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	Guantanamo Suicides prompt new calls for Closure by UN News / Associated Press   June 19, 2006   Sending shameful signals, by James Carroll. (Bloomberg News)   ''No question Guantánamo sends, you know, a signal," President George W. Bush said last week. "It provides an excuse, for example, to say the United States is not upholding the values that they''re trying to encourage other countries to adhere to." This frank admission is anomalous, of course, because Bush intends to maintain the prison complex in Cuba indefinitely. And every day that he does so, the signal sent grows louder.   It didn''t take the recent suicides of three detainees to make known Guantánamo''s character as a center of human-rights violations. A sorry list of accusations and criticisms has besmirched the place, including charges of deliberate insult to the religion of Muslims and interrogation practices that are "tantamount to torture." Prime Minister Tony Blair and the UN secretary general, Kofi Annan, have called for its closure, and last week the European Parliament passed a resolution doing the same. This week, Bush is likely to face criticism on the question at the EU-U.S. summit meeting in Vienna.   Representatives of the International Committee of the Red Cross, meanwhile, are at Guantánamo to learn more about the three suicides, which one U.S. official characterized as "acts of asymmetric warfare." The U.S. Supreme Court is expected to rule soon on Hamdan v. Rumsfeld, a case involving questions of detainee rights at Guantánamo and the powers of military commissions to try terror suspects held there.   But all of this unfolds in the context identified by Bush himself - that of "values" represented by this astounding American prison. How might perceptions of the United States be different today, especially in Arab and Muslim worlds, if the hundreds of prisoners captured in Afghanistan in 2001 had been treated with scrupulous adherence to the highest standards of international law; if they had been provided lawyers, promptly charged, and brought to public trials - all showing that the United States treats even its purported enemies as persons with rights, worthy of due process?   Had America followed such a course, it would have put its best values on display, a not incidental rebuttal to the demonizing of America as a great Satan. But such a course would have been more than propaganda. It would have been a defining act, proof that Americans are the good and exceptional people we think we are.   Just such a thing happened before. After World War II, many Allied leaders, led by Joseph Stalin and Winston Churchill, assumed that captured Nazis, whose war crimes were evident, should be summarily executed. But others, led by the U.S. secretary of war, Henry Stimson, understood the importance of dealing with the major criminals according to scrupulous legal procedures. The result was the Nuremberg tribunals, where the rights of defendants, even those defendants, were affirmed. Those trials, from 1945 to 1949, involving more than 200 accused war criminals, demonstrated the values for which the United States had just fought the brutal war. More than that: In a recovery from brutality, the Nuremberg trials rescued those values.   The opposite has been occurring in Guantánamo Bay. Prisoners were taken there in the first place in an obvious end run around the jurisdiction of courts inside the United States, a blatant statement that traditional legal procedures would not apply. Such cynical exceptionalism was reinforced when the captured men were categorized as "enemy combatants" instead of "prisoners of war," a ploy to dodge standards set by the Geneva Conventions of 1949 (which themselves came out of the spirit reflected at Nuremberg). Little thought seems to have been given even now to the consequences for Americans when they are captured in future conflicts by enemies who will surely cite Guantánamo as precedent for methods tantamount to torture.   Guantánamo defenders define the enterprise as an exercise in intelligence gathering, but it has been years since any of those prisoners could have provided meaningful information about enemy intentions or capacity. Something else accounts for this cruelty, this illegality. Instead of the dignity of Nuremberg, it evokes the shame of the World War II incarceration of Japanese-Americans.   Racial hatred, revenge, a blind belief in toughness - these are the values that America is "signaling" in Cuba. After the Sept. 11 attacks, we Americans were determined that our enemies would not wound us again. They did not have to. We have wounded ourselves - nowhere more destructively than at Guantánamo. The time is long past for this disgraceful American prison to be closed.   14 June 2006   UN rights experts call for immediate closure of US Guantánamo centre after suicides. (UN News)   Five independent United Nations human rights experts today called on the United States to immediately close the Guantánamo Bay detention centre following three suicides there, citing a report they issued three months ago alleging inhuman conditions amounting to torture and the “profound effect” on detainees’ mental health.   “The simultaneous suicide of three detainees in the Guantánamo military base on 10 June 2006 was to a certain extent foreseeable in light of the harsh and prolonged conditions of their detention and reinforces the need for the urgent closure of the detention centre", they said in a joint statement issued in Geneva, reiterating their repeated calls for its closure.   Today they cited copiously from the report they issued on 27 February, saying the suicides confirmed the relevance of its recommendations and the urgency for their implementation, including the detention centre’s immediate closure.   “Many of the detainees continue to carry out a prolonged hunger strike to protest against their conditions of detention, while others have attempted to commit suicide,” the statement said.   February’s report cited the arbitrary nature of detentions; violation of judicial guarantees and other elements of the right to a fair trial; lack of access to competent and independent tribunals established by law; the inhuman and degrading nature of conditions of detention, in various cases amounting to torture; the harmful impact of those conditions on the health and life of those persons; and attacks against the religious beliefs and dignity of detainees.   It urged that ill-treatment cease, detainees be brought before and tried by ordinary tribunals and experts be allowed unfettered access to the detention facilities as well as interviews with detainees in private. The report was produced after the experts were denied access to Guantánamo.   In today’s statement the experts recalled “the need for norms of fair trial and access to detainees to be ensured in counter-terrorism measures in all instances.”   Today’s statement followed comments yesterday by a spokesman of the UN Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights (OHCHR) calling the suicides “a very, very tragic event which was not completely unexpected.”   Spokesman José Luis Díaz noted at a news briefing in Geneva that the UN Committee against Torture had recently made a very strong call for the closing of Guantánamo and issued other very specific recommendations on the treatment of prisoners there.   13/6/2006 (AP)   The EU has become increasingly vocal in urging Washington to close the prison camp in southeast Cuba where about 460 people are being held on suspicion of links to al-Qaeda and the Taliban.   The suicides of three Guantanamo Bay detainees has prompted new calls in Europe and the U.N. for closing the prison camp.   The U.N. human rights agency said that the suicides could have been anticipated and the focus now should be on closing the facility. The European Parliament renewed its calls for closure.   The highest priority in the wake of the deaths of two Saudi men and one Yemeni Saturday is working out how to close the camp and what to do with the detainees, said Jose Diaz, spokesman for the U.N. High Commissioner for Human Rights.   "It"s not completely unexpected that this should happen," Diaz said. "The focus of attention should be on closing Guantanamo."   EU lawmakers urged the United States to stop subjecting prisoners to what they called arbitrary detention in violation of international legal and human rights standards, and to stop using interrogation techniques such as dunking detainees in water, shackling them to the floor to limit movement, and sexually humiliating them.   The resolution also said the Guantanamo prisoners still are detained without a fair hearing by an impartial tribunal.   The EU has become increasingly vocal in urging Washington to close the prison camp. The EU is expected to raise the issue at an EU-U.S. summit in Vienna next week.
	Eurasia: Uphold Human Rights in combating Terrorism by Human Rights Watch   June 14, 2006   Shanghai Cooperation Organization must not punish Peaceful Dissent.   Members of the Shanghai Cooperation Organization (SCO) should commit to adhering to international standards on human rights when they meet to discuss joint counterterrorism measures on June 15, Human Rights Watch said today.   Human Rights Watch said that SCO member states – which include Russia, China, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Tajikistan, and Uzbekistan – have committed serious violations of human rights and humanitarian law in the name of counterterrorism. Of particular concern are SCO members’ records with respect to extraditions, renditions, extrajudicial executions, treatment of terrorism suspects in police custody, and the treatment of religious dissidents and of ethnic minorities, among others, who peacefully advocate independence.      “Some SCO countries have conflated domestic dissent with terrorism, and used abusive means in combating it,” said Joanne Mariner, Terrorism and Counterterrorism Program director at Human Rights Watch. “While constructive regional cooperation could play an important role in defeating terrorism, there is good reason to worry that the organization simply reinforces members’ worst practices.”     The SCO signed the “Shanghai Convention on Combating Terrorism, Separatism, and Extremism” on June 15, 2001, and considers itself to be “the pioneer organization” dealing with terrorism at the international level. The convention broadly spells out commitments to exchange information, develop joint legal frameworks, and share “practical assistance to suppress” terrorist activities. In 2002, the SCO established the Regional Anti-Terrorist Structure (RATS), in Tashkent.     In 2005, RATS claimed to have prevented more than 250 acts of terrorism. SCO officials also noted that, “Fifteen chieftains of terrorist organizations were either bagged or eliminated by secret services of Organization members.” Although the organization claims it is not the forerunner to a military alliance, it has conducted several joint exercises. An official recently stated that RATS “spared no efforts to collect information about extremist organizations and terror suspects and posted the blacklist on [its] website.”     China has used its “counter-terrorism” agenda to ruthlessly suppress Uighurs, a predominantly Muslim ethnic group that comprises the majority of Xinjiang province’s population. Over the past few years, numerous campaigns against the so-called “three evils” of “terrorism, separatism and religious extremism” have led to widespread arbitrary arrests, closure of places of worship, crackdowns on traditional religious activities, and the sentencing of thousands of people to harsh prison terms or death after grossly unfair and often summary judicial processes.     The SCO helped China gain international acceptance for its portrayal of Uighur strife as inspired by, and linked to, international Islamic terrorism. Beijing had long equated independent religious and political activities with “separatism,” but never before has it explicitly linked all dissenting voices in Xinjiang with terrorism. At Beijing’s request, some Central Asian members of the SCO effectively silenced independent Uighur organizations on their soil and forcibly repatriated refugees wanted by China – some of whom have been executed upon their return. China has provided no details about the alleged activities of these “terrorist forces,” arguing that even those who have eschewed violence continue to engage in “separatist thought.”     “Under the guise of combating terrorism, China has stepped up its efforts to silence those peacefully advocating political rights, religious freedom, or independence,” said Sophie Richardson, deputy director of the Asia division at Human Rights Watch. “We want to see these practices stopped, not exported.”     Since the late 1990s the government of Uzbekistan has also used the fight against terrorism to justify the imprisonment of thousands of Muslims whose non-violent religious practices, affiliations and beliefs fall outside official institutions and guidelines. In doing so, the government has failed to distinguish between those who advocate violence and those who peacefully express their religious beliefs. Many of those arrested and charged made credible allegations of torture and ill-treatment in custody. In the past year hundreds of people were convicted or awaiting trial on charges of “religious fundamentalism.” The government of Uzbekistan also uses terrorism accusations to secure extraditions and deportations.     On May 13, 2005, Uzbek government forces killed hundreds of unarmed protesters in Andijan, in eastern Uzbekistan. The government has denied its forces’ responsibility for the killings, instead blaming “terrorists and bandits” who had launched an armed uprising in the early morning hours of May 13. In public statements, it branded as “terrorists” hundreds of refugees whose forced return the government sought. The government has refused to even acknowledge the role of government forces in killing civilians in Andijan, arguing that only terrorists were responsible for the deaths. In the past year, more than 200 men have been convicted under more than 30 articles of the Uzbek criminal code, including membership in an extremist organization, murder, and terrorism, and were sentenced to prison terms ranging from nine to 20 years.   The July 2005 SCO summit framed the events in Andijan as part of a wider threat of destabilization, rather than as an excessive government response to a largely peaceful demonstration. Some of the resolutions adopted aimed at fighting “terrorism, separatism, and extremism” appeared directly to target Uzbek refugees in Kyrgyzstan, including an accord not to extend asylum to persons classified as terrorists or extremists by SCO member states. Recently Uzbek president Islam Karimov used the Chinese terminology to describe the SCO as “a body which can firmly crack down on the ‘three evils.’”     Russia has billed its armed conflict in Chechnya, now in its seventh year, as a counterterrorism operation. Russia’s forces in Chechnya have committed serious violations of human rights on a massive scale in the name of counter-terrorism. These include torture, forced disappearances, extrajudicial executions, and arbitrary detention.   In the course of a counterterrorism operation following the October 13, 2005 attack on Nalchik, in southern Russia, by local insurgents, Russian police engaged in widespread torture and ill treatment of alleged insurgents. As in Chechnya, Russian forces have enjoyed almost complete impunity for these abuses.     The government of Kazakhstan used laws banning political “extremism” to close a prominent opposition political party. In January 2005 a court in Almaty liquidated the Democratic Choice of Kazakhstan (Demokraticheski Vybor Kazakhstana, or DVK) on charges that it had violated an article of the Law on National Security banning “inciting social tension in society” and “political extremism.” As evidence, the prosecutor’s office cited a DVK statement calling for civil disobedience to protest the conduct of the 2004 parliamentary elections.     “For many years SCO governments have been criticized for their poor human rights records,” said Holly Cartner, Europe and Central Asia director at Human Rights Watch. “The SCO’s policies could worsen human rights conditions and seek to justify abuse. It’s therefore imperative that the European Union and the United States place even greater emphasis on human rights issues in the region.”     The Shanghai Cooperation Organization is the successor to the Shanghai Five grouping, which was founded in 1996 and included Russia, China, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, and Tajikistan. It was established to facilitate regional security cooperation and confidence. In 2001, the Shanghai Five admitted Uzbekistan and changed its name to the Shanghai Cooperation Organization. India, Iran, Mongolia, and Pakistan now have observer status.
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