Subject:
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How Will We Ever Wash the Stink of GWB Jr. Off?!
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Newsgroups:
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lugnet.off-topic.debate
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Date:
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Thu, 24 Apr 2003 06:37:26 GMT
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Viewed:
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184 times
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"Children held at Guantanamo Bay"
http://www.guardian.co.uk/Print/0,3858,4653978,00.html
Children younger than 16 are being held as "enemy combatants" in the
American detention camp at Guantanamo Bay, the US military admitted
yesterday, a practice human rights groups condemned as repugnant and illegal.
Three boys aged between 13 and 15 are among about 660 inmates at the
controversial camp, a US military official told the Guardian, on condition
of anonymity. The official would not disclose their nationalities but said
they had been brought from Afghanistan this year on suspicion of terrorism.
As soon as their ages were confirmed in medical tests, the children were
moved to a "dedicated juvenile facility" at the camp, where they could
socialise with each other, according to Lieutenant Corporal Barry Johnson, a
spokesman at the base.
"They are in a secure environment free from the influences of older
detainees," Lt Cpl Johnson said. "They are receiving specialist mental
health care, in recognition of the difficult circumstances that child
combatants go through, and some basic education in terms of reading and
writing." Efforts were under way to contact their home nations, he added.
But the children would still be held indefinitely and would not be granted
access to lawyers, he said, because the US continues to view them as "enemy
combatants" - a term it has used to argue that the Geneva Conventions do not
apply to the inmates, who have not been charged with any crimes.
That would be the case "until we ensure that they're no longer a threat to
the United States, that there's no pending law enforcement against them,
that they're no longer of intelligence value," Lt Cpl Johnson said.
Holding the children was "wholly repugnant and contrary to basic principles
of human rights," said Angela Wright of Amnesty International, and
contravened UN rules with "near-universal acceptance" regarding the
treatment of juveniles.
------------------------------------
The people comprising the Bush administration are godless -- and I mean this
to convey the idea that they are without ethics understandable to the
religious and secular members of the U.S. population alike. Defend them if
you can...
-- Hop-Frog
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