The Supreme Court has ruled that foreign terrorism suspects held at Guantanamo Bay have rights under the U.S. Constitution to challenge their detention in civilian courts.

The justices, in a 5-4 ruling Thursday, handed the Bush administration its third setback at the high court since 2004 over its treatment of prisoners who are being held indefinitely and without charges at the U.S. naval base in Cuba.

"We hold these petitioners do have the habeas corpus privilege," Justice Anthony Kennedy wrote for the court majority in the 70-page opinion.

In the first decision of its kind, a federal judge today ordered the government to stop the deportation of Egyptian national Sameh Khouzam based on a secret and unreliable "assurance" from the Egyptian government that it will not torture him upon his return. The judge called for Khouzam's immediate release from jail under reasonable conditions of supervision and granted his habeas corpus petition. The American Civil Liberties Union, which filed a lawsuit on Khouzam's behalf, applauded the judge's ruling.

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The U.S. State Department has documented widespread Egyptian persecution and discrimination against Christians and other religious minorities, as well as widespread use of torture in Egypt. A State Department report on the matter is available at:
www.state.gov/g/drl/rls/hrrpt/2006/78851.htm

Senator Robert Casey, Jr. (D-PA) sent a letter to Homeland Security Director Michael Chertoff supporting Khouzam and denouncing Egypt’s diplomatic assurances. That letter is available at:
www.aclupa.org/downloads/CaseytoChertoffonKhouzam.pdf

Congressman Joseph Pitts (R-PA) also sent a letter to Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice requesting Khouzam’s deportation be cancelled. That letter is available at:
www.aclu.org/immigrants/gen/29982prs20070604.html

More here:

Mr. Khouzam's lawyers say he was detained and beaten by Egyptian authorities after he refused to convert to Islam. They say he escaped from a hospital, went straight to the airport and got on a plane to the United States. While he was in the air, Egyptian officials called U.S. officials and said Mr. Khouzam was wanted for killing a woman, and the U.S. canceled his visa.

"The issue in this case does not concern any right of Khouzam to remain in the United States," Judge Vanaskie wrote. "The right at stake here is to be free from torture."

Local mirror of Judge Vanaskie's decision freeing Khouzam and barring his deportation

On December 30th Joint Task Force Guantanamo (JTF-GTMO) announced the fifth death in custody of a Guantanamo captive.

The JTF-GTMO asserted that 68 year-old Abdul Razzak was a confirmed jihadist and military leader.

It is interesting to compare the JTF-GTMO claims with his testimony.

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Is it possible that Razzak was lying? Sure. It is possible. But what is clear is that even though Razzak was in US custody for six years -- no member of the US counter-terrorism establishment bothered to take the trouble to contact Ismail Khan, to see if Razzak had been telling the truth.

Many other captives were told that the USA couldn't find the witnesses they requested, even though those witnesses were members of Karzai's cabinet, or they were senior members of Karzai's administration.

Unfortunately, the American counter-terror establishment did not take any steps to check out the alibis of any of its captives.

Another aspect of Razzak's case is that his death casts doubt on the meme that the Guantanamo captives are getting excellent health care. Razzak died of colorectal cancer. Colorectal cancer is a very slow-growing kind of cancer, that takes decades to get to the fatal stage. It is also very easily detected, decades before it becomes dangerous, when one is receiving competent, modern medical care. After fifty everyone should get a butt periscope. A tube with a camera, and tiny pincers, is inserted up the butt. A doctor monitors the camera, and if he or she sees a pre-cancerous polyp, the pincers are used to snip it off.

If Razzak had been getting the excellent health care the Bush Presidency claims, his cancer would have been detected back in 2002.

George Bush and Dick Cheney were always talking about how great it was there. Cheney even said "they've got everything they could possibly want."

Interesting comment:

This is not to justify the lack of medical care in Gitmo, but there may be more factors. Do the US Army MDs know their stuff? Will the patients accept screening (due to religious beliefs of personal fears)? Can they even do colonoscopy in Gitmo? I wonder if there are any gastroenterologists there. If not, the detainee would have to be transported to another location (in the US) and then could make a claim for habeus or other legal motions.

Voters who want more liberty and smaller government have only one realistic choice in the upcoming presidential race: Dr. Ron Paul. No other candidate comes close to matching his record. For more than three decades, he has consistently opposed spending, tax increases and burdensome regulation.

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Paul's unilateral approach combined with his calls for a foreign policy of humility, prudence, and diplomacy stands in stark contrast to other candidates who vow to meddle in the foreign affairs of other countries through sanctions and military force. Paul, of course, is the only Republican to call for ending the embargo on Cuba. He insists that private property rights and free markets are the only answers for Latin America, but knows that by trying to force these principles, we only drive their people toward socialism.

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Paul breaks completely from the others in monetary policy. His long-term goal is to phase out the Federal Reserve, which he compares to a price fixing agency. As recent events, such as the lending crisis, devaluation of the dollar and roller coaster on Wall Street have shown, the Fed is incapable of managing the money supply in a world of uncertainty and constant flux. Paul would follow the course recommended by Nobel prize-winning economist F.A. Hayek, fully legalizing competition in currencies as well as eliminating legal tender laws and capital gains taxes on gold coinage.

Paul is the most consistent champion of civil liberties in the presidential race. He voted against the PATRIOT Act and has fought against the Real ID, personal income tax and attacks on habeas corpus.

According to a document that was one of many declassified [PDF] by The State Department yesterday, "Former FBI Director J. Edgar Hoover had a plan to suspend the rules against illegal detention and arrest up to 12,000 Americans he suspected of being disloyal....The plan called for the FBI to apprehend all potentially dangerous individuals whose names were on a list Hoover had been compiling for years. 'The index now contains approximately twelve thousand individuals, of which approximately ninety-seven percent are citizens of the United States,' Hoover wrote in the now-declassified document. ‘In order to make effective these apprehensions, the proclamation suspends the writ of habeas corpus.'"

Local mirror of declassified document in which Hoover planned to suspend habeas corpus and arrest thousands

During a hearing last month Lord Justice Moses, one of the Court of Appeal judges, asked Alun Jones QC, representing the US government, about its treatment of Gavin, Tollman's nephew. Gavin Tollman was the subject of an attempted abduction during a visit to Canada in 2005.

Jones replied that it was acceptable under American law to kidnap people if they were wanted for offences in America. "The United States does have a view about procuring people to its own shores which is not shared," he said.

He said that if a person was kidnapped by the US authorities in another country and was brought back to face charges in America, no US court could rule that the abduction was illegal and free him: "If you kidnap a person outside the United States and you bring him there, the court has no jurisdiction to refuse — it goes back to bounty hunting days in the 1860s."

The following e-mail came in via Omer from Asma Jahangir who is the Secretary General of HRCP (Human Rights Commission Pakistan):

The situation in the country is uncertain. There is a strong crackdown on the press and lawyers. Majority of the judges of the Supreme Court and four High Courts have not taken oath. The Chief Justice is under house arrest (unofficially). The President of the Supreme Court Bar (Aitzaz Ahsan) and 2 former presidents, Mr. Muneer Malik and Tariq Mahmood have been imprisoned for one month under the Preventive Detention laws. The resident of the Lahore High Court Mr. Ahsan Bhoon and former bar leader Mr. Ali Ahmed Kurd have also been arrested. The police is looking or 6 other lawyers, including President of Peshawar and Karachi bar. The President of Lahore bar is also in hiding. There are other scores political leaders who have also been arrested. Yesterday I was house arrested for 90 days. I am sending my detention order.

Ironically the President (who has lost his marbles) said that he had to clamp down on the press and the judiciary to curb terrorism. Those he has arrested are progressive, secular minded people while the terrorists are offered negotiations and ceasefires. Lawyers and civil society will challenge the government and the scene is likely to get uglier.We want friends of Pakistan to urge the US administration to stop all support of the instable dictator, as his lust for power is bringing the country close to a worse form of civil strife. It is not time for the international community to insist on preventive measures, otherwise cleaning up the mess may take decades. There are already several hundred IDPs and the space for civil society has hopelessly shrunk.

We believe that Musharaf has to be taken out of the equation and a government of national reconciliation put in place. It must be backed by the military. Short of this there are no realistic solutions, although there are no guarantees that this may work.

Let's see, we have a leader who:

• thinks that he's completely above all other branches of government
• thinks checks and balances need not apply to him
• thinks that upon his say-so, basic constituional rights instantly suspended and people rounded up and either placed under house arrest or imprisoned without trial
• wasn't elected by the majority of the citizens

Anyone seeing any similarities here?

Fifty-six senators voted to cut off debate, and move forward to a vote on the bill itself, a step known as cloture. But under Senate rules, 60 votes are needed to invoke cloture.

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The legal concept of habeas corpus ("You have the body" in Latin) dates back to medieval England, and is meant to protect people from being locked up indefinitely without a court review. Last year, Congress passed and President Bush signed an act eliminating the right of habeas corpus for non-Americans who are labeled "enemy combatants" in the continuing campaign against terrorism.

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Senator Russell D. Feingold, Democrat of Wisconsin, said it was "deeply disappointing" that a Senate minority had blocked efforts to restore the right of habeas corpus. "We can and should bring terrorists to justice but we can do it without sacrificing the values upon which our nation was built," he said.

Previously

This is HR 2826, the House bill to restore habeas corpus. Please call your representative and tell them to support it. You might also remind them that the 4th Amendment says:

The right of the people to be secure in their persons, houses, papers, and effects, against unreasonable searches and seizures, shall not be violated, and no warrants shall issue, but upon probable cause, supported by oath or affirmation, and particularly describing the place to be searched, and the persons or things to be seized.

And that their recent dicking around with the FISA bill is a gross violation, and that the violations by the White House and the DOJ are criminal activities that should be prosecuted appropriately.