23 Nov 2011 A War Crimes Tribunal in Malaysia has found former US President [sic] George W. Bush and former British Prime Minister Tony Blair guilty of war crimes for their roles in the Iraq war, Press TV reports. The five-panel Kuala Lumpur War Crimes Tribunal decided that Bush and Blair committed genocide and crimes against humanity by leading the invasion of Iraq in 2003, a Press TV correspondent reported on Tuesday. The Malaysian tribunal judges ruled that the decision to wage war against Iraq by the two former heads of government was a flagrant abuse of law and an act of aggression that led to large-scale massacres of the Iraqi people.
Thursday, November 24, 2011
Thursday, November 10, 2011
Alfermedi Cert Petition 11-10-2011
from Lawfareblog.com http://www.lawfareblog.com/2011/11/almerfedi-cert-petition/
By Ritika Singh
(item 2 shifts the burden of proof from the government to the detainee. –ed.)
Contains links to the oral argument summary, April 11, government’s reply brief, the petitioner’s brief, and the government’s opening brief.
The abstract follows below.
Almerfedi Cert Petition
by Ritika Singh
Hussain Salem Mohammed Almerfedi, a Guantanamo habeas petitioner, has filed a cert petition that presents the following questions:
1. Whether the Authorization for Use of Military Force, Pub. L. No. 107-40, § 2(a), 115 Stat. 224 (2001) (“AUMF’), orBoumediene v. Bush, 553 U.S. 723 (2008), permits detention on the basis of three facts that are themselves not incriminating.
2. Whether the AUMF or Boumediene authorizes a standard of proof under which, if the government puts forward somecredible evidence justifying the detainee’s detention, the detainee, to prevail, must rebut government’s evidence.
3. Whether the Court of Appeals’ manifest unwillingness to allow Guantanamo detainees to prevail in their habeas corpus cases calls for the exercise of this Court’s supervisory power.
For our readers who’d like to get a complete overview of the case, here are Ben’s thoughts on the D.C. Circuit opinion from June 10, the oral argument summary from April 11, the government’s reply brief, the petitioner’s brief, and the government’s opening brief.
D. Lagutaris, ed.
Wednesday, November 9, 2011
Guantánamo: the most expensive prison on earth (ever)
The cost to house a captive at Guantánamo Bay is $800,000 per year, far in excess of other federal or state lockups.
Miami Herald; Tuesday, November 8, 2011
by Carol Rosenberg crosenberg@miamiherald.com
Read more: http://www.miamiherald.com/2011/11/08/2493042/guantanamo-bay-the-most-expensive.html#ixzz1dBHgHzbx
Olivia LaRosa, relayer/reframer
Also at Hypatia of California, Olivia’s and Deb’s Blog
GUANTANAMO BAY NAVY BASE, Cuba -- Guards get combat pay, just like troops in Afghanistan, without the risk of being blown up. Some commanders get to bring their families to this war-on-terror deployment. And each captive gets $38.45 worth of food a day.
The Pentagon detention center that started out in January 2002 as a collection of crude open-air cells guarded by Marines in a muddy tent city is today arguably the most expensive prison on earth, costing taxpayers $800,000 annually for each of the 171 captives by Obama administration reckoning.
That’s more than 30 times the cost of keeping a captive on U.S. soil.
It’s still funded as an open-ended battlefield necessity, although the last prisoner arrived in March 2008. But it functions more like a gated community in an American suburb than a forward-operating base in one of Afghanistan’s violent provinces.
Congress, charged now with cutting $1.5 trillion from the budget by Christmas, provided $139 million to operate the center last year, and has made every effort to keep it open — even as a former deputy commander of the detention center calls it “expensive” and “inefficient.”
“It’s a slow-motion Berlin Airlift — that’s been going on for 10 years,” says retired Army Brig. Gen. Greg Zanetti, a West Point graduate who in 2008 was deputy commander at the detention center.
Both its location and temporary nature drive up costs, says Zanetti. While there, he wrote a secret study that compared the operation to Alcatraz, noting that Attorney General Robert F. Kennedy had closed it in 1963 because it was too expensive.
At Guantánamo, everything comes in by barge or aircraft “from paper clips to bulldozers,” Zanetti says, as well as the revolving guard force. Also, more recently, a massage chair for stressed-out prison camp staff.
Zanetti, now a Seattle-based money manager, was a financial advisor in civilian life before his New Mexico National Guard unit’s call-up to Guantánamo. He has never disputed that America needed the detention center after 9/11 but argues that today it deserves a cost-benefit analysis.
“What complicates the overall command further is you have the lawyers, interrogators and guards all operating under separate budgets and command structures,” he said. “It’s like combining the corporate cultures and budgets of Goldman, Apple and Coke. Business schools would have a field day dissecting the structure of Guantánamo.”
An examination of the expenses shows that now, with no strategy for meeting President Barack Obama’s Jan. 22, 2009 closure order, the military is preparing for the prison’s next decade. Spending is not just aimed at upgrades for the captive population, most in medium security confinement, but also for the revolving staff of 1,850 troops, linguists, intelligence analysts, federal agents and contract laborers.
Commanders are contracting for a new round of capitol improvements, including $2 million worth of new computer equipment to grow storage space under a fast-track, noncompetitive contract with Dell recently posted on a government website. And that doesn’t include the un-networked laptops the prison provides captives taking a life skills class that includes a resume writing lesson, in case anyone gets to go home.
Meantime, the guard force commander is getting a new 3,000-3,500 square foot headquarters at the prison camps for what is predicted to cost less than $750,000, below the amount that needs Congress’ sign-off.
End of Page One of Five-continue to Page Two at the Miami Herald site.
Another method of access: http://www.miamiherald.com/2011/11/08/2493042/guantanamo-bay-the-most-expensive.html#ixzz1dBIiQTvm
Miami Herald; Tuesday, November 8, 2011
by Carol Rosenberg crosenberg@miamiherald.com
Read more: http://www.miamiherald.com/2011/11/08/2493042/guantanamo-bay-the-most-expensive.html#ixzz1dBHgHzbx
Olivia LaRosa, relayer/reframer
Also at Hypatia of California, Olivia’s and Deb’s Blog
GUANTANAMO BAY NAVY BASE, Cuba -- Guards get combat pay, just like troops in Afghanistan, without the risk of being blown up. Some commanders get to bring their families to this war-on-terror deployment. And each captive gets $38.45 worth of food a day.
The Pentagon detention center that started out in January 2002 as a collection of crude open-air cells guarded by Marines in a muddy tent city is today arguably the most expensive prison on earth, costing taxpayers $800,000 annually for each of the 171 captives by Obama administration reckoning.
That’s more than 30 times the cost of keeping a captive on U.S. soil.
It’s still funded as an open-ended battlefield necessity, although the last prisoner arrived in March 2008. But it functions more like a gated community in an American suburb than a forward-operating base in one of Afghanistan’s violent provinces.
Congress, charged now with cutting $1.5 trillion from the budget by Christmas, provided $139 million to operate the center last year, and has made every effort to keep it open — even as a former deputy commander of the detention center calls it “expensive” and “inefficient.”
“It’s a slow-motion Berlin Airlift — that’s been going on for 10 years,” says retired Army Brig. Gen. Greg Zanetti, a West Point graduate who in 2008 was deputy commander at the detention center.
Both its location and temporary nature drive up costs, says Zanetti. While there, he wrote a secret study that compared the operation to Alcatraz, noting that Attorney General Robert F. Kennedy had closed it in 1963 because it was too expensive.
At Guantánamo, everything comes in by barge or aircraft “from paper clips to bulldozers,” Zanetti says, as well as the revolving guard force. Also, more recently, a massage chair for stressed-out prison camp staff.
Zanetti, now a Seattle-based money manager, was a financial advisor in civilian life before his New Mexico National Guard unit’s call-up to Guantánamo. He has never disputed that America needed the detention center after 9/11 but argues that today it deserves a cost-benefit analysis.
“What complicates the overall command further is you have the lawyers, interrogators and guards all operating under separate budgets and command structures,” he said. “It’s like combining the corporate cultures and budgets of Goldman, Apple and Coke. Business schools would have a field day dissecting the structure of Guantánamo.”
An examination of the expenses shows that now, with no strategy for meeting President Barack Obama’s Jan. 22, 2009 closure order, the military is preparing for the prison’s next decade. Spending is not just aimed at upgrades for the captive population, most in medium security confinement, but also for the revolving staff of 1,850 troops, linguists, intelligence analysts, federal agents and contract laborers.
Commanders are contracting for a new round of capitol improvements, including $2 million worth of new computer equipment to grow storage space under a fast-track, noncompetitive contract with Dell recently posted on a government website. And that doesn’t include the un-networked laptops the prison provides captives taking a life skills class that includes a resume writing lesson, in case anyone gets to go home.
Meantime, the guard force commander is getting a new 3,000-3,500 square foot headquarters at the prison camps for what is predicted to cost less than $750,000, below the amount that needs Congress’ sign-off.
End of Page One of Five-continue to Page Two at the Miami Herald site.
Another method of access: http://www.miamiherald.com/2011/11/08/2493042/guantanamo-bay-the-most-expensive.html#ixzz1dBIiQTvm
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