Obama restarts Guantanamo trials, with reservations

WASHINGTON (Agencies)

President Barack Obama lifted a two-year freeze on new military trials at Guantanamo Bay in
Cuba and suggested early Tuesday the U.S. Congress was hurting national security by blocking his attempts to move some trials into U.S. civilian courts. In an apparent acknowledgment that the Guantanamo detention camp won’t be shut down any time soon, Obama also outlined procedures for reviews to be held at least every four years for prisoners held indefinitely without charge or trial. Obama suspended new trials at the Guantanamo tribunals, which had been heavily criticized as unfair, when he announced his review of detainee policy in early 2009 and vowed just after becoming president that he would close the camp.

	I strongly believe that the American system of justice is a key part of our arsenal in the war against al-Qaeda and its affiliates, and we will continue to draw on all aspects of our justice system — including Article III courts (U.S. federal courts) — to ensure that our security and our values are strengthened
President Barack Obama

Objections

He had tried, and failed, to overcome objections by Republicans and some of his fellow Democrats in Congress to transferring some of the detainees to U.S. prisons and trying Khalid Sheikh Mohammed, mastermind of the Sept. 11 attacks, and others in federal courts.

The administration has also struggled to convince other countries to accept detainees.

Obama said he still wanted some detainees — all terrorism suspects — to face civilian trials, and resistance to doing so undermined U.S. counter-terrorism efforts.

“I strongly believe that the American system of justice is a key part of our arsenal in the war against al-Qaeda and its affiliates, and we will continue to draw on all aspects of our justice system — including Article III courts (U.S. federal courts) — to ensure that our security and our values are strengthened,” Obama said in a statement.

Obama also issued an executive order establishing a process to continue to hold some Guantanamo detainees who have been neither charged, convicted nor designated for transfer but who are deemed to pose a threat to U.S. security.

He ordered periodic reviews of the determination that some detainees were so dangerous they must be held without charge, with a review for each coming as quickly as possible, but no later than one year from the order.

The first round of new charges against detainees could come within days or weeks, a senior administration official said.

Recruiting tool

Administration officials said they still wanted eventually to close the prison, which they have called a recruiting tool for anti-American militants that made it hard to negotiate with some allies to take in detainees cleared of any wrongdoing.

Officials said the camp system had already been improved by measures including banning the use of statements taken as a result of cruel treatment and a better system for handling classified information.

Secretary of State Hillary Clinton meanwhile said the administration would ask the Senate to back an addition to the 1949 Geneva Conventions on standards of “fair treatment and fair trial.”

The administration also pledged to adhere to another protocol on “humane treatment and fair trial safeguards” for war prisoners.

Obama’s order got a mixed response on Capitol Hill.

Patrick Leahy, Democratic chairman of the Senate Judiciary Committee slammed the approach as falling “far short of core constitutional values” in offering judicial review or guaranteeing detainees meaningful representation by counsel.”

“I am also concerned that these orders do little to bring us closer to closing the prison at Guantanamo Bay,” Leahy said.

But Republican congressman Peter King, an outspoken voice on security issues, commended the administration.

“The bottom line is that it affirms the Bush administration policy that our government has the right to detain dangerous terrorists until the cessation of hostilities,” he said.

Rights activists disappointed

Florida lawmaker Tom Rooney welcomed the resumption of military trials but warned the administration could still thread a legal needle and seek to try alleged 9/11 mastermind Khalid Sheikh Mohammed in a civil court.

“Giving foreign terrorists the same rights as American citizens is unacceptable,” Rooney said.

“Terrorists like KSM should be tried by military commission at Guantanamo Bay, and they must never step foot on American soil.”

Rights activists said they were disappointed.

“The best way to get America out of the Guantanamo morass is to use the most reliable tool we have — our criminal justice system,” Hina Shamsi, director of the American Civil Liberties Union’s National Security Project, told Reuters.

“Instead, the Obama administration has chosen to institutionalize unlawful, indefinite detentions and to revive illegitimate military commissions, which will do nothing to remove the stain on America’s reputation that Guantanamo represents.”

There are still 172 detainees at Guantanamo and about three dozen were set for prosecution in either U.S. criminal courts or military commissions. There were 242 when Obama took office. Many have been held there for more than nine years.

“The president’s ongoing commitment to close the prison at Guantanamo Bay holds,” a senior administration official said. He provided no timeframe for doing so, but pointed to actions including transferring 67 prisoners away from the camp and reforming the tribunals there.

“We’ve done a lot of legwork” (toward closing), he said.

The White House blasted some members of Congress who it said had sought to undermine efforts by the Departments of Justice and Defense to bring Guantanamo defendants to justice, pointing particularly to restrictions enacted in December on prosecuting detainees in federal courts.