The Obama administration’s Guantanamo task force is far behind in determining the disposition of the 229 remaining detainees being held at Gitmo. As officials work with a very few in Congress to reach agreement on revisions to the Military Commissions Act, the task force received two and six-month deadline extensions today while presenting President Barack Obama an interim report on the due date of the final report. The language within it reflects the President’s desire to move as many cases to federal court as possible yet indicates rules of evidence may preclude that choice and the task force cannot easily reconcile administration views on “rule of law” with the Laws of War.
The Wall Street Journal reports:
Six months before President Barack Obama’s self-imposed deadline to close the controversial detention center at Guantanamo Bay, senior administration officials said more European allies are offering to accept detainees from there, despite Congress’s refusal to allow any such transfers to the U.S.
But serious obstacles remain if the president’s closure deadline is to be met, including resolving which prisoners might be detained indefinitely without trial, where they would be detained once Guantanamo is shut and where future military commissions might be held. One presidential task force on future interrogation policies on Monday asked for a two-month extension for submitting a report that was originally due on Tuesday. Another task force on future detention policy asked for a six-month extension for its report.
“These are hard, complicated and consequential decisions,” one senior administration official said. “Let’s not kid ourselves.”
The Los Angeles Times reports al Qaeda’s lawyers are not happy:
Civil liberties groups expressed concern Monday that the White House was planning to preserve the ability to hold some prisoners indefinitely.
“The Obama administration must not slip into the same legal swamp that engulfed the Bush administration with its failed Guantanamo policies,” said Anthony D. Romero, executive director of the American Civil Liberties Union. “A promise deferred could soon become a promise broken.”
ABC News included pdf files as the administration attempted to shift blame to past mistakes as a January 22, 2010 self-imposed deadline to close the detention facility there looms:
The report asserted that the Bush administration’s commissions “suffered from a perceived lack of legitimacy” both because they initially had been created without congressional approval and also “because some of the provisions, such as those that allowed the use of evidence obtained through cruel and inhuman treatment, did not comport with fundamental fairness.”
The preliminary recommendations include prohibiting the admission of statements obtained through cruel, inhuman, and degrading treatment; providing detainees greater latitude in the choice of counsel; affording basic protections for those defendants who refuse to testify; reforming the use of hearsay by putting the burden on the party trying to use the statement; and making clear that military judges may determine their own jurisdiction.
That said, the report asserts that U.S. “soldiers should not be required to give Miranda warnings to enemy forces captured on the battlefield, asserting that they have the right to remain silent, to an attorney, and so on. The report says that “applying these rules in such a context would be impractical and dangerous. Similarly, strict hearsay rules may not afford either the prosecution or the defense sufficient flexibility to submit the best available evidence from the battlefield…”
“Military commissions that take into account these concerns are necessarily somewhat different from out federal courts, but no less legitimate,” the report states.
The Obama administration attempted to deflect recent criticisms — our troops will not have to read detainees their “rights” — yet the report indicates there is infighting over who will interrogate unlawful combatants. While he will not take it, my advice to President Obama is let our troops do their job and keep both the FBI and ACLU off the battlefield.
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