Guantanamo Trial Unraveling

[seemslikeadream]

http://www.washingtonindependent.com/view/guantanamo-trial

By Aziz Huq 06/02/2008
The war crimes trial of the alleged child soldier Omar Khadr at Guantánamo has new problems.

I wrote last week about the Canadian Supreme Court's astute judgment about the case. Now the U.S. proceedings themselves seem to be unraveling.

Last week, the chief judge for the military commissions announced that Army Col. Peter Brownback had been removed from the case. According to defense attorneys, Brownback had recently threatened to suspend the case against Khadr unless the prosecution ponied up exculpatory evidence. His dismissal deepens the impression that these military commissions are being run with an eye to political goals, and the November 2008 election -- which both have little to do with just process.

This offers further evidence why creating of a new procedural system for terrorism-related detentions is flawed. A new system will, by definition, lack a reservoir of experienced practitioners. Any new system has glitches. While established systems, like the federal courts and the military courts-martial system, for example, have had decades to identify glitches and figure out work-arounds, a new system lacks that depth.

A bigger problem is that the new system may be vulnerable to manipulation by those who drafted the rules or have the power to tinker with them.

This is not Khadr’s first military commission trial. He was first charged on Nov. 7, 2005, under President George W. Bush’s unilateral executive order creating commissions. Proceedings began in January 2006. On the first day, two issues emerged for which the executive-order-based military commission rules had no response: whether Khadr could reject the military lawyer assigned; and whether he could have the help of Canadian counsel -- Khadr is a Canadian citizen.

[babylonsister]

1. Hmmm. Does this mean they won't be able to showboat with

this/these trials prior to the November election? Someone's in trouble.

I'm not in Gitmo, but maybe if we waited for some honest brokers to be in control, the 'prisoners' might fare better.

[Thickasabrick]

2. When is Brownback going to speak up? Someone needs to get

to that guy - pronto before he gets "offed".