I Cogitate

"...Rep. Duncan Hunter, chairman of the House Armed Services Committee, displayed for reporters Guantanamo-like prison entrees of lemon-baked fish and oven-fried chicken with rice, fruit and vegetables 'purchased for them by American taxpayers' to illustrate conditions at the prison and to counter claims of mistreatment..."

Liberals Embarrass Nation with G'itmo Slander
RushLimbaugh.com - Jun 14, 2005

"...Joseph Margulies, who represented a Guantanamo Bay detainee in a case that went before the Supreme Court, told senators yesterday that the military commission review process is "a sham" that mocks the nation's commitment to due process.

He said the definition of who qualifies as an "enemy combatant" is far too broad, and noted that accused persons cannot review secret evidence that is held against them.

Margulies used the story of one of his clients to illustrate what he sees as flaws in the system. In a well-publicized case, his client, Mamdouh Habib, was taken into custody in Pakistan and held in Egypt where he was subjected to what his lawyer described as psychological torture. Margulies said the government planned to use the statements Habib had made during his detention in Egypt to continue holding him at Guantanamo Bay. The case was publicized by the press, and Habib has since been released.

"Any process that relies on information secured in this way is just not worthy of American justice. It's as simple as that," Margulies said..."

Jane Mayer, in the February 14 and 21 edition of the New Yorker, is quoted:

"...Habib's case, if his allegations are true, illustrates a disturbing change in the rendition program. Habib was suspected of training Al Qaeda operatives involved in 9/11. He was, like earlier suspects, a radical Muslim. But, unlike most of the pre-9/11 suspects, there appears to have been no warrant for his arrest when the U.S. government took custody of him in Pakistan, a few months after the World Trade Center attacks. Again, because the program is secret, it is difficult to know this with certainty. But, according to Habib's attorney, Joe Margulies, Pakistan turned Habib over to Egypt's custody at the urging of the United States, without any formal charges or arrest warrant against Habib. Once in Egypt, Margulies said, Habib made no appearances that he knew of in court, nor was there any record Margulies knew of showing that the U.S. had sought assurances that Habib would not be tortured.

Some of the allegations in Habib's case, and in others, seem to go beyond rendering: he says Americans were actually present during some of his interrogations. When we talk about renditions today, are we only talking about what we allow or encourage our allies to do-or also about how Americans treat prisoners outside of our borders?

Many legal and operational variations on the earlier form of renditions seem to have emerged since 9/11. The question of coöperation between foreign security officers and the U.S. comes up a couple of times in the Habib story. Habib said that he was first held for about three weeks in Pakistani custody, during which time he said he was tortured by being made to stand on a metal drum that was electrified, while he was suspended from hooks. During those three weeks, according to Habib, he was questioned by several American-accented English-speaking interrogators, who he said wore no military uniforms. Margulies said that the U.S. Department of Defense seemed to have access to the confessions that Habib made after he was rendered from Pakistan to Egypt, because they accused him of offenses he confessed to while, he claimed, he was being tortured. If this is the case, the lines between the U.S.'s conduct and that of allied intelligence agencies does appear to have been blurred. And, after his interrogation in Egypt, Habib ended up in American custody—as a prisoner in Guantánamo Bay..."

It's curious that Duncan Hunter didn't serve up a big helping of Mamdouh Habib.

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