement authorities have become part of the program, many others have refused to participate. They say enforcing Federal immigration law is the job of the federal government; that local peace officers don’t have the training and experience to enforce complex immigration law; and that existing police manpower is needed for community policing.
In addition, it has been revealed that many of those who have been deported by the Barack Obama Administration have committed only minor infractions such as broken taillights and driving without a license. ICE’s programs are supposedly geared toward deporting dangerous criminal aliens.
Prominent human rights groups went to federal court Thursday, seeking clarification of whether state and local law enforcement authorities can “opt-in” or “opt-out” of the Secure Communities program, a controversial federal-local partnership that provides prison inmates’ fingerprints and other information to a Federal database of persons wanted for immigration violations.
The action brought by the Center for Constitutional Rights (CCR) and the Kathryn O. Greenberg Immigration Justice Clinic (IJC) of Cardozo law school, seeks an emergency injunction and documents regarding the controversial Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) Secure Communities program.
The documents sought are part of a Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) lawsuit filed against the Immigration Customs Enforcement (ICE) agency on behalf of the National Day Laborer Organization Network (NDLON). ICE is a unit of the Department of Homeland Security.
“As advocates across the country are pushing on the state and local levels to find a way to opt-out of Secure Communities, we are going to court to obtain information that the public and advocates need to determine how and if it's possible to opt-out,” said CCR staff attorney Sunita Patel. “Only the government has the information everyone needs.”
The emergency injunction specifically requests documents related to the voluntary nature of the program, which has been unclear and the subject of mixed messages thus far. Advocates and community leaders across the country have called this program “dangerous” and say it strains local law enforcement and resources while damaging already the already tenuous relationship between immigrant communities and the police.
“To keep our families together, we need to keep police and ICE separate. The Orwellian-named Secure Communities program does the opposite of making us safer,” said Sarahí Uribe of NDLON. “We see innocent people swept up in a massive dragnet sending a chilling effect through migrant communities.”
Advocates argue that ICE’S unwillingness to provide clear information about the program’s opt-out process at a time when municipalities such as San Francisco and Santa Clara in California and Arlington, Virginia voted to opt-out and numerous others localities are deliberating their participation, requires court-ordered immediate access to key documents.
The groups say immigration authorities in charge of the program, which culls fingerprint data from local jails, have been “inconsistent and dishonest in representing the relationship between local governments and the federal program.” In an email to New York Governor David Patterson, the agency said “We get it. No one will be forced.’ In a press conference two months later, ICE said, “We do not see this as an opt-in opt-out program.”
At a recent speaking engagement, Assistant Director of Secure Communities David Venturella was confronted by Maria Bolaños, a domestic violence survivor whose call for help resulted in deportation proceedings under the program.
His accusation of inaccurate reporting moved the Washington Post to publish “ICE Reversals Sowing Mistrust.” Citing cases like Bolaños as a reason for concern, the article said, “cities worried about the program’s effects on community-policing efforts are interested in opting-out of the overly broad dragnet.” The plaintiffs maintain that “the on-going dishonesty and desire to opt-out makes gives today's injunction urgency.”
With thirteen states yet to join the program, New York and numerous other activated jurisdictions still trying to opt out, and its current spokespeople unwilling to set the record straight, advocates are asking a judge to counteract the misinformation by opening the files related to the “opt-out” policies immediately.
The Center for Constitutional Rights is dedicated to advancing and protecting the rights guaranteed by the United States Constitution and the Universal Declaration of Human Rights.
The mission of the National Day Laborer Organization Network is to improve the lives of day laborers in the U.S. by unifying and strengthening its member organizations to be more strategic and effective in their efforts to develop leadership, mobilize day laborers in order to protect and expand their civil, labor and human rights.
The Kathryn O. Greenberg Immigration Justice Clinic of the Benjamin N. Cardozo School of Law was founded in 2008 to provide quality pro bono legal representation to indigent immigrants facing deportation.
Secure Communities is one of several ICE programs that rely on continuing cooperation from local law enforcement authorities. In the 287(g) program, for example, local police and sheriffs have been recruited to help federal immigration authorities by arresting and detaining persons suspected of having committed immigration crimes.
While many local law enforcement authorities have become part of the program, many others have refused to participate. They say enforcing Federal immigration law is the job of the federal government; that local peace officers don’t have the training and experience to enforce complex immigration law; and that existing police manpower is needed for community policing.
In addition, it has been revealed that many of those who have been deported by the Barack Obama Administration have committed only minor infractions such as broken taillights and driving without a license. ICE’s programs are supposedly geared toward deporting dangerous criminal aliens.
GITMO RECIDIVISM
By William Fisher
A prominent human rights organization and public interest law firm that has defended numerous Guantanamo Bay detainees charged Thursday that a recent government report on a high rate of recidivism among former GITMO inmates is loaded with “vague and unsubstantiated claims and misinformation.”
The Center for Constitutional Rights said in a statement that the report to Congress by the Director of National Intelligence (DNI) was “the latest in a line of reports that have been repeatedly discredited for using dubious classifications to produce unreliable statistics.”
CCR said that the DNI’s report contains “unsubstantiated statistics on what it persists in calling recidivism or re-engagement of former detainees.”
In so doing, CCR added, the administration is “shooting itself in the foot, through political miscalculation and propaganda, in its efforts to close the prison.”
The report said that 150 detainees, or 25 per cent of those released, are confirmed or believed to have rejoined the fight. CCR questioned those figures and called on the DNI to provide more detailed information.
In the last two days, Congress has voted to block the use of any funds to pay for transporting Guantanamo detainees to mainland U.S. This effectively forecloses the possibility of Guantanamo detainees being tried in civilian courts. Most members of Congress believe GITMO trials should be before military tribunals.
CCR criticized the vague and unsubstantiated claims and misinformation in the National Intelligence Director’s release of figures regarding the supposed "recidivism" of former Guantanamo detainees.
“The director's summary report also persists in using the language of ‘re-engagement’ to describe individuals, despite the fact that the majority of them should never have been detained in the first place and were known early on by the government to be innocent. It is not possible to return to the battlefield if you were never there in the first place,” the CCR said, adding:
“If the underlying basis for most detentions was suspect, the claims of re-engagement are more so and only serve to whitewash the original situation.”
The group noted that Colonel Lawrence Wilkerson, a senior State Department official who served as chief of staff to Secretary of State Colin Powell during the Bush administration, recently stated in a federal court declaration in support of a former detainee's claims of wrongful detention that “the Bush administration knew early on that the majority of the men at Guantanamo were wrongfully detained, but did not release them because of political concerns that doing so could harm the government’s push for war.”
CCR said the latest DNI report “only summarizes its figures without actually naming any alleged recidivists or including any information that would enable meaningful scrutiny.”
Leili Kashani, a CCR attorney, told IPS, “The problem with the latest government recidivism report, as with the ones that have preceded it, is that it provides no substance that can be assessed, and from experience we know that we cannot just accept it at face value.”
She added, “If the government thinks individual men released from Guantanamo have “returned to the battlefield,” then it should tell us who they are and what they are alleged to have done. These periodic reports that do not provide names or any concrete allegations are useless at best and fear mongering at worst. They function much like those color-coded terror warnings that the government has now had the sense to drop.”
She continued: “Tragically, these reports continue to obscure the fact that the vast majority of the men at Guantanamo should never have been detained in the first place and that a great injustice has been done to them. Hundreds of men have now been released and are peacefully rebuilding their lives. Rather than fueling fear, the government should be acknowledging these facts and making sure that the remaining men who have been wrongfully detained are quickly repatriated or resettled.”
Earlier reports that did identify individuals by name revealed, for example, that former detainee Moazzem Begg had been classified as a "recidivist" because he participated in a documentary about Guantanamo.
“As we now know from cables released by WikiLeaks, Mr. Begg has been privately championed by the State Department for his lack of animosity towards the United States since his release and for his valuable work assisting with the resettlement of other detainees,” CCR said.
An August 2010 U.S. Department of Justice letter responding to a Freedom of Information Act request reveals that criteria for identifying recidivism are arbitrary and can change at any time: “DIA [U.S. States Defense Intelligence Agency] does not endeavor to create any sort of firm guidelines for identifying a detainee as having returned to the fight,” CCR claims, adding:
“In the absence of specific and concrete information, which has been called for each time new reports have been released, the latest findings can simply not be assessed or trusted. They only serve to thwart the release of men whom the courts or the government have determined should not be detained and to fuel unfounded generalizations about detainees, the vast majority of whom have been successfully repatriated and resettled.”
The Wall Street Journal (WSJ) reported that intelligence officials claimed that five of the 69 detainees transferred to other countries from Guantanamo Bay by the Obama administration are believed to have rejoined terrorist groups.
The DNI report also said two former detainees were confirmed to be "re-engaging in terrorist or insurgent activities" and three others released in 2009 are suspected of doing so. The former detainees weren't named.
Since the prison at GITMO was opened in 2002, 598 detainees have been released, most of them during the administration of George W. Bush. They were sent home or to other countries that agreed to take them in.
Among the recent diplomatic cables released by Wikileaks are some describing the inducements and pressure U.S. officials proffered to secure host countries for detainees scheduled for release.
In the past, other organizations have also taken issue with recidivism statistics provided by the Department of Defense (DOD) and other government agencies. Students and faculty of Seton Hall law school have carried out extensive examinations of the claims made in prior reports as well as questioning the methodology used to arrive at those claims, and revealed numerous errors and anomalies.
On his first day in office, President Barack Obama signed an executive order closing the prison at Guantanamo Bay in one year. But the task has proved more challenging than the administration imagined. In addition to the difficulty of finding host countries for prisoners scheduled for release, the issue became highly politicized by widespread rumors that former detainees “would be allowed to roam the Main Streets of American towns and cities with impunity.”
While this was never the government’s intention, members of congress were [placed under considerable pressure by their frightened constituencies.
When the government proposed to try the alleged mastermind of the 9/11/2001 terrorist attacks in a New York federal court, a public outcry forced the Obama administration to put the idea on a back burner – where it remains.
One Guantanamo inmate has been tried in federal civilian court in New York without incident. He was found guilty and faces a sentence of 20 years to life.
A prominent human rights organization and public interest law firm that has defended numerous Guantanamo Bay detainees charged Thursday that a recent government report on a high rate of recidivism among former GITMO inmates is loaded with “vague and unsubstantiated claims and misinformation.”
The Center for Constitutional Rights said in a statement that the report to Congress by the Director of National Intelligence (DNI) was “the latest in a line of reports that have been repeatedly discredited for using dubious classifications to produce unreliable statistics.”
CCR said that the DNI’s report contains “unsubstantiated statistics on what it persists in calling recidivism or re-engagement of former detainees.”
In so doing, CCR added, the administration is “shooting itself in the foot, through political miscalculation and propaganda, in its efforts to close the prison.”
The report said that 150 detainees, or 25 per cent of those released, are confirmed or believed to have rejoined the fight. CCR questioned those figures and called on the DNI to provide more detailed information.
In the last two days, Congress has voted to block the use of any funds to pay for transporting Guantanamo detainees to mainland U.S. This effectively forecloses the possibility of Guantanamo detainees being tried in civilian courts. Most members of Congress believe GITMO trials should be before military tribunals.
CCR criticized the vague and unsubstantiated claims and misinformation in the National Intelligence Director’s release of figures regarding the supposed "recidivism" of former Guantanamo detainees.
“The director's summary report also persists in using the language of ‘re-engagement’ to describe individuals, despite the fact that the majority of them should never have been detained in the first place and were known early on by the government to be innocent. It is not possible to return to the battlefield if you were never there in the first place,” the CCR said, adding:
“If the underlying basis for most detentions was suspect, the claims of re-engagement are more so and only serve to whitewash the original situation.”
The group noted that Colonel Lawrence Wilkerson, a senior State Department official who served as chief of staff to Secretary of State Colin Powell during the Bush administration, recently stated in a federal court declaration in support of a former detainee's claims of wrongful detention that “the Bush administration knew early on that the majority of the men at Guantanamo were wrongfully detained, but did not release them because of political concerns that doing so could harm the government’s push for war.”
CCR said the latest DNI report “only summarizes its figures without actually naming any alleged recidivists or including any information that would enable meaningful scrutiny.”
Leili Kashani, a CCR attorney, told IPS, “The problem with the latest government recidivism report, as with the ones that have preceded it, is that it provides no substance that can be assessed, and from experience we know that we cannot just accept it at face value.”
She added, “If the government thinks individual men released from Guantanamo have “returned to the battlefield,” then it should tell us who they are and what they are alleged to have done. These periodic reports that do not provide names or any concrete allegations are useless at best and fear mongering at worst. They function much like those color-coded terror warnings that the government has now had the sense to drop.”
She continued: “Tragically, these reports continue to obscure the fact that the vast majority of the men at Guantanamo should never have been detained in the first place and that a great injustice has been done to them. Hundreds of men have now been released and are peacefully rebuilding their lives. Rather than fueling fear, the government should be acknowledging these facts and making sure that the remaining men who have been wrongfully detained are quickly repatriated or resettled.”
Earlier reports that did identify individuals by name revealed, for example, that former detainee Moazzem Begg had been classified as a "recidivist" because he participated in a documentary about Guantanamo.
“As we now know from cables released by WikiLeaks, Mr. Begg has been privately championed by the State Department for his lack of animosity towards the United States since his release and for his valuable work assisting with the resettlement of other detainees,” CCR said.
An August 2010 U.S. Department of Justice letter responding to a Freedom of Information Act request reveals that criteria for identifying recidivism are arbitrary and can change at any time: “DIA [U.S. States Defense Intelligence Agency] does not endeavor to create any sort of firm guidelines for identifying a detainee as having returned to the fight,” CCR claims, adding:
“In the absence of specific and concrete information, which has been called for each time new reports have been released, the latest findings can simply not be assessed or trusted. They only serve to thwart the release of men whom the courts or the government have determined should not be detained and to fuel unfounded generalizations about detainees, the vast majority of whom have been successfully repatriated and resettled.”
The Wall Street Journal (WSJ) reported that intelligence officials claimed that five of the 69 detainees transferred to other countries from Guantanamo Bay by the Obama administration are believed to have rejoined terrorist groups.
The DNI report also said two former detainees were confirmed to be "re-engaging in terrorist or insurgent activities" and three others released in 2009 are suspected of doing so. The former detainees weren't named.
Since the prison at GITMO was opened in 2002, 598 detainees have been released, most of them during the administration of George W. Bush. They were sent home or to other countries that agreed to take them in.
Among the recent diplomatic cables released by Wikileaks are some describing the inducements and pressure U.S. officials proffered to secure host countries for detainees scheduled for release.
In the past, other organizations have also taken issue with recidivism statistics provided by the Department of Defense (DOD) and other government agencies. Students and faculty of Seton Hall law school have carried out extensive examinations of the claims made in prior reports as well as questioning the methodology used to arrive at those claims, and revealed numerous errors and anomalies.
On his first day in office, President Barack Obama signed an executive order closing the prison at Guantanamo Bay in one year. But the task has proved more challenging than the administration imagined. In addition to the difficulty of finding host countries for prisoners scheduled for release, the issue became highly politicized by widespread rumors that former detainees “would be allowed to roam the Main Streets of American towns and cities with impunity.”
While this was never the government’s intention, members of congress were [placed under considerable pressure by their frightened constituencies.
When the government proposed to try the alleged mastermind of the 9/11/2001 terrorist attacks in a New York federal court, a public outcry forced the Obama administration to put the idea on a back burner – where it remains.
One Guantanamo inmate has been tried in federal civilian court in New York without incident. He was found guilty and faces a sentence of 20 years to life.
GITMO RECIDIVISM
By William Fisher
A prominent human rights organization and public interest law firm that has defended numerous Guantanamo Bay detainees charged Thursday that a recent government report on a high rate of recidivism among former GITMO inmates is loaded with “vague and unsubstantiated claims and misinformation.”
The Center for Constitutional Rights said in a statement that the report to Congress by the Director of National Intelligence (DNI) was “the latest in a line of reports that have been repeatedly discredited for using dubious classifications to produce unreliable statistics.”
CCR said that the DNI’s report contains “unsubstantiated statistics on what it persists in calling recidivism or re-engagement of former detainees.”
In so doing, CCR added, the administration is “shooting itself in the foot, through political miscalculation and propaganda, in its efforts to close the prison.”
The report said that 150 detainees, or 25 per cent of those released, are confirmed or believed to have rejoined the fight. CCR questioned those figures and called on the DNI to provide more detailed information.
In the last two days, Congress has voted to block the use of any funds to pay for transporting Guantanamo detainees to mainland U.S. This effectively forecloses the possibility of Guantanamo detainees being tried in civilian courts. Most members of Congress believe GITMO trials should be before military tribunals.
CCR criticized the vague and unsubstantiated claims and misinformation in the National Intelligence Director’s release of figures regarding the supposed "recidivism" of former Guantanamo detainees.
“The director's summary report also persists in using the language of ‘re-engagement’ to describe individuals, despite the fact that the majority of them should never have been detained in the first place and were known early on by the government to be innocent. It is not possible to return to the battlefield if you were never there in the first place,” the CCR said, adding:
“If the underlying basis for most detentions was suspect, the claims of re-engagement are more so and only serve to whitewash the original situation.”
The group noted that Colonel Lawrence Wilkerson, a senior State Department official who served as chief of staff to Secretary of State Colin Powell during the Bush administration, recently stated in a federal court declaration in support of a former detainee's claims of wrongful detention that “the Bush administration knew early on that the majority of the men at Guantanamo were wrongfully detained, but did not release them because of political concerns that doing so could harm the government’s push for war.”
CCR said the latest DNI report “only summarizes its figures without actually naming any alleged recidivists or including any information that would enable meaningful scrutiny.”
Leili Kashani, a CCR attorney, told IPS, “The problem with the latest government recidivism report, as with the ones that have preceded it, is that it provides no substance that can be assessed, and from experience we know that we cannot just accept it at face value.”
She added, “If the government thinks individual men released from Guantanamo have “returned to the battlefield,” then it should tell us who they are and what they are alleged to have done. These periodic reports that do not provide names or any concrete allegations are useless at best and fear mongering at worst. They function much like those color-coded terror warnings that the government has now had the sense to drop.”
She continued: “Tragically, these reports continue to obscure the fact that the vast majority of the men at Guantanamo should never have been detained in the first place and that a great injustice has been done to them. Hundreds of men have now been released and are peacefully rebuilding their lives. Rather than fueling fear, the government should be acknowledging these facts and making sure that the remaining men who have been wrongfully detained are quickly repatriated or resettled.”
Earlier reports that did identify individuals by name revealed, for example, that former detainee Moazzem Begg had been classified as a "recidivist" because he participated in a documentary about Guantanamo.
“As we now know from cables released by WikiLeaks, Mr. Begg has been privately championed by the State Department for his lack of animosity towards the United States since his release and for his valuable work assisting with the resettlement of other detainees,” CCR said.
An August 2010 U.S. Department of Justice letter responding to a Freedom of Information Act request reveals that criteria for identifying recidivism are arbitrary and can change at any time: “DIA [U.S. States Defense Intelligence Agency] does not endeavor to create any sort of firm guidelines for identifying a detainee as having returned to the fight,” CCR claims, adding:
“In the absence of specific and concrete information, which has been called for each time new reports have been released, the latest findings can simply not be assessed or trusted. They only serve to thwart the release of men whom the courts or the government have determined should not be detained and to fuel unfounded generalizations about detainees, the vast majority of whom have been successfully repatriated and resettled.”
The Wall Street Journal (WSJ) reported that intelligence officials claimed that five of the 69 detainees transferred to other countries from Guantanamo Bay by the Obama administration are believed to have rejoined terrorist groups.
The DNI report also said two former detainees were confirmed to be "re-engaging in terrorist or insurgent activities" and three others released in 2009 are suspected of doing so. The former detainees weren't named.
Since the prison at GITMO was opened in 2002, 598 detainees have been released, most of them during the administration of George W. Bush. They were sent home or to other countries that agreed to take them in.
Among the recent diplomatic cables released by Wikileaks are some describing the inducements and pressure U.S. officials proffered to secure host countries for detainees scheduled for release.
In the past, other organizations have also taken issue with recidivism statistics provided by the Department of Defense (DOD) and other government agencies. Students and faculty of Seton Hall law school have carried out extensive examinations of the claims made in prior reports as well as questioning the methodology used to arrive at those claims, and revealed numerous errors and anomalies.
On his first day in office, President Barack Obama signed an executive order closing the prison at Guantanamo Bay in one year. But the task has proved more challenging than the administration imagined. In addition to the difficulty of finding host countries for prisoners scheduled for release, the issue became highly politicized by widespread rumors that former detainees “would be allowed to roam the Main Streets of American towns and cities with impunity.”
While this was never the government’s intention, members of congress were [placed under considerable pressure by their frightened constituencies.
When the government proposed to try the alleged mastermind of the 9/11/2001 terrorist attacks in a New York federal court, a public outcry forced the Obama administration to put the idea on a back burner – where it remains.
One Guantanamo inmate has been tried in federal civilian court in New York without incident. He was found guilty and faces a sentence of 20 years to life.
A prominent human rights organization and public interest law firm that has defended numerous Guantanamo Bay detainees charged Thursday that a recent government report on a high rate of recidivism among former GITMO inmates is loaded with “vague and unsubstantiated claims and misinformation.”
The Center for Constitutional Rights said in a statement that the report to Congress by the Director of National Intelligence (DNI) was “the latest in a line of reports that have been repeatedly discredited for using dubious classifications to produce unreliable statistics.”
CCR said that the DNI’s report contains “unsubstantiated statistics on what it persists in calling recidivism or re-engagement of former detainees.”
In so doing, CCR added, the administration is “shooting itself in the foot, through political miscalculation and propaganda, in its efforts to close the prison.”
The report said that 150 detainees, or 25 per cent of those released, are confirmed or believed to have rejoined the fight. CCR questioned those figures and called on the DNI to provide more detailed information.
In the last two days, Congress has voted to block the use of any funds to pay for transporting Guantanamo detainees to mainland U.S. This effectively forecloses the possibility of Guantanamo detainees being tried in civilian courts. Most members of Congress believe GITMO trials should be before military tribunals.
CCR criticized the vague and unsubstantiated claims and misinformation in the National Intelligence Director’s release of figures regarding the supposed "recidivism" of former Guantanamo detainees.
“The director's summary report also persists in using the language of ‘re-engagement’ to describe individuals, despite the fact that the majority of them should never have been detained in the first place and were known early on by the government to be innocent. It is not possible to return to the battlefield if you were never there in the first place,” the CCR said, adding:
“If the underlying basis for most detentions was suspect, the claims of re-engagement are more so and only serve to whitewash the original situation.”
The group noted that Colonel Lawrence Wilkerson, a senior State Department official who served as chief of staff to Secretary of State Colin Powell during the Bush administration, recently stated in a federal court declaration in support of a former detainee's claims of wrongful detention that “the Bush administration knew early on that the majority of the men at Guantanamo were wrongfully detained, but did not release them because of political concerns that doing so could harm the government’s push for war.”
CCR said the latest DNI report “only summarizes its figures without actually naming any alleged recidivists or including any information that would enable meaningful scrutiny.”
Leili Kashani, a CCR attorney, told IPS, “The problem with the latest government recidivism report, as with the ones that have preceded it, is that it provides no substance that can be assessed, and from experience we know that we cannot just accept it at face value.”
She added, “If the government thinks individual men released from Guantanamo have “returned to the battlefield,” then it should tell us who they are and what they are alleged to have done. These periodic reports that do not provide names or any concrete allegations are useless at best and fear mongering at worst. They function much like those color-coded terror warnings that the government has now had the sense to drop.”
She continued: “Tragically, these reports continue to obscure the fact that the vast majority of the men at Guantanamo should never have been detained in the first place and that a great injustice has been done to them. Hundreds of men have now been released and are peacefully rebuilding their lives. Rather than fueling fear, the government should be acknowledging these facts and making sure that the remaining men who have been wrongfully detained are quickly repatriated or resettled.”
Earlier reports that did identify individuals by name revealed, for example, that former detainee Moazzem Begg had been classified as a "recidivist" because he participated in a documentary about Guantanamo.
“As we now know from cables released by WikiLeaks, Mr. Begg has been privately championed by the State Department for his lack of animosity towards the United States since his release and for his valuable work assisting with the resettlement of other detainees,” CCR said.
An August 2010 U.S. Department of Justice letter responding to a Freedom of Information Act request reveals that criteria for identifying recidivism are arbitrary and can change at any time: “DIA [U.S. States Defense Intelligence Agency] does not endeavor to create any sort of firm guidelines for identifying a detainee as having returned to the fight,” CCR claims, adding:
“In the absence of specific and concrete information, which has been called for each time new reports have been released, the latest findings can simply not be assessed or trusted. They only serve to thwart the release of men whom the courts or the government have determined should not be detained and to fuel unfounded generalizations about detainees, the vast majority of whom have been successfully repatriated and resettled.”
The Wall Street Journal (WSJ) reported that intelligence officials claimed that five of the 69 detainees transferred to other countries from Guantanamo Bay by the Obama administration are believed to have rejoined terrorist groups.
The DNI report also said two former detainees were confirmed to be "re-engaging in terrorist or insurgent activities" and three others released in 2009 are suspected of doing so. The former detainees weren't named.
Since the prison at GITMO was opened in 2002, 598 detainees have been released, most of them during the administration of George W. Bush. They were sent home or to other countries that agreed to take them in.
Among the recent diplomatic cables released by Wikileaks are some describing the inducements and pressure U.S. officials proffered to secure host countries for detainees scheduled for release.
In the past, other organizations have also taken issue with recidivism statistics provided by the Department of Defense (DOD) and other government agencies. Students and faculty of Seton Hall law school have carried out extensive examinations of the claims made in prior reports as well as questioning the methodology used to arrive at those claims, and revealed numerous errors and anomalies.
On his first day in office, President Barack Obama signed an executive order closing the prison at Guantanamo Bay in one year. But the task has proved more challenging than the administration imagined. In addition to the difficulty of finding host countries for prisoners scheduled for release, the issue became highly politicized by widespread rumors that former detainees “would be allowed to roam the Main Streets of American towns and cities with impunity.”
While this was never the government’s intention, members of congress were [placed under considerable pressure by their frightened constituencies.
When the government proposed to try the alleged mastermind of the 9/11/2001 terrorist attacks in a New York federal court, a public outcry forced the Obama administration to put the idea on a back burner – where it remains.
One Guantanamo inmate has been tried in federal civilian court in New York without incident. He was found guilty and faces a sentence of 20 years to life.
Thursday, December 09, 2010
Who Supports Wikileaks?
By William Fisher
As pro- and anti-Wikileaks forces ratchet up their battle, and Wikileaks’ impresario marks time in storied, overcrowded, and very Victorian Wandsworth Prison in southwest London, a group of his supporters are taking a different tack. They’re not hacking Visa or Master Card or Sarah Palen; instead they’re speaking out in no uncertain terms. Their message: On balance, Wikileaks has performed a valuable public service for which he is now being persecuted with trumped up sex charges.
These champions of transparency and enemies of government secrecy are the small but vocal community known as the human rights constituency. Many were among the first to defend Wikileaks and among the most vocal.
Joining them is an equally articulate community: the groups that campaign tirelessly for press freedom.
Here are some of the sentiments expressed by these groups when contacted by IPS:
Dinah PoKempner of Human Rights Watch says she “has no information regarding Mr. Assange's personal actions in Sweden and thus no position on his arrest on charges of sexual assault other than that like any suspect in a criminal case, he should be accorded full rights of defense due under international and domestic law.”
However, [her organization does] have concerns at recent allegations from various political figures that the actions of Wikileaks in releasing classified US cables somehow amount to either "terrorism" or "espionage" in the absence of evidence of any intent to attack civilians or endanger national security. Threats made against Mr. Assange's life are particularly reprehensible,” she says.
She added: “Although the quantity of the Wikileaks cable release is unprecedented, the nature of the material is not. Traditional media frequently reveal non-public government information of an embarrassing nature, and this can be in the public interest and in furtherance of the right to receive information in a democratic society. We have expressed concern to Wikileaks that care be taken not to reveal information that endangers lives, and we continue to monitor the disclosures to that end.”
Michael Ratner, the firebrand President of the Center for Constitutional Rights, told IPS, “ Wikileaks has played a critical role in giving the American people the truth about the lies the US government has told about its wars, especially those in the Middle East and Central Asia. We were lied to about Yemen, Pakistan, Afghanistan, Iran, Iraq and other places. There can be no issue more important then getting the truth out about war and the drum beats of war; only then can people act responsibly to protest war. Why did no other major newspaper bring the US lies to our attention?”
He pivoted to Assange's arrest, saying, “Yes, the charges for which he is being investigated need to be investigated. Yet the irregularities in the proceeding are glaring. Why was the case dropped originally? Why was he allowed to leave Sweden? Why was an arrest warrant issued to bring him back to Sweden for questioning--which he is willing to do at a Swedish embassy in the UK? Why was bail denied when he surrendered and his lawyers had let the police know he would do so when the warrant was served? Finally, is the hand of the US the answer to these questions? Sweden is not the UK; the US can squash that tiny country. The chances of getting its hands on Assange from there are probably improved--and that may be the story.”
Hina Shamsi, Director of the ACLU National Security Project, focused on widespread rumors that there is a conspiracy between the U.K. and Sweden to extradite Assange to the United States.
She told us, “We’re deeply skeptical that prosecuting WikiLeaks would be constitutional, or a good idea. The courts have made clear that the First Amendment protects independent third parties who publish classified information. Prosecuting WikiLeaks would be no different from prosecuting the media outlets that also published classified documents”
“If newspapers could be held criminally liable for publishing leaked information about government practices, we might never have found out about the CIA’s secret prisons or the government spying on innocent Americans. Prosecuting publishers of classified information threatens investigative journalism that is necessary to an informed public debate about government conduct, and that is an unthinkable outcome,” she said, adding,
“The broader lesson of the WikiLeaks phenomenon is that President Obama should recommit to the ideals of transparency he invoked at the beginning of his presidency. The American public should not have to depend on leaks to the news media and on whistleblowers to know what the government is up to.”
AMNESTY International played a more direct role than most. It said one of Wiki’s leaked diplomatic cables corroborates images released earlier this year by Amnesty International showing that the U.S. military carried out a missile strike in south Yemen in December 2009 that killed dozens of local civilians, including women and children.
The organization said that in the secret cable from January 2010 published by Wikileaks, Yemen’s President Ali Abdullah Saleh is reported as having assured U.S. General David Petraeus that his government would “continue saying the bombs are ours, not yours.”
Human Rights First notes that the latest round of WikiLeaks documents is rousing discussion about U.S. diplomatic relations – but Human Rights First, along with Human Rights Watch, has raised the question of human rights activists who may be at danger if certain information is not redacted. Wikileaks says it has been especially careful in removing those names and, according to human rights activist Chip Pitts, “The US Government has now repeatedly admitted that contrary to their prior alarmist statements no one has come to harm as a result of the Wikileaks disclosures (to which I would add none is likely, since Wikileaks has followed the lead of the other major news outlets in redacting information that would actually endanger lives or national security).
Organizations dedicated to press freedom have been equally outspoken.
Reporters Without Borders says it “can only condemn this determination to hound Assange and reiterates its conviction that WikiLeaks has a right under the U.S. Constitution’s First Amendment to publish these documents and is even playing a useful role by making them available to journalists and the greater public.”
They say that “any restriction on the freedom to disseminate this body of documents will affect the entire press, which has given detailed coverage to the information made available by WikiLeaks, with five leading international newspapers actively cooperating in preparing it for publication.”
John Kampfner, the chief executive of Index on Censorship, associated with IFEX (the International Freedom of Expression Exchange), says, “Good journalists and editors should be capable of separating the awkward from the damaging. Information that could endanger life, either in the short term or as part of a longer-term operation, should remain secret.”
He predicts: “Once this latest flurry is over, prepare for the backlash. Mr. Assange’s industrial-scale leaking may lead to legislation in a number of countries that makes whistle-blowing harder than it already is. Perhaps the most curious aspect of the Wikileaks revelations is not that they have happened, but it took someone as mercurial as Mr. Assange to be the conduit.”
He added, ”Rather than throwing stones, newspapers should be asking themselves why they did not have the wherewithal to hold truth to power.”
IFEX reiterated its call for “governments to improve the public's access to information, and only limit access if governments can demonstrate it would cause a specific and articulated harm. "The rules should not be used to hide other interests. Indeed, the existing U.S. rules on secrecy prohibit classifying information about crimes and as a means to prevent embarrassment.”
He believes “those rules are ignored far too often."
Chip Pitts, past president and current member of the Executive Committee of the Bill of Rights Defense Committee, told us, “Assange’s arrest now further complicates and escalates the situation: The ferocity with which the establishment has targeted Assange reveals its profound concern over the historic new trend toward global transparency Wikileaks exemplifies: if the big thieves can’t keep their thievery secret, what will they do?
He answers his question: “They thus strive with all their might to dramatically quash this upstart before others follow Assange’s example. Yet international as well as U.S. law is now clearly implicated, including international human rights law (for example the rights to free expression – including “to seek, receive and impart information and ideas through any media and regardless of frontiers” -- and fair trial) and the particulars of the extradition treaty to which Assange will ultimately be subject (for example Sweden’s, which precludes extradition for “political” offenses).”
Pitts believes these actions “will succeed only if the rule of law continues to be eroded on the global level as it has been at the national level in recent years, with Kafkaesque labels of ‘terrorism’ or ‘espionage’, and invocations of ‘state secrecy’ and ‘military necessity’ being used to chill journalists and shield even the most egregious facts from coming to light – let alone being used to finally hold the high and mighty accountable for their crimes.”
As pro- and anti-Wikileaks forces ratchet up their battle, and Wikileaks’ impresario marks time in storied, overcrowded, and very Victorian Wandsworth Prison in southwest London, a group of his supporters are taking a different tack. They’re not hacking Visa or Master Card or Sarah Palen; instead they’re speaking out in no uncertain terms. Their message: On balance, Wikileaks has performed a valuable public service for which he is now being persecuted with trumped up sex charges.
These champions of transparency and enemies of government secrecy are the small but vocal community known as the human rights constituency. Many were among the first to defend Wikileaks and among the most vocal.
Joining them is an equally articulate community: the groups that campaign tirelessly for press freedom.
Here are some of the sentiments expressed by these groups when contacted by IPS:
Dinah PoKempner of Human Rights Watch says she “has no information regarding Mr. Assange's personal actions in Sweden and thus no position on his arrest on charges of sexual assault other than that like any suspect in a criminal case, he should be accorded full rights of defense due under international and domestic law.”
However, [her organization does] have concerns at recent allegations from various political figures that the actions of Wikileaks in releasing classified US cables somehow amount to either "terrorism" or "espionage" in the absence of evidence of any intent to attack civilians or endanger national security. Threats made against Mr. Assange's life are particularly reprehensible,” she says.
She added: “Although the quantity of the Wikileaks cable release is unprecedented, the nature of the material is not. Traditional media frequently reveal non-public government information of an embarrassing nature, and this can be in the public interest and in furtherance of the right to receive information in a democratic society. We have expressed concern to Wikileaks that care be taken not to reveal information that endangers lives, and we continue to monitor the disclosures to that end.”
Michael Ratner, the firebrand President of the Center for Constitutional Rights, told IPS, “ Wikileaks has played a critical role in giving the American people the truth about the lies the US government has told about its wars, especially those in the Middle East and Central Asia. We were lied to about Yemen, Pakistan, Afghanistan, Iran, Iraq and other places. There can be no issue more important then getting the truth out about war and the drum beats of war; only then can people act responsibly to protest war. Why did no other major newspaper bring the US lies to our attention?”
He pivoted to Assange's arrest, saying, “Yes, the charges for which he is being investigated need to be investigated. Yet the irregularities in the proceeding are glaring. Why was the case dropped originally? Why was he allowed to leave Sweden? Why was an arrest warrant issued to bring him back to Sweden for questioning--which he is willing to do at a Swedish embassy in the UK? Why was bail denied when he surrendered and his lawyers had let the police know he would do so when the warrant was served? Finally, is the hand of the US the answer to these questions? Sweden is not the UK; the US can squash that tiny country. The chances of getting its hands on Assange from there are probably improved--and that may be the story.”
Hina Shamsi, Director of the ACLU National Security Project, focused on widespread rumors that there is a conspiracy between the U.K. and Sweden to extradite Assange to the United States.
She told us, “We’re deeply skeptical that prosecuting WikiLeaks would be constitutional, or a good idea. The courts have made clear that the First Amendment protects independent third parties who publish classified information. Prosecuting WikiLeaks would be no different from prosecuting the media outlets that also published classified documents”
“If newspapers could be held criminally liable for publishing leaked information about government practices, we might never have found out about the CIA’s secret prisons or the government spying on innocent Americans. Prosecuting publishers of classified information threatens investigative journalism that is necessary to an informed public debate about government conduct, and that is an unthinkable outcome,” she said, adding,
“The broader lesson of the WikiLeaks phenomenon is that President Obama should recommit to the ideals of transparency he invoked at the beginning of his presidency. The American public should not have to depend on leaks to the news media and on whistleblowers to know what the government is up to.”
AMNESTY International played a more direct role than most. It said one of Wiki’s leaked diplomatic cables corroborates images released earlier this year by Amnesty International showing that the U.S. military carried out a missile strike in south Yemen in December 2009 that killed dozens of local civilians, including women and children.
The organization said that in the secret cable from January 2010 published by Wikileaks, Yemen’s President Ali Abdullah Saleh is reported as having assured U.S. General David Petraeus that his government would “continue saying the bombs are ours, not yours.”
Human Rights First notes that the latest round of WikiLeaks documents is rousing discussion about U.S. diplomatic relations – but Human Rights First, along with Human Rights Watch, has raised the question of human rights activists who may be at danger if certain information is not redacted. Wikileaks says it has been especially careful in removing those names and, according to human rights activist Chip Pitts, “The US Government has now repeatedly admitted that contrary to their prior alarmist statements no one has come to harm as a result of the Wikileaks disclosures (to which I would add none is likely, since Wikileaks has followed the lead of the other major news outlets in redacting information that would actually endanger lives or national security).
Organizations dedicated to press freedom have been equally outspoken.
Reporters Without Borders says it “can only condemn this determination to hound Assange and reiterates its conviction that WikiLeaks has a right under the U.S. Constitution’s First Amendment to publish these documents and is even playing a useful role by making them available to journalists and the greater public.”
They say that “any restriction on the freedom to disseminate this body of documents will affect the entire press, which has given detailed coverage to the information made available by WikiLeaks, with five leading international newspapers actively cooperating in preparing it for publication.”
John Kampfner, the chief executive of Index on Censorship, associated with IFEX (the International Freedom of Expression Exchange), says, “Good journalists and editors should be capable of separating the awkward from the damaging. Information that could endanger life, either in the short term or as part of a longer-term operation, should remain secret.”
He predicts: “Once this latest flurry is over, prepare for the backlash. Mr. Assange’s industrial-scale leaking may lead to legislation in a number of countries that makes whistle-blowing harder than it already is. Perhaps the most curious aspect of the Wikileaks revelations is not that they have happened, but it took someone as mercurial as Mr. Assange to be the conduit.”
He added, ”Rather than throwing stones, newspapers should be asking themselves why they did not have the wherewithal to hold truth to power.”
IFEX reiterated its call for “governments to improve the public's access to information, and only limit access if governments can demonstrate it would cause a specific and articulated harm. "The rules should not be used to hide other interests. Indeed, the existing U.S. rules on secrecy prohibit classifying information about crimes and as a means to prevent embarrassment.”
He believes “those rules are ignored far too often."
Chip Pitts, past president and current member of the Executive Committee of the Bill of Rights Defense Committee, told us, “Assange’s arrest now further complicates and escalates the situation: The ferocity with which the establishment has targeted Assange reveals its profound concern over the historic new trend toward global transparency Wikileaks exemplifies: if the big thieves can’t keep their thievery secret, what will they do?
He answers his question: “They thus strive with all their might to dramatically quash this upstart before others follow Assange’s example. Yet international as well as U.S. law is now clearly implicated, including international human rights law (for example the rights to free expression – including “to seek, receive and impart information and ideas through any media and regardless of frontiers” -- and fair trial) and the particulars of the extradition treaty to which Assange will ultimately be subject (for example Sweden’s, which precludes extradition for “political” offenses).”
Pitts believes these actions “will succeed only if the rule of law continues to be eroded on the global level as it has been at the national level in recent years, with Kafkaesque labels of ‘terrorism’ or ‘espionage’, and invocations of ‘state secrecy’ and ‘military necessity’ being used to chill journalists and shield even the most egregious facts from coming to light – let alone being used to finally hold the high and mighty accountable for their crimes.”
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