US ‘violating detainees’ human rights’

THE United States is violating a host of human rights, including a ban on torture, arbitrary detention and the right to a fair trial at Guantanamo Bay prison, a United Nations report said yesterday.

“The United States government should close the Guantanamo Bay detention facilities without further delay,” the human rights’ rapporteurs declared.

Until then, the US should “refrain from any practice amounting to torture or cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment or punishment”.

The report’s findings were based on interviews with former detainees, public documents, media reports, lawyers and a questionnaire filled out by the US government.

The US is holding about 500 men at its naval base in Cuba. They are accused of having links to Afghanistan’s ousted Taliban regime or al-Qaida, though only 10 have been charged.

Although the investigators did not visit Guantanamo, they said photographic evidence and the testimonies of former prisoners showed detainees were shackled, chained, hooded and forced to wear earphones and goggles. They said prisoners were beaten if they resisted.

“Such treatment amounts to torture,” the report said.

Some interrogation techniques - particularly the use of dogs, exposure to extreme temperatures, sleep deprivation for consecutive days and prolonged isolation - caused extreme suffering, the report said.

It concluded the status of Guantanamo Bay under the international lease agreement between the US and Cuba did not limit Washington’s obligations under international human rights law toward the detainees.

But Washington, which denies that Guantanamo inmates are mistreated or that international laws are being broken, accused the UN investigators of acting like the prosecution lawyers.

The US denies that most of the rights laid down in the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights, to which Washington is a signatory, apply to Guantanamo Bay.

If they did, US ambassador Kevin Moley argued, this would lead to “the manifestly absurd result” that prisoners seized in the US struggle against al-Qaida would have more rights than those taken in armed conflict between two states.

“It is particularly unfortunate that the special rapporteurs rejected the invitation and that their unedited report does not reflect the direct, personal knowledge that this visit would have provided,” he wrote.

The report’s five authors worked independently and were not paid, though the UN covered expenses.