Saturday, July 25, 2009
(Ap Photo/Brennan Linsley)
President Barack Obama’s stated goal to make government more open has not extended to requests by United Nations officials to visit the detention facility at Guantánamo Bay or learn more about secret prisons once operated by the CIA. Last month, Secretary of State Hillary Clinton refused to meet with the U.N.’s top anti-torture official, who wanted to learn more about conditions at Guantánamo and the location of clandestine locations around the world where the CIA interrogated and tortured suspected terrorists.
U.N. human rights researcher Martin Scheinin told The Washington Post that administration officials informed him that his request was not a priority, as they work on closing down Guantánamo. “It was not a ‘no, no.’ It was a diplomatic ‘no.’ Let’s say dialogue will continue.”
The U.N. plans to publish a major report later this year on the historical use of secret prisons by countries, ranging from activities in Latin America in the 1970s to the Bush administration’s covert program of hiding detainees in places like Thailand and other nations. Scheinen expressed concern that other countries, such as Russia and China, are citing U.S. practices to justify their own human rights abuses.
-Noel Brinkerhoff
U.S. Rebuffs U.N. Requests for Guantanamo Visits, Data on CIA Prisons (By Colum Lynch, Washington Post)
Comments