Guantanamo and US District Courts/Appeals Courts

My report about an important lawsuit submitted to the District Court in Washington, D.C. by the ACLU, the Center for Constitutional Rights and the International Refugee Assistance Project (IRAP), asking the Court to urgently intervene to “put a stop” to what they accurately describe as the Trump administration’s “cruel, unnecessary and illegal transfers” of migrants to the naval base at Guantánamo Bay, Cuba. The lawsuit was submitted on behalf of ten named individuals — seven Venezuelans, an Afghan, a Pakistani and a Bangladeshi — who are currently being held in immigration detention facilities in Texas, Virginia and Arizona run by Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE), but who legitimately fear being sent to Guantánamo. The lawyers correctly argue that, even though the men’s asylum claims were ultimately unsuccessful, and they have all been subjected to “final removal” orders, they are still protected by the US Constitution, and by US law; specifically, the Immigration and Nationality Act and the Administrative Procedure Act. Regarding the Constitution, the lawyers argue that the transfers and detention of the migrants at Guantánamo “violate due process under the Fifth Amendment because the transfers are undertaken for punitive, illegitimate reasons and the conditions in which the detainees are housed are unconstitutional.” It is to be hoped that the Court arranges a hearing soon, and that the judge recognizes the illegality of the Trump administration’s actions, and can act to stop it.

My detailed analysis of the latest disturbing news regarding Donald Trump’s “war on migrants”, and, specifically, his use of Guantánamo, where, as of February 12, 98 Venezuelan migrants had been sent from the US mainland, with 45 of them being held in the Migrant Operations Center used since the 1990s, and 53 in Camp 6 of the notorious “war on terror” prison, after the three remaining “low-value detainees” — all long approved for release, but still held — were moved into the neighboring Camp 5, where the other remaining prisoners, 12 “high-value detainees”, are also held. The legality of sending any migrant from the US mainland to Guantánamo is extremely dubious, but it is beyond doubt that holding any of these men in the “war on terror” prison is absolutely illegal, because the authorization for holding prisoners there, passed after the 9/11 attacks, stipulates that they can only be people accused of involvement with Al-Qaeda, the Taliban or associated forces, in connection with 9/11. Framing this in the context of Trump’s wider “war on migrants”, I analyze the cynical comparisons being deliberately made with the “war on terror”, I examine the lawsuit submitted last week seeking access to the prison for lawyers representing the migrants, and I also examine the stories that have emerged of three of these men, which reveal the same sweeping generalizations and distortions that were used to demonize Muslims in the “war on terror.” As with the almost entirely non-existent terrorists at Guantánamo, beginning 23 years ago, the migrants seem not to be “the worst of the worst”, as the Trump administration suggests, but entirely unconnected with any kind of criminal activity — one being a car mechanic, and another a barber — who were doing nothing more than trying, with the odds stacked against them, as for so many migrants, simply to get into the US to work.

The fifth article in my ongoing series about the 16 men approved for release from Guantánamo, noting how long they have been held since those decisions were taken, telling their stories, and tying publication of these articles into significant dates in their long ordeal. The articles are published alternately here and on the Close Guantánamo website, and this particular article highlights three men approved for release in December 2021 — the talented artist Moath al-Alwi, and two victims of extraordinary rendition and torture: Zakaria al-Baidany and Mohammed Abdul Malik Bajabu.

The third article in my ongoing series about the 16 men approved for release from Guantánamo, noting how long they have been held since those decisions were taken, telling their stories, and tying publication of these articles into significant dates in their long ordeal. This particular article highlights the three especially unfortunate men who were approved for release over 14 years ago.

The first of a series of articles focusing on the 16 men still held at Guantánamo who have long been approved for release by high-level US government review processes. Published to coincide with significant dates in these men’s long wait for freedom, this first article focuses on Uthman Abd Al-Rahim Muhammad Uthman, a Yemeni who was approved for release 1,000 days ago.

My report about the release from Guantánamo of Said Bakush, the last Algerian in the prison, who was held for nearly 21 years without charge or trial. Bakush, as I have reported previously, was misidentified by the US military, who used a photo that purported to be of him, but was not him at all, and he was also analyzed as suffering from PTSD by a psychologist contacted by his attorney, Candace Gorman, who continued to work on his behalf, even though he has not seen her since 2016, because he became so depressed about his predicament.

An exclusive article about the latest court hearing in the case of Khalid Qassim, a Yemeni prisoner in Guantánamo whose lawyers are seeking to persuade a judge to order his release on the basis that, as someone seized after the US-led invasion of Afghanistan as a soldier, with no connection to terrorism, he must be released now that the war in Afghanistan is definitively over. The case was heard in December, in the District Court in Washington, D.C., before Senior Judge Thomas Hogan, and was argued by Tom Wilner, who was Counsel of Record to the Guantánamo prisoners in their Supreme Court cases establishing their right to habeas corpus in 2004 and 2008.

The video – with my introduction – of ‘Guantánamo: 21 Years On’, the very first episode of a new English language show, ‘The London Circle’, broadcast by the Arabic news channel Al Hiwar TV, featuring Moazzam Begg and I in discussion with Anas Altikriti.

An update on the story of Ali Hamza al-Bahlul, who was given a life sentence after a one-sided military commission trial at Guantánamo in 2008, when he refused to mount a defence, and who, disgracefully, has been held ever since in solitary confinement. As his lawyers appeal to the court of appeals in Washington, D.C., I look at their submission, and review the history of his legal challenges against his conviction, which has, over the years, involved most of the charges on which he was convicted being overturned.

My report about the latest medical scandal at Guantánamo, as a medical team was flown in to conduct emergency surgery on Abd al-Hadi al-Iraqi, who has a degenerative spinal condition. Al-Iraqi previously had five surgical operations at Guantánamo, in 2017-18, after his condition was ignored for ten years. It is clear that his needs cannot be met at the prison, but he cannot receive urgent and more appropriate medical care on the US mainland because of an ongoing ban, imposed by Congress in the annual National Defense Authorization Act, which prevents prisoners from being transferred to the US mainland for any reason. I also look at the case of Ammar al-Baluchi, who suffered brain damage as a result of torture in a CIA “black site,” but whose calls for independent medical experts to assess him are being resisted by the Biden administration.