United States scales back plans for Guantanamo prosecutions

[Judi Lynn]

Source: Reuters

United States scales back plans for Guantanamo prosecutions
Reuters By Jane Sutton | Reuters – 19 minutes ago.

By Jane Sutton

GUANTANAMO BAY U.S. NAVAL BASE, Cuba (Reuters) - - F ar fewer prisoners will be tried in the Guantanamo war crimes tribunals than the Obama administration originally planned after a recent court ruling cast doubt on the viability of some charges, the chief prosecutor for the tribunals told Reuters.

U.S. President Barack Obama's Guantanamo Review Task Force had said 36 detainees could be prosecuted, but the tribunal's chief prosecutor put the figure at 20 at most.

The number set by the task force after a review completed in 2010 was "ambitious" in light of a recent court ruling, Army Brigadier General Mark Martins said.

The drastic scaling back of the prosecutions comes after a U.S. appeals court threw out the conviction of Osama bin Laden's former driver, Salim Hamdan, who was found guilty in 2008 of providing material support for terrorism.

The court agreed with defense arguments that material support was not internationally recognized as a war crime when Hamdan worked for bin Laden's motor pool in Afghanistan between 1996 and 2001.

Read more: http://in.news.yahoo.com/united-states-scales-back-plans-guantanamo-prosecutions-204015972.html

[Solly Mack]

1. K&R

[Earth_First]

2. Yet sadly these men will remain indefinately incarcerated. nt

[Kelvin Mace]

3. But we are still going to keep everyone illegally jailed

ESPECIALLY the innocent ones.

[DallasNE]

4. At Least 8 Years Ago

Following knowledge about how evidence was compiled (torture, etc.) that there would never be more than a handful of those held at Gitmo that would ever be tried. Bin Laden's driver was tried and found guilty except the "crime" he was tried for did not exist, showing that it takes more than guilt by association.

So, just as the system of military tribunals was cooked up on the spot, so were the charges. My guess is that the final tally on those tried will be far below the 20 mentioned here.

[JoeyT]

5. They're not rubber stamping our kangaroo court convictions,

so we're not going to give them a chance to overrule us on the innocent ones. We'll just keep them indefinitely detained and force feed them when they protest.