Murat Karnaz and Guantanamo

Mr. Karnaz is a German national who was ‘picked up’ while traveling in Pakistan and transported by the U.S. government to Afghanistan where he was (per his testimony) interrogated and tortured. He was then shipped to Guantanamo where he wallowed for 4 years.

60 Minutes just ran an interview with him. Check it out here.

The absolute horror of this story is this: the tribunal system set up to assess the standing of detainees ignored its own government’s exculpating evidence, ruling instead to detain Karnaz based on an unsubstantiated claim made by sources unknown. Since the documents used by the tribunal have been declassified, this establishes, assuming at the minimum the sincerity of the proceedings, that they are extremely risk averse. The upshot is this: give the tribunal anything suggesting that the detainee has committed or might commit an act of terror and, even when it is overwhelmingly disconfirmed and contradicted by other available evidence, they will decide to detain him, if it were solely up to them, forever. Ticking time bombs, everywhere.

In light of this, it seems moot to insist, as the D.C. Court of Appeals has done (in Bismullah v Gates, if you’re interested), that detainees have a right to demand that the tribunal make their judgment based on all the available evidence (in particular, the evidence held by the government). It is, of course, a reasonable judgment, but what does it change for the detainees if the tribunal system is irrationally risk averse? Well, legally, it would give those responsible for reviewing the tribunal’s decisions access to relevant information. That is an advantage, but it is one to be enjoyed by the detainee only after the years it will take for review to occur. (I am assuming that the reviewing court will not be irrationally risk averse as well.)

In the nature of things, even in the face of de facto victories, the Bush administration filed an emergency petition to the Supreme Court, asking it to review the Court of Appeals decision. Evidently, they are not satisfied with having the power to detain innocent people indefinitely, they want it made into a right.

Guantanamo is a circus. The mental and legal gymnastics it forces upon us and our legal system cannot be worth it.

I saw an interview with John McCain last night. He is evidently dead set upon closing the prison. Thus, along with the commitments made by Obama and Clinton, we can be assured (hopefully) that the nightmare will end in 2009.