Americans Should Not Forget the Atrocities of Guantanamo Bay
By Aditya Rajagopalan ’09
News Staff Writer
For years, Americans have responded in outrage when hearing of the jailing of monks, the incessant scourge of Tibetan cities, or the reprehensible human rights violations persisting in Tibet. And with the recent uprisings that have proliferated across Tibet, Americans have rightfully sought to “free Tibet,”; many have even called for our president to boycott the Beijing Olympics, as a gesture condemning the actions of China. But these very same Americans often ignore the country in which we live, the country that holds an equally dubious record on human rights. These same Americans often turn a blind eye to the atrocities of Guantanamo Bay.
The Guantanamo Bay detention camp is a detention center to which the United States has sent suspected terrorists since 2002. 775 detainees have been brought to the military prison camp in Cuba, of whom 420 have been released. Because the United States believes these detainees to be terrorists, army officials have claimed that no international or US laws should apply.
We consider, for example, the story of Murat Kurnaz, a German Muslim whose parents immigrated to Germany from Turkey. Though not particularly religious for the majority of his life, Murat sought to marry a very religious Turkish woman, and decided in 2001 to learn more about the faith he knew so little about. Murat went to Muslim Missions in Germany, who advised him to go to Pakistan to have face-to-face contact with the Islamic faith. After spending a few weeks in Pakistan, Murat took a bus home to the airport, a bus that was stopped at a routine Pakistani checkpoint. Murat, because of his skin color, was detained by bounty hunters seeking the $3000 dollar US reward offered for the capture of any suspicious foreigners. This fateful day would turn a simple religious pilgrimage into a nightmare that would only cease a few weeks ago.
According to a “60 Minutes” investigation, Murat was flown to Afghanistan and held alongside Taliban fighters. Kept in a freezing outdoor pen, Murat was interrogated daily by Americans asking him the whereabouts of Osama Bin Laden. When Murat responded, puzzled at even what al-Qaeda even was, US troops beat Murat while his head was submerged underwater. But Murat still knew nothing. So when Americans learned that Murat went to Pakistan to renew his Islamic faith, they sent him to Guantanamo Bay, to exacerbate the nightmare. In Guantanamo, Murat was beaten by soldiers in riot gear, deprived of sleep for weeks at a time, and placed in dark solitary confinement for months in unventilated cells—all even though he was innocent.
Six months after his detainment, the US government noted: “Criminal investigation task force has no definite link [or] evidence of detainee having an association with al Qaeda or making any specific threat toward the US.” So why didn’t Murat have an opportunity to prove his innocence in Guantanamo? Our current government is of the opinion that suspected terrorists have no right to lawyers and are guilty until proven innocent. Our government invented charges to keep Murat under Guantanamo torture, three and a half years after Murat was declared a non-threat to the US.
How can a man who has committed no crime be treated and tortured as if he were a terrorist for four years? It’s only possible when an island is accountable to no one, and respects neither US nor international law. It’s only possible when a prison camp thinks itself superior to the Geneva Convention, and exploits loopholes in international laws to subvert the very spirit of anti-torture laws. It’s only possible when a federal government can’t adhere to its own messages of freedom, can’t cease terrorizing innocent men.
I therefore ask not that the US cease firmly countering terrorism, but rather that the US adhere to its own principles and treat the innocent as they ought to be treated. I ask that the US release the twenty percent of Guantanamo detainees currently declared innocent. I ask that Guantanamo be accountable to some law, and not have the ability to torture innocent men without consequence. I ask that Guantanamo prove the guilt of its detainees before torturing them, that Murat’s story never happen again.
