Tuesday, Dec 16th
Last update09:33:48 AM GMT
Human Rights Glance
African mercenaries hired by the Gaddafi regime to kill Libyan protesters would be immune from prosecution for war crimes due to a clause in this weekend's UN resolution that was demanded by the United States.
This means that mercenaries from countries such as Algeria, Ethiopia and Tunisia – which have all been named by rebel Libyan diplomats to the UN as being among the countries involved – would escape prosecution even if they were captured, because their nations are not members of the court.
In response to news that the full panel of Judges of the Audencia Nacional (Spain’s High Court) rejected a Spanish prosecutor’s effort to stop an investigation into the role of US officials for torture on Guantanamo, the Center for Constitutional Rights, which has submitted many papers in this and a related case in Spain, released the following statement:
This is a monumental decision that will enable a Spanish judge to continue a case on the “authorized and systematic plan of torture and ill treatment” by U.S. officials at Guantanamo. Geoffrey Miller, the former commanding officer at Guantánamo, has already been implicated, and the case will surely move up the chain of command.
Some Tennessee legislators want to make it a felony, punishable by 15 years in prison, to follow Muslim religious law.
Republicans in both chambers introduced a bill last week that declares Shariah law a threat to the nation and authorizes the state attorney general to investigate complaints of people practicing it, The (Nashville) Tennessean reported.
Lyglenson Lemorin, acquitted in a major terrorism trial of conspiring with other Miami men to support al Qaeda, may never be able to return to the country where he grew up – the United States.
Lemorin, 35, a lawful U.S. resident with no criminal record, has lost a crucial legal appeal to reverse his deportation to Haiti a month ago. Although he was found not guilty in the first federal trial of the so-called Liberty City Seven in 2007, Lemorin immediately faced a deportation order issued by Immigration and Customs Enforcement.
As Secretary of State Hillary Clinton gave her speech at George Washington University yesterday condemning governments that arrest protestors and do not allow free expression, 71-year-old Ray McGovern was grabbed from the audience in plain view of her by police and an unidentified official in plain clothes, brutalized and left bleeding in jail. She never paused speaking.
When Secretary Clinton began her speech, Mr. McGovern remained standing silently in the audience and turned his back. Mr. McGovern, a veteran Army officer who also worked as a C.I.A. analyst for 27 years, was wearing a Veterans for Peace t-shirt.
The Pentagon Thursday abruptly canceled a pre-trial hearing at Guantánamo next week and said it would instead hold “other proceedings” at the war court for an alleged Sudanese terror trainer -- the strongest sign yet that the Obama administration had secured another plea agreement in its revamped military commissions.
Noor Uthman Mohammed, in his 40s, is accused of being a trainer and sometime-commander in charge of a paramilitary camp in Afghanistan where some of the 9/11 hijackers honed their skills before the Sept. 11, 2001 suicide attacks.
A former al Qaeda cook who pleaded guilty to war crimes at Guantánamo could go home to Sudan in the summer of 2012, under a secret deal just approved by a senior Pentagon official and made public Wednesday by the Defense Department.
Ibrahim al Qosi, 50, is the first Guantánamo captive to reach a war court settlement during the Obama administration.
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