Guantanamo lawyers

My detailed analysis of the stories of the five men who have recently been approved for release from Guantánamo by Periodic Review Boards (a review process set up under President Obama), which reveals, on the part of the US government, a total lack of justification for depriving them of their liberty for 20 years, without charge or trial, and, in some cases, makes it clear that they should never have been held by the US or brought to Guantánamo in the first place.

The first of a number of articles covering events marking the 20th anniversary of the opening of the prison at Guantánamo Bay on Jan. 11, 2022 — an online panel discussion, hosted by New America, at which I joined Tom Wilner, Karen Greenberg and Peter Bergen to discuss whether President Biden can or will finally close the prison.

Videos from ‘Guantánamo: 20 Years After’, the online conference, hosted by the University of Brighton, which took place on Nov. 12-13, 2021, and which I helped to organize. I was also a keynote speaker, along with former prisoner Shaker Aamer. Included here are videos of the keynote speeches, a presentation by Jeremy Varon of Witness Against Torture, and the conference’s three panel discussions.

My report about last week’s Senate Judiciary Committee hearing, “Closing Guantánamo: Ending 20 Years of Injustice,” chaired by Sen. Dick Durbin, including the video of the entire hearing, which featured expert witnesses explaining why the prison must be closed.

My appearance, with Clive Stafford Smith, on the ‘Primary Sources’ podcast, hosted by Chip Gibbons of Defending Rights and Dissent, to discuss our long involvement with Guantánamo, the significance of WikiLeaks’ release of ‘The Guantánamo Files’ in 2011, and the reasons why we testified on behalf of Julian Assange in his extradition hearing in October 2020.

My report about ‘Guantánamo: 20 Years After’, the successful two-day international online conference hosted by the University of Brighton, which took place on November 12-13, 2021, and which I helped to organize with law lecturer and activist Sara Birch.

Publicizing a great two-day online conference about Guantánamo on Nov. 12 and 13, hosted by the University of Brighton, which I’ve been organizing with Sara Birch, a law lecturer at the university, featuring former prisoners, panels of lawyers and other experts, and academic papers from around the world.

Celebrating the good news that, for the first time since 2010, a US judge has granted the habeas corpus petition of a Guantánamo prisoner. The prisoner is Asadullah Haroon Gul, who was associated with the Hezb-e-Islami Gulbuddin militia, but the US Justice Department had continued to try to justify his ongoing imprisonment even though HIG reached a peace deal with the Afghan government in 2016.

My report on the latest news from Guantánamo: that two more men have been approved for release by Periodic Review Boards, bringing to 13 the number of men still held who the US no longer wants to hold, which is one-third of the prison’s current population.

Good news from Guantánamo, as torture victim Ahmed Rabbani, held in CIA “black sites” for 18 months from 2002 to 2004, and at Guantánamo, without charge or trial since September 2004, is approved for release from the prison via a Periodic Review Board, a parole-type system set up by President Obama in 2013.