Andy Worthington's Blog, page 97

UK Election: Tory Victory A Disaster for the People of Britain and the Democratic Process

Some of the worst nights of my life have taken place in early May — Margaret Thatcher’s first election victory on May 3, 1979 (when I was too young to even vote), and the 2010 election, on May 6, 2010, which brought a Tory-led coalition government, led by David Cameron, to power.

There were other dreadful nights, on or around May — the Tory victories on June 9, 1983, June 11, 1987 and April 9, 1992 — and after the anti-Tory euphoria of Tony Blair’s victory wore off, following New Labour’s landslide victory on May 1, 1997, the reality of a New Labour Britain was of course a huge disappointment, as the party embarked on its own neo-liberal trajectory, and the country became host to a housing price casino that was a poor substitute for an actual functioning economy — and, in 2003, also became the home of an illegal warmonger.

As a result, the rest of New Labour’s victories — on June 7, 2001 and May 5, 2005 — were also disappointing, as the party failed to remember what it was supposed to be, and continued, instead, as a general betrayer of its founding values. On those occasions, however, the disappointment in a Labour victory was, pragmatically, offset by slim gratitude that at least the Tories weren’t back in.

All that changed in 2010. With the Labour government discredited, in the eyes of a majority of the voting public, as a result of the global financial crash of 2008 (even though the Tories were also 100% in bed with the bankers, and most people seemed to have been delighted with New Labour’s housing bubble), the Tories emerged as the largest party, although David Cameron’s efforts to sell himself as a charismatic leader fell short of his expectations. An unholy alliance with the Liberal Democrats was then required for the Tories to embark on their horrible assault on the British state, and on everyone not fortunate enough to be rich, that they have imposed ever since, and that they will now be hoping to inflict on us for the next five years.

Tory crimes

That is a truly chilling thought, as Cameron and Osborne’s Tories have, over the last five years, proven that they have only three reasons for existing: to enable the rich to get richer, to privatise almost everything that has not yet been privatised, and, while undertaking this butchery — which involves a monstrous belief in the need to destroy almost all state provision of services, including the NHS, the single greatest institution in the UK — to make life as miserable as possible for all vulnerable members of society; in particular, the working poor, the unemployed, and the disabled. See my extensive archive of articles, under the heading, “Battle for Britain: Fighting the Coalition Government’s Vile Ideology.”

Among the Tories’ many disgraceful policies — notwithstanding the fact that some were inherited from Labour, but have been more aggressively pursued — are reviews for the disabled, designed to find people with severe mental and physical health problems fit for work when they are not (and there are no jobs anyway), and to subsequently cut their benefits, the enthusiastic promotion of zero hours contracts, and the implementation of a range of workfare schemes, designed to make the unemployed work for hourly rates that are way below the minimum wage.

Another horrible innovation has been the benefit cap, which has imposed restrictions on the amount of housing benefit that can be claimed by those without work, portraying them as scroungers when most of the money goes to private landlords and not, of course, the claimants themselves.

Also noteworthy is the bedroom tax, whereby a cabinet of millionaires forced unemployed people to move out of their homes if they dared to have what was regarded as a spare room, even though it is fundamentally offensive to decide that poorer people are not entitled to regard their homes as homes, or to have the luxury of any spare space whatsoever, and even though there are few smaller properties for them to move to, and it has ended up costing more than before while making life miserable for vast numbers of people.

The Tories also attacked students, tripling tuition fees, and undermined state schools, and they have presided over an even more bloated and ridiculous house price casino than existed under New Labour. London is now the global capital for super-rich dictators and criminals, who drive up house prices while contributing almost nothing to the wider economy, as they are protected from fair taxation through the vile and unjustifiable allowances for “non-doms” to be parasites in the UK, by pretending to live somewhere else. All the while, the gap between the rich and the poor has continued to grow to monstrous levels.

Winners and losers

The Lib Dems, it turned out, committed political suicide through their coalition with the Tories, losing 49 of their 57 seats on Thursday, but, depressingly — almost incomprehensibly — the Tories were not only unpunished at the ballot box; they actually secured enough seats to form a government on their own.

The other winners in the election were the Scottish National Party (SNP), who conquered Scotland, securing 56 of the 59 Scottish seats, up from just six in 2010. This was a disaster for Scottish Labour, of course, and while it was punishment for their disdainful approach to those seeking independence, I personally think that what drove the landslide even more was Scottish voters’ perceived need to set themselves up in the clearest manner possible, not just as a declaration of their own identity, as a continuation of the national conversation that arose through last year’s referendum on independence,  but also, explicitly, in opposition to the power base in Westminster — the Tories. This could only be achieved by taking over from Labour, because the Tories, of course, have been in the electoral wilderness in Scotland since the Thatcher days.

The losers in this election were not primarily the Labour Party, whose share of the vote, and number of seats gained, actually increased slightly from 2010 — although it would be foolish not to acknowledge that Labour’s pledges, including supporting the NHS, scrapping the bedroom tax, and ending “non-dom” status, failed to convince numerous voters who, by voting Tory, actually voted to make life much more difficult for themselves.

The biggest losers, primarily, were other parties — and, as I noted in an article just before the election, entitled, “Time for Proportional Representation: Whatever the Outcome of the General Election, Our Voting System is Unfair and Unrepresentative” — the electoral process itself.

The biggest single group in the election were the 15,733,706 people who didn’t vote, far more than the 11,334,920 people who voted for the Tories. Nevertheless, the Tories secured a majority of the seats (50.9%) even though they had just 36.8% of the vote, and the support of just 24.4% of those eligible to vote. On the other extreme, UKIP got just one seat even though they secured 3,881,129 votes, meaning that it was 113 times harder for them to get a seat than it was for the Tories.

A broken and unjust system

Here’s a more detailed breakdown of why the current system is so broken and unjust:

11,334,920 people voted for the Tories, which was 36.8% of the voter turnout (30,691,680), but just 24.4% of the total number of people eligible to vote (46,425,386).

In addition, the distribution of seats per vote was also unfair. With their 36.8% of the vote, the Tories nevertheless secured 50.9% of the seats. Each of their 331 seats, therefore, required 34,244 votes.

Another party that benefitted from the uneven distribution of votes under the “first past the post” system was Labour, who received 9,344,328 votes. That was 30.4% of the voter turnout, and enabled them to secure 232 seats (35.7% of the total). Each of their seats, therefore, required 40,277 votes.

Also benefitting was the Scottish National Party, whose 1,454,436 votes represented 4.7% of the voter turnout. In terms of seats, however, the SNP’s 56 seats constituted 8.6% of the total. Each of their seats required just 25,972 votes.

The losers in this unequal carve-up of the British people and their intentions were, primarily, the Liberal Democrats, UKIP and the Green Party.

The Liberal Democrats, although electorally almost wiped out, still managed to secure 2,415,888 votes (7.9% of the total), which translated into 8 seats (just 1.2% of the total). Each of their seats, therefore, required 301,986 votes.

UKIP secured 3,881,129 votes (12.6% of the total), but this translated into just one seat (0.2% of the total), and the Green Party secured 1,154,562 votes (3.8% of the total), which also translated into just one seat (0.2% of the total).

Under proportional representation, the 30,691,680 votes cast, divided by 650 seats,  would have translated into 47,218 votes per MP, with the following breakdown (which would be fair, even though I despise UKIP):

Con: 240 instead of 331

Lab: 198 instead of 232

Lib Dem: 51 instead of 8

SNP: 31 instead of 56

UKIP: 82 instead of 1

Green: 24 instead of 1

Call for electoral reform

If you find this situation unacceptable, please sign the Avaaz petition, “Democratic Deficit,” which calls on MPs to undertake an urgent review of the electoral system.

As they state:

The first past the post system is designed for two-party politics. But that’s just not on our landscape any more. Over 1 million voted for the Green Party and got just one seat and whether you agree with them or not, UKIP also suffered from this yawning democratic deficit.

With 1 in 3 people not bothering to vote, we need to reconnect politics back to the people. Let’s end the era of ‘wasted votes’ and create a system where every voice in Britain matters. Let’s call on all our MPs to fight for an electoral review as soon as parliament reconvenes.

Still unconvinced? How about this then for my parting shot?

Can it be fair that, with 11,334,920 votes, the Tories are running the country, with 331 seats, while the Liberal Democrats, the Greens and UKIP, with 7,451,479 votes, got just ten seats between them?

The answer has to be no.

POSTSCRIPT May 11: Please also sign the Electoral Reform Society’s petition, Make Seats Match Votes, which states, “We want a fairer, more proportional voting system which ensures that seats in Parliament match the way people vote.” At midnight on May 10, it had 112,494 signatures.

Andy Worthington is a freelance investigative journalist, activist, author, photographer, film-maker and singer-songwriter (the lead singer and main songwriter for the London-based band The Four Fathers). He is the co-founder of the “Close Guantánamo” campaign, the co-director of “We Stand With Shaker,” calling for the immediate release from Guantánamo of Shaker Aamer, the last British resident in the prison, and the author of The Guantánamo Files: The Stories of the 774 Detainees in America’s Illegal Prison (published by Pluto Press, distributed by the University of Chicago Press in the US, and available from Amazon, including a Kindle edition — click on the following for the US and the UK) and of two other books: Stonehenge: Celebration and Subversion and The Battle of the Beanfield. He is also the co-director (with Polly Nash) of the documentary film, “Outside the Law: Stories from Guantánamo” (available on DVD here — or here for the US).

To receive new articles in your inbox, please subscribe to Andy’s RSS feed — and he can also be found on Facebook (and here), Twitter, Flickr and YouTube. Also see the six-part definitive Guantánamo prisoner list, and “The Complete Guantánamo Files,” an ongoing, 70-part, million-word series drawing on files released by WikiLeaks in April 2011. Also see the definitive Guantánamo habeas list, the full military commissions list, and the chronological list of all Andy’s articles.

Please also consider joining the “Close Guantánamo” campaign, and, if you appreciate Andy’s work, feel free to make a donation.

Video: Omar Khadr Speaks, Says, “Freedom Is Way Better Than I Thought”

Last night, as Britain collapsed into five more years of Tory rule, from the party that believes only in enriching the already rich, privatising everything that hasn’t yet been privatised, and permanently abusing the poor, the unemployed and the disabled, one of the only glimmers of light was not in the UK, but was in Canada, on a suburban street where former Guantánamo prisoner Omar Khadr was holding his first press conference since being released from prison.

Now 28, Omar was held for twelve years and ten months — ten years and two months in US custody (almost all in Guantánamo), and two years and eight months in Canadian prisons. This was in spite of the fact that he was just 15 years old when he was seized after a firefight in Afghanistan, where he had been taken by his father, and was therefore a juvenile, and not responsible for his actions.

Abused by the Americans, Omar also had his rights ignored by Canadian agents who visited him at Guantánamo, and who destroyed his hopes that his home country would help him. He then had to plead guilty at a disgraceful war crimes trial, in the military commissions at Guantánamo, to secure his release from the prison, receiving an eight-year sentence, with one more year to be served at Guantánamo, and the rest in Canada.

It took almost two years for the Harper government to get him back, and he was then imprisoned in a maximum-security prison, and demonized by the government, even though he has always been a model prisoner. He was finally moved to a medium-security facility in February 2014, and on May 7 this year, in the appeals court in Edmonton, Justice Myra Bielby granted him bail, following his application in March, after a judge’s ruling accepting his application two weeks ago, and the government’s shameful, last-ditch appeal.

Omar walked free yesterday, and, under his bail conditions, moved in with Dennis Edney, who has been his lawyer since 2004. And last night (UK time), as the first hints were dropped that Britain was entrenching itself as a country dominated by a cruel right-wing ideology, Omar spoke to the media, in a nearly six-minute interview in which he was radiantly happy at being free, and was gracious and articulate in a manner that, genuinely, is rarely seen or heard in public.

The video is below, and I hope you watch it and share it if, like me, you find Omar to be an extremely sympathetic young man.

One of the most significant things that Omar said was, “Freedom is way better than I thought,” adding, “And the Canadian public, so far, has been way better than I anticipated.”

He also said, “I would like to thank the Canadian public for trusting me, and giving me a chance. I will prove to them that I’m more than what they thought of me. I’ll prove to them that I’m a good person.”

When he was asked “what he would say to Prime Minister Stephen Harper, whose government worked for years to keep him from being transferred to Canada, then to keep him behind bars,” as CBC News put it, he said, simply and powerfully, “I’m going to have to disappoint him. I’m better than the person he thinks I am.”

He also “apologized for his actions as a teenager and offered advice to young people who might consider joining jihad against the West,” as CBC News described it.

“Don’t let emotions control you,” he said. “I’ve noticed that a lot of people are manipulated by not being educated.”

He also spoke about his remorse for anyone he had harmed — if the grenade he threw in 2002 did kill US Sgt. Christopher Speer, something that is far from certain. “I can just say that I’m sorry for the pain that I might [have] caused the families of the victims,” he said. “There is nothing I can do about the past but … I can do something about the future.”

He also spoke about his plans for the future, saying that he hopes, one day, to work in healthcare. “I’ve experienced pain, so I think I can empathize with people who are going through that,” he said.

He also spoke of his plans for furthering his education, following on from the extensive education he has undertaken since a Canadian professor, Arlette Zinck, began corresponding with him at Guantánamo. “I have a lot of learning to do,” he said. “A lot of basic skills I need to learn. I’m excited to start my life. I can’t change the past. All I can do is work on the present and the future.”

Before the interview, as CBC News put it, the reporters who gathered to watch the press conference received “a stern warning to be respectful” from Dennis Edney, who said, “I’ve had a long day. And I don’t mind going back into that house. Omar is going to say a few words. You can also ask him certain questions. But if the questions become too intrusive, then I’ll shut it down. This is Omar’s first time out in society since the age of 15.”

Omar also thanked Dennis in a witty exchange at the end of the interview. “I really appreciate him working for that last 11 years,” he said, adding, “I’m surprised he’s not sick of me yet.”Edney replied, “Wait till you get your bill,” and both men then shared a laugh.

After Omar returned to Edney’s home yesterday, his lawyer stayed behind to speak about his work, and his time with Omar. “It’s the start of that journey that I decided to do a long time ago, when I walked out of Guantanamo for the first time,” he said, adding, “I would like to restore him back to whole. And be able to allow him to participate in the Canadian community.”

He also explained that he will soon be arguing “aspects of the Khadr case before the Supreme Court of Canada,” and in June “will be back before a US court for the appeal of the original war crimes convictions” — the trigger for the bail Omar has just been granted.

“In many ways the fights continue,” Edney said. “It’s cost millions. And we’ve spent that. Both in terms of cash, and in terms of lost hours. And every lawyer and every judge, they all pat me on the back and say, good stuff.”

Asked again about this relationship with Omar, Edney said, “I think he’s worth every effort. I met him in a cold, empty cell. And I saw a broken bird, chained to a floor. So we journeyed together. We have, in some ways, both grown up together. I’m proud of who he is. He’s gone through hell.”

Hearing about Dennis Edney’s love for Omar, it’s hard for it not to bring tears to one’s eyes — and that, surely, is appropriate as this young man’s much-delayed freedom finally resumes after nearly 13 years in which two countries who claim to have a respect for the rule of law have treated him with absolutely disgraceful contempt and cruelty. I wish him all the best, and have no hesitation in stating that I think he will rise to the occasion, and the opportunities presented to him.

Andy Worthington is a freelance investigative journalist, activist, author, photographer, film-maker and singer-songwriter (the lead singer and main songwriter for the London-based band The Four Fathers). He is the co-founder of the “Close Guantánamo” campaign, the co-director of “We Stand With Shaker,” calling for the immediate release from Guantánamo of Shaker Aamer, the last British resident in the prison, and the author of The Guantánamo Files: The Stories of the 774 Detainees in America’s Illegal Prison (published by Pluto Press, distributed by the University of Chicago Press in the US, and available from Amazon, including a Kindle edition — click on the following for the US and the UK) and of two other books: Stonehenge: Celebration and Subversion and The Battle of the Beanfield. He is also the co-director (with Polly Nash) of the documentary film, “Outside the Law: Stories from Guantánamo” (available on DVD here — or here for the US).

To receive new articles in your inbox, please subscribe to Andy’s RSS feed — and he can also be found on Facebook (and here), Twitter, Flickr and YouTube. Also see the six-part definitive Guantánamo prisoner list, and “The Complete Guantánamo Files,” an ongoing, 70-part, million-word series drawing on files released by WikiLeaks in April 2011. Also see the definitive Guantánamo habeas list, the full military commissions list, and the chronological list of all Andy’s articles.

Please also consider joining the “Close Guantánamo” campaign, and, if you appreciate Andy’s work, feel free to make a donation.

Former Guantánamo Prisoner Omar Khadr Says He Is “Ready” for Freedom; All Decent People Must Agree

UPDATE: I’m delighted to report that Justice Myra Bielby has granted Omar’s bail. “Mr. Khadr, you are free to go,” she said at the hearing today in the appeals court in Edmonton. The Toronto Star reported that Omar “broke into a big, wide smile when the decision was read. His supporters in the courtroom erupted in cheers.”

As the Guardian described it, however, “Khadr’s legal ordeal is far from over. The government has given notice that it intends to challenge the bail order itself.” Nevertheless, I believe the government needs to accept that its vindictive demonization of Omar has run its course. On June 25, Omar will go before a parole board, providing another opportunity for him to be granted his freedom.

Omar’s long-established attorney Dennis Edney, with whom he will be living, told reporters, “I intend to drive him straight home,” and added, as the Guardian put it, that “he had squeezed [his] finger and said: ‘We did it.'” His other longtime attorney, Nathan Whitling, said, “Whatever anyone may think of Mr. Khadr, he’s now served his time.”

Edney added that “he expects to hold a press conference on Friday so Khadr can address the public for the first time,” as the Guardian described it. “I look forward to Omar Khadr letting the Canadian public see who he really is, to challenge the lies of this government, who have not allowed him to be seen or to speak to you media,”  Edney said. He also said, “Mr. Harper is a bigot. Mr. Harper doesn’t like Muslims. He wants to prove he’s tough on crime so who does he pick on? A 15-year-old boy.”

*****

Nearly 13 years after he was first seized after a firefight in Afghanistan at the age of 15, Omar Khadr, who is now 28, is hoping that today he will be released on bail. Two weeks ago, a judge in Alberta, Justice June Ross, granted his application for bail, which his lawyers had argued for at a hearing on March, but the government then announced its intention to appeal, even though there were no grounds for doing so.

The Canadian government has persistently treated Omar with contempt, ignoring the fact that, as a juvenile, he was not responsible for his father taking him to Afghanistan and putting him in harm’s way, ignoring their obligations and those of the US to rehabilitate child prisoners seized in wartime, and not to punish them, and refusing to accept that the plea deal he agreed to in Guantánamo was not a trustworthy admission of guilt, but an understandable route out of Guantánamo, where, otherwise, he might have been held forever.

The government also dragged its heels securing Omar’s release from Guantánamo, and then tried to defend holding him in a maximum-security prison, which prevented him from applying for bail. That disgraceful situation only came to an end last year, in part because of repeated complaints by senior prison officials.

As Justice Ross noted, Omar “has a 12½ year track record as a model prisoner, and a release plan supported by educators, mental health professionals, and his lawyers.” She also noted that his appeal against his conviction at Guantánamo, in the monstrously flawed military commission system, was “likely to succeed and keeping him in jail was not in the public interest,” as the BBC described it.

On Tuesday afternoon, Justice Ross set the conditions of Omar’s bail — he will live with his longtime lawyer, Dennis Edney, and his wife, he will have to wear an electronic tag, and he will have limited access to his family and to the internet.

However, on Tuesday morning, Justice Myra Bielby, of the appeals court in Edmonton, heard the government argue against Omar’s proposed bail, and will only decide whether to accept that appeal today, May 7.

Anyone with any decency will have to hope it is the former, because the government has no case. Not only do ministers concede that Omar has been a model prisoner throughout nearly 13 years of imprisonment, but there is no evidence to back up their claim that releasing him on bail while he is challenging his conviction in the US would somehow damage Canada’s diplomatic relations with other countries.

As the Toronto Star put it, Department of Justice lawyer Bruce Hughson “argued that releasing Khadr would cause ‘irreparable harm’ to Ottawa’s diplomatic relations with other countries looking to transfer Canadians home to serve the remainder of their sentences.” However, under cross-examination by one of Omar’s lawyers, Nathan Whitling, Lee Redpath, a senior Corrections Canada official involved with prisoner transfers, “admitted that there was no evidence that Khadr’s release would strain relations, only that the possibility existed.”

On Tuesday, the Toronto Star also reported on a psychological report about Omar, prepared by Nathan Lau, the prison psychologist at the prison in which he is currently being held, the Bowden Institution in Alberta, following an interview on February 20, which, as the Toronto Star described it, “presents the most sympathetic portrait of Khadr to date.”

“I’m ready,” Omar told Nathan Lau, speaking about his potential release, adding, “I hope that people get a chance to know the new me.”

Omar also said, “In prison, I had lots of bad experiences. If I hold on to each one, I would have been very bitter. I can’t afford to be bitter. I did something bad and I’m here for a reason. The only way to survive is to have hope. If I hope for people to give me a second chance, I should afford them the same.”

Crucially, as the Toronto Star explained, “Lau’s assessment led to Khadr’s reclassification from a medium security inmate to one that requires minimum security,” as well as providing “some of the most candid and detailed descriptions of Khadr’s past and outlook for the future.”

“If I could do things differently, I probably would have challenged my father more,” Omar told Lau, adding, “I don’t think I could have said ‘no’ to him but would have tried.”

It was Omar’s father, Ahmed Said Khadr (killed by Pakistani forces in 2003), who had taken him to Afghanistan, and who was responsible for his actions. As the article described him, he was “a charity worker with ties to Al-Qaeda’s elite,” who “shuttled Khadr and his siblings between their home in Scarborough to residences in Afghanistan and Pakistan throughout the 1990s.”

Speaking of the circumstances that led to his capture, Omar told Lau, “Then 9-11 happens. My dad wasn’t around and everyone freaked out.” He then, as the newspaper put it, “described the lead-up to July 27, 2002, when he was shot and captured after, it is alleged, he’d thrown a grenade that fatally wounded US Delta Force Sgt. Christopher Speer.”

“I’ll tell you what I thought happened,” Omar said. “I heard Americans. I heard shooting. I was scared. I had a hand grenade. I threw it over my back and it exploded. I wanted to scare them away, I wasn’t thinking of the consequences. After that I was shot.”

Omar also stated that, since his capture, he has “seen evidence that he was buried under rubble and could not have thrown the grenade,” but he explained, “I still take responsibility but hold on to hope it wasn’t me … I just hope I wasn’t the person responsible for killing someone.”

He also told Lau that he was “happy with this transfer to Canada in 2012 but had difficulty adapting to the ‘con code’ of federal penitentiaries,” as the Toronto Star put it. In his own words, he said, “It’s hard to build a relationship with the guards here. We can’t seem to be too friendly with each other. It gets me in some trouble when I refuse to abide by the con code.”

He also explained how he had to give up his job as a food server while he was held in the maximum-security Millhaven Institution in Ontario. “This guy, he thinks we are buddies and that I will give him a whole bag of butter,” Omar said. “I wouldn’t give it to him and he gets p—ed off. I talked to my Correctional Officer and just quit the job. There was too much drama.”

He also explained how later, in Edmonton, he was “punched in the face by another inmate who said his family was in the military.”

He also pointed out that he is looking forward to life outside prison, although he conceded, “I don’t think it will be a piece of cake. I’ve screwed up in the past and I’m worried it will haunt me. People will think I’m the same person I was 12 or 13 years ago. They might treat me in the same light.”

He added, “However, if I carry myself with dignity and respect, people will respect me. I hope there won’t be this terrorism nonsense. I’m not going to get involved.”

I hope these words will be the last we hear from Omar in captivity, and that later today he will be free.  As I noted in a statement I was asked to submit by the Free Omar Khadr Now campaign, “It is time for the Canadian government to abandon its shameful and unacceptable vilification of Omar, and to accept Justice Ross’s ruling.” I added that Omar should finally be “allowed to begin to rebuild his life free of a prison’s walls.”

Andy Worthington is a freelance investigative journalist, activist, author, photographer, film-maker and singer-songwriter (the lead singer and main songwriter for the London-based band The Four Fathers). He is the co-founder of the “Close Guantánamo” campaign, the co-director of “We Stand With Shaker,” calling for the immediate release from Guantánamo of Shaker Aamer, the last British resident in the prison, and the author of The Guantánamo Files: The Stories of the 774 Detainees in America’s Illegal Prison (published by Pluto Press, distributed by the University of Chicago Press in the US, and available from Amazon, including a Kindle edition — click on the following for the US and the UK) and of two other books: Stonehenge: Celebration and Subversion and The Battle of the Beanfield. He is also the co-director (with Polly Nash) of the documentary film, “Outside the Law: Stories from Guantánamo” (available on DVD here — or here for the US).

To receive new articles in your inbox, please subscribe to Andy’s RSS feed — and he can also be found on Facebook (and here), Twitter, Flickr and YouTube. Also see the six-part definitive Guantánamo prisoner list, and “The Complete Guantánamo Files,” an ongoing, 70-part, million-word series drawing on files released by WikiLeaks in April 2011. Also see the definitive Guantánamo habeas list, the full military commissions list, and the chronological list of all Andy’s articles.

Please also consider joining the “Close Guantánamo” campaign, and, if you appreciate Andy’s work, feel free to make a donation.

Time for Proportional Representation: Whatever the Outcome of the General Election, Our Voting System is Unfair and Unrepresentative

On the eve of Britain’s General Election, I wanted to make sure that I expressed my hope that anyone who can will vote to keep the Tories out — for the reasons I have been pointing out since they came to power in 2010: their disdain for the poor, the ill, the unemployed and the disabled; their unparalleled obsession with destroying the state provision of services; and their dedication to enriching the already rich, all carried out under a false claim that we need savage austerity, a false claim that has repeatedly been exposed by competent economists as an ideologically-driven madness that is enormously damaging to the economy.

My archive of articles about the Tories’ crimes since May 2010 (225 articles to date) is here, under the unambiguous heading, “Battle for Britain: Fighting the Coalition Government’s Vile Ideology,” and if you still have any doubts about my position, please listen to “Tory Bullshit Blues,” the free song I recently made available on Soundcloud, by my band The Four Fathers.

The worst outcome after the election would be for the Tories to be back in power with the support of the Liberal Democrats, who will be given a kicking at the polls for their support of the Tories for the last five years, but who will limp on electorally. I can’t even bear to think about the Tories continuing to be in charge of the country, to be honest, but if it does happen I can only hope that ordinary people will — eventually — rise up in disgust and will not continue to embrace their oppressors as though punishment is something they deserve (a legacy of Puritanism and the class system), or in the futile hope — largely, it seems, successfully imported from the US in recent decades — that they too may one day be rich, when, of course, given the current fashion for rich people to be as greedy as possible, they would not want to pay any of their wealth in tax to ensure the smooth running of society as a whole.

The best result, given the current electoral system, would be for Labour to be able to form a government with the support of the SNP (Scottish National Party), although that, too, is not without its problems. Although the SNP would obviously provide a much needed push to the left — having demonstrated during last year’s referendum on independence that socialism can be discussed openly in Scotland — their raison d’être is to leave the union, something that for myself, from a northern English working class background, is more a betrayal of our shared heritage, oppressed by rich southerners, than a declaration of freedom.

And the Labour Party, of course, continues, in many ways, to be the weird schizophrenic monster it has been since New Labour transformed it 20 years ago — a friend of the same dark forces embraced by the Tories (and the Lib Dems), but one that is, however, constantly being pulled to the left by those who remember its higher calling — to stand for the people against the oppressors. That said, I believe the Labour Party can be argued with, fought against and negotiated with in a way that the Tories cannot. Like true psychopaths and sociopaths (and, indeed, like Tony Blair and Margaret Thatcher), they are not for turning, they are never for turning, and attacking them, or even arguing with them, only makes them more fanatically determined to do whatever it is that those opposing them dislike.

Despite all of my comments above, however, the biggest problem in this election is the electoral system itself, with its ludicrous, anachronistic “first past the post” voting system, which consigns the majority of votes to the electoral dustbin. I don’t think it was ever justifiable as a fair system, and recall how unjust it was in the 1970s, when I grew up in a Liberal household. In February 1974, for example, when Labour won with 11,645,616 votes and 301 seats (29.3% of those eligible to vote), the Liberals, who got 6,059,519 votes, secured just 14 seats — something that, on my 11th birthday (which was when the election took place), I was able to work out was an appallingly unjust state of affairs. To spell it out, what it meant was that, for Labour, 38,690 votes were required for each seat, while the Liberals had to get a staggering 432,822 votes for each of their seats.

In February 1974, 78.8% of registered voters turned out to vote, and over 70% of voters continued to turn out at elections until 2001, when just 59.4% of those eligible to vote bothered to visit a polling station. In 2005 and 2010, those figures rose — but not to 20th century levels. 61.4% turned out in 2005, and 65.1% in 2010 — a demonstration, if any were needed, of an ongoing disengagement with the political establishment.

In addition, a breakdown of the votes reveals how the unjust distribution of votes has continued. In 2005, when the Labour Party won its third election in a row, 9,552,436 people voted for Labour, which was 35.2% of the votes cast, but just 21.6% of the total population eligible to vote. Labour had 355 seats, meaning that 26,908 votes were required for each seat. The Liberal Democrats, meanwhile, received 5,985,454 votes but only secured 62 seats, meaning that 96,540 votes were required for each seat, an improvement on 1974, but still grossly unfair, although this was nothing compared to the unfairness faced by UKIP and the Greens, who secured no seats at all, even though UKIP got 605,973 votes and the Greens got 257,758 votes.

In 2010, 10,703,654 people voted for the Tories, which was 36.1% of the votes cast, but just 23.5% of the total population eligible to vote. The Tories had 306 seats, meaning that 34,979 votes were required for each seat. The Liberal Democrats, meanwhile, received 6,836,248 votes but only secured 57 seats, meaning that 119,934 votes were required for each seat. The Greens, meanwhile, secured one seat with 265,243 votes while UKIP, which received 919,471 votes, got no seats.

So is there any chance of changing this unfair situation? When political power used to bounce between Labour and Conservative, who were able to form governments without resorting to coalitions, it was obvious that neither party would call for electoral reform. Now, however, it looks like coalitions are the new norm, and with falling voter numbers for the Tories and Labour, and ever increasing voter numbers for other parties, it is difficult to see how resistance to a fairer system can continue forever.

Based on the voting figures from 2010, when 27,148,510 people voted in 650 seats, a genuinely representative proportional representation system would mean that 41,766 votes for any party would secure the election of an MP. For this to work, constituencies would have to be slightly larger, but there is no reason to think that this would severely dilute constituency representation, and the outcome would be both fairer, and much more likely to encourage voter participation. When your vote actually does count — rather than only counting if you live in a marginal seat — there’s far less justification for people to say that there’s no point in voting.

Yesterday, the Independent addressed electoral reform, on its front page, in an article entitled, “Sixty per cent of people want voting reform, says survey.” Actually, the figure was 61%, from a poll conducted by ORB, who spoke to over 2,000 people between May 1 and 3, finding that the majority “believe the system should be reformed so that smaller parties are better represented in parliament, while 39 per cent think it should remain as it is.”

Four years ago, a watered-down PR system was put to a referendum, as a Lib Dem condition of entering into a coalition with the Tories, which was vigorously opposed by the Tories and by Labour. On a low turnout (just 42.2%), those who took part voted by 68% to 32% against a switch to the “alternative vote” system — which, it should be noted, is not true proportional representation.

The graphs alongside this article, which accompanied the Independent‘s article yesterday, show the percentage of votes for each party based on the latest estimates, the results under the current system, and under a system of proportional representation, and while I find it alarming to consider that UKIP would have 84 MPs as a result, I will defend that because of its fairness — a fairness that would also, of course, see the Greens get the seats they deserve.

As the Independent noted yesterday, “Reform is endorsed by all social class groups and in every region of Great Britain,” and Vince Cable, the Lib Dem business secretary, was clear about why change is needed. “There must be a debate,” he said, adding, “The system is breaking down and producing particularly absurd outcomes.” He also pointed out that the SNP look set to dominate Scotland with “barely majority, and possibly minority support.”

Cable also explained, “First-past-the-post was designed for a two-party system. We have long since passed that point. The next step is for people in the two biggest parties to say ‘enough is enough’. The problem is that they are vested interests standing in the way. I would hope they realise we are getting into dangerous political waters — parties with very limited legitimacy trying to form governments.”

It is time for change — but first of all, to put it bluntly, we have to get rid of the Tories, to allow room for notions of fairness and social justice to breathe once more. Please vote wisely tomorrow!

Andy Worthington is a freelance investigative journalist, activist, author, photographer, film-maker and singer-songwriter (the lead singer and main songwriter for the London-based band The Four Fathers). He is the co-founder of the “Close Guantánamo” campaign, the co-director of “We Stand With Shaker,” calling for the immediate release from Guantánamo of Shaker Aamer, the last British resident in the prison, and the author of The Guantánamo Files: The Stories of the 774 Detainees in America’s Illegal Prison (published by Pluto Press, distributed by the University of Chicago Press in the US, and available from Amazon, including a Kindle edition — click on the following for the US and the UK) and of two other books: Stonehenge: Celebration and Subversion and The Battle of the Beanfield. He is also the co-director (with Polly Nash) of the documentary film, “Outside the Law: Stories from Guantánamo” (available on DVD here — or here for the US).

To receive new articles in your inbox, please subscribe to Andy’s RSS feed — and he can also be found on Facebook (and here), Twitter, Flickr and YouTube. Also see the six-part definitive Guantánamo prisoner list, and “The Complete Guantánamo Files,” an ongoing, 70-part, million-word series drawing on files released by WikiLeaks in April 2011. Also see the definitive Guantánamo habeas list, the full military commissions list, and the chronological list of all Andy’s articles.

Please also consider joining the “Close Guantánamo” campaign, and, if you appreciate Andy’s work, feel free to make a donation.

Please Support the Campaign for the Reinstatement of a Publicly-Owned NHS

Ever since the Tory-led coalition government passed the wretched Health and Social Care Act in 2011 (after David Cameron blatantly lied to the British people, by falsely promising “no more of the tiresome, meddlesome, top-down re-structures that have dominated the last decade of the NHS”), privatisation of the greatest and most important institution in the UK, the NHS (National Health Service, founded in 1948), has been increasing to an alarming degree.

As Headway, the brain injury association, described the impact of the Health and Social Care Act, “The Secretary of State no longer has a duty to provide health services through the NHS, which increases the opportunity for private health care firms to deliver many services that were previously operated by the NHS.” The bill also replaced the bodies responsible for commissioning services — Primary Care Trusts and Strategic Health Authorities — with Clinical Commissioning Groups, nominally under the control of GPs (responsible for 60-80% of the NHS budget), but also providing another opportunity for private health care firms to infiltrate the NHS.

I campaigned against the passage of the Health and Social Care Act at the time (see here and here), and then became heavily involved in the successful campaign to save my local hospital, in Lewisham, in south east London, from savage cuts (see here, here and here). Last year I campaigned to resist the Tories’ spiteful response to Lewisham’s success, which became known as the “hospital closure clause” (see here and here), and covered the People’s March for the NHS, a grass-roots initiative that involved a recreation of the Jarrow March from the 1930s to save the NHS (see here and here).

One of the organisers of the People’s March for the NHS was Joanna Adams, who has continued to maintain a campaigning website, 999 Call for the NHS, which, on Saturday, had an open letter published in the Guardian, signed by numerous health professionals and high-profile supporters, which I’m posting below.

The letter also asks people to support a private member’s bill for the reinstatement of the NHS, which was introduced on March 11, 2015 by 12 MPs from five political parties — Caroline Lucas (Green, Brighton Pavilion), Andrew George (Liberal Democrat, St. Ives), John Pugh (Liberal Democrat, Southport), Michael Meacher (Labour, Oldham West and Royton), Chris Williamson (Labour, Derby North), Roger Godsiff (Labour, Birmingham Hall Green), Kelvin Hopkins (Labour, Luton North), Jeremy Corbyn (Labour, Islington North), John McDonnell (Labour, Hayes and Harlington), Dr. Eilidh Whiteford (SNP, Banff and Buchan), Hywel Williams (Plaid Cymru, Arfon) and Katy Clark (Labour, North Ayrshire and Arran).

Also still on the books, it is worth noting, is a private member’s bill introduced by Clive Efford, the National Health Service (Amended Duties and Powers) Bill, which aims to repeal the worst aspects of the Health and Social Care Act. In November, as I explained here, Efford’s bill passed its second reading, when 241 MPs voted for it — whose names can be found here, and should be useful for pro-NHS campaigners. Both bills will be considered by the new Parliament, and it may be instructive for those who want to know more to read the analysis from last November, by academic and pro-NHS campaigner Caroline Molloy, of the strengths and weaknesses of Clive Efford’s bill.

Introducing the NHS reinstatement bill in March, Caroline Lucas wrote:

The Bill proposes to fully restore the NHS as an accountable public service — with time and flexibility for implementation — and so reversing 25 years of marketisation, for an NHS that is truly public, joined-up, fully protected and free at the point of delivery.

Scotland and Wales have already reversed marketisation and restored their NHS without immense upheaval. England can too.

Far from being another top-down, centralised re-structuring, the Bill — crucially — reinstates the Secretary of State’s responsibility for the provision of services, something the Health and Social Care Act 2012 (HSCA) severed. The Bill would strip away the costly market mechanisms that waste NHS money which could be spent on patient care.

Caroline Lucas said, “We must stop our NHS being whittled down to little more than a corporate logo. The public service we love is being dismantled and defined by bidding wars and market structures that waste billions which could be spent on patient care. Our public health service should be run with patients, not profit, at its heart. Its rescue package must be rigorous and comprehensive to fully protect it from the private sector. I’m honoured to be presenting just such a Bill and with such strong cross-party support.”

She added, “The NHS is a core part of our national identity — but as things stand, it’s under immediate and growing threat.  What the founders of our NHS achieved was radical and far-reaching — and we have a duty to ensure that reinstating their vision of the publicly provided NHS we still want is at the heart of our General Election debate.”

If you’d like to add your name to the open letter from ‘999 Call for the NHS,’ please visit this page.

Also, on the eve of the General Election, the Campaign for the NHS Reinstatement Bill 2015 is asking people to write to the candidates in their constituencies to ask them to support the bill for the reinstatement of the NHS, which you can do here.

The bill has the support of many MPs and candidates, and you can find details here.

Please do get involved if you care about the NHS, and please also note the Labour Party’s position. As described in the Guardian on April 21, “the Labour manifesto commits to repealing the Health and Social Care Act 2012 passed by the Conservative and Liberal Democrat coalition. It would end competition between providers, in favour of making NHS organisations the preferred providers of services, impose a cap on profits made by companies providing clinical services and ensure the NHS was protected from the Transatlantic Trade and Investment Partnership (TTIP) Treaty.” Good news, if Labour can beat the Tories to No. 10 on May 7 — and if they stick to their promises. Clearly, though, whatever else may be up in the air, the future of the NHS in England is particularly threatened if the Tories manage to stay in power.

See below for the ‘999 Call For The NHS’ letter to the Guardian:

Support the bill to reinstate the NHS

Letter to the Guardian, May 1, 2015

On 11 March, the NHS bill 2015 was presented in parliament with cross-party support. Its policies would comprehensively reinstate the NHS throughout England. The bill’s policies restore the secretary of state for health’s duty to provide universal listed health services throughout England based on people’s needs and not their ability to pay. The bill abolishes the expensive internal and external market, stops the break up of the NHS and returns the NHS to public control and accountability. This is vital to protect the NHS from EU trade treaties and others in the pipeline like the TTIP.

It will end the high costs to the NHS of PFI schemes. By making PFI debts a Treasury responsibility, it removes the exorbitant costs of PFI from the NHS and enables the state to negotiate restoration of PFI services and assets into public ownership. The British Medical Association, representing 150,000 doctors, has stated publicly that its members want a publicly funded and publicly provided National Health Service. It supports the principles behind the legislation which the NHS bill proposes.

Many MPs and parliamentary candidates and some political parties now support the Bill. We urge the public to support the NHS bill 2015 and to ensure that their parliamentary candidates now commit to supporting the reinstatement of the NHS through the bill, and to ensuring it is in the first Queen’s speech after the election.

Joanna Adams, founder, 999 Call For The NHS campaign group

Dr. Jackie Applebee, GP, chair, Tower Hamlets BMA

Lady Joan Bakewell, broadcaster and writer

Alan Bennett, author

Natalie Bennett, leader, Green party

Dr. Naureen Bhatti, GP, Limehouse

Dr. Kambiz Boomla, Ex-chair, City and East London Medical Committee

William Boyd, author

Lord Melvyn Bragg, author and broadcaster

Sandra Carey, midwife

Janet Chadwick, nurse practitioner

Marcus Chown, author, journalist and broadcaster

Ben Clements, community mental health nurse

Dr. Liz Davies, Reader in Child Protection

Dr. Robert Delamont, consultant neurologist

Dolmen Domikles, mental health worker, Sussex NHS Foundation Trust

Fiona Duby, international health & development consultant

Dr. Paul Evans, director, NHS Support Federation

Sir Richard Eyre, film, TV, theatre and opera director

Craig Farlow, ‘300-miler’, 999 People’s Jarrow March 2014

Dr Richard Fielding, professor, medical psychology in public health

Joe Finlayson, community mental health nurse

Dr. Peter Fisher, president, Doctors for the NHS

Shirley Franklin, Defend Whittington Hospital Coalition

Dr. Patrick French, Doctors For The NHS

Dr. Wendy Geraghty, lead clinician, Lewisham CAMHS

Dr. Bob Gill, GP, National Health Action Party

Roger Graef, TV/film producer and director

Jacqueline Gruhn, commissioner, adult care

Alun Hamnett, senior technical officer, blood and transplant

Earl of Harewood, film and theatre producer

Paul Hardman, paramedic

Jean Hay-Burns, psychotherapist

Carolyn Heads, quality & HR manager

John Hilary, executive director, War on Want

Dr. Kate Hudson, general secretary, CND

Christine Hyde, retired, ‘300-miler’

Dr. Bridget Innes, out-of-hours GP

Dr. Louise Irvine, chair, Save Lewisham Hospital campaign

Dr. Coral Jones, GP, Hackney and TTIP activist

Ben Judd, team manager, AWP NHS Trust

Linda Kaucher, StopTTIP

Dr. Jeremiah Kelly, researcher

Lady Helena Kennedy, barrister

Neshane Kunanathan, biomedical scientist

Dr. Alan Lawlor, chemist

Dr. Anna Livingstone, GP, CCG clinical lead, Tower Hamlets

Ken Loach, filmmaker

Professor Rajan Madhok, retired NHS medical director, ‘300-miler’

John McCarthy, writer and broadcaster

Sir Jonathan Miller, theatre and opera director

Sienna Miller, actor

Caroline Molloy, editor, OurNHS, openDemocracy

Michael Morpurgo, writer, co-founder, Farms for City Children

Clare Morpurgo, co-founder, Farms for City Children

Anita Nuckhir, occupational therapist

Dr. Katherine Oliver, general manager

Dr. Tony O’Sullivan, Lewisham consultant paediatrician

Lord David Owen, former health minister and neurologist

Janet Patrick, children’s social care expert

Clive Peedell, co-leader, National Health Action Party

Peter Pinkney, president, RMT Union

Professor Allyson Pollock, professor of public health research and policy

Alexandra Pringle, group editor-in-chief, Bloomsbury Publishing

Jonathan Pryce, actor

Sir Steven Redgrave, five-times Olympic Gold medal oarsman

Professor Chris Redman, professor emeritus of obstetric medicine

Professor Sue Richards, co-chair, Keep Our NHS Public (KONP)

Dr. Adam Riley, consultant

Peter Roderick, barrister, drafter of NHS bill

Dr. Hermione Roy, consultant child and adolescent psychiatrist

Dr. Helen Salisbury, GP

Professor Wendy Savage, president, Keep Our NHS Public (KONP)

Dr. Alex Scott-Samuel, joint chair, Politics of Health Group

Dr. Ron Singer, chair, doctors’ section of Unite

David Skidmore, A&E nurse

Annie Smedley, senior OT, NHS

Stephen Smith, ambulance EMT2

Clive Stafford Smith, international human rights lawyer

Rick Stroud, author and film director

Dr. Richard Walshaw, scientist

Dr. Eric Watts, chair, Doctors for the NHS

Dr. Charles Webster, official historian of the NHS

Andy Worthington is a freelance investigative journalist, activist, author, photographer, film-maker and singer-songwriter (the lead singer and main songwriter for the London-based band The Four Fathers). He is the co-founder of the “Close Guantánamo” campaign, the co-director of “We Stand With Shaker,” calling for the immediate release from Guantánamo of Shaker Aamer, the last British resident in the prison, and the author of The Guantánamo Files: The Stories of the 774 Detainees in America’s Illegal Prison (published by Pluto Press, distributed by the University of Chicago Press in the US, and available from Amazon, including a Kindle edition — click on the following for the US and the UK) and of two other books: Stonehenge: Celebration and Subversion and The Battle of the Beanfield. He is also the co-director (with Polly Nash) of the documentary film, “Outside the Law: Stories from Guantánamo” (available on DVD here — or here for the US).

To receive new articles in your inbox, please subscribe to Andy’s RSS feed — and he can also be found on Facebook (and here), Twitter, Flickr and YouTube. Also see the six-part definitive Guantánamo prisoner list, and “The Complete Guantánamo Files,” an ongoing, 70-part, million-word series drawing on files released by WikiLeaks in April 2011. Also see the definitive Guantánamo habeas list, the full military commissions list, and the chronological list of all Andy’s articles.

Please also consider joining the “Close Guantánamo” campaign, and, if you appreciate Andy’s work, feel free to make a donation.

Andy Worthington’s Band The Four Fathers Release Free Song, ‘Tory Bullshit Blues’

I’ve just made available a free song on Soundcloud, ‘Tory Bullshit Blues‘, by my band The Four Fathers, from our forthcoming album, ‘Love and War.’

With just five days to go until the General Election, and with reports that the Tories are leading in the polls, I wanted to make sure that I made my opinions clear about the last five years under the Tory-led coalition government, with its assault on the poor, the unemployed and the disabled — as well as my thoughts about UKIP, whose rise has been such a depressing spectacle.

The song is embedded below, and I hope you like it and share it if you do.

Last week I also set up a Facebook page for the Four Fathers, and will soon be setting up a Bandcamp account to make all our songs available online — and we’ll also be making CDs. Along with myself, Andy Worthington (on vocals and guitar), the band is made up of Richard Clare (guitar and backing vocals), Bren Horstead (drums and percussion), Andrew Fifield (flute and harmonica) and Louis Sills-Clare (bass). We began recording last November, and have had two other sessions in January and February, and we’re in the studio later today (May 2) recording the last two songs for the album, two of my recent compositions — ‘Fighting Injustice’, a storming roots reggae anthem, and ’81 Million Dollars’, about the architects of the Bush administration’s torture program.

The album features eight original compositions, seven of my own songs (including ‘Song for Shaker Aamer’, featured in the campaign video for We Stand With Shaker, the campaign I launched in November, with the activist Joanne MacInnes, to secure the release from Guantánamo of Shaker Aamer, the last British resident in the prison), and one by Richard, and two covers, Bob Dylan’s ‘Masters of War’ and a radical re-make of Gloria Gaynor’s ‘I Will Survive.’

We also have some gigs coming up. We’re playing at the Bird’s Nest pub in Deptford at 6pm on Monday (May 4, the Bank Holiday) as part of the Deptford Heritage Festival (a change in time and venue — it was originally scheduled to be at 3pm at another venue, Number Three, on Creekside, just around the corner from the Bird’s Nest), and on June 4 on the closing day of the Brockley Max festival (further details to follow). Do get in touch if you’re interested in having us play.

Andy Worthington is a freelance investigative journalist, activist, author, photographer, film-maker and singer-songwriter. He is the co-founder of the “Close Guantánamo” campaign, the co-director of “We Stand With Shaker,” calling for the immediate release from Guantánamo of Shaker Aamer, the last British resident in the prison, and the author of The Guantánamo Files: The Stories of the 774 Detainees in America’s Illegal Prison (published by Pluto Press, distributed by the University of Chicago Press in the US, and available from Amazon, including a Kindle edition — click on the following for the US and the UK) and of two other books: Stonehenge: Celebration and Subversion and The Battle of the Beanfield. He is also the co-director (with Polly Nash) of the documentary film, “Outside the Law: Stories from Guantánamo” (available on DVD here — or here for the US).

To receive new articles in your inbox, please subscribe to Andy’s RSS feed — and he can also be found on Facebook (and here), Twitter, Flickr and YouTube. Also see the six-part definitive Guantánamo prisoner list, and “The Complete Guantánamo Files,” an ongoing, 70-part, million-word series drawing on files released by WikiLeaks in April 2011. Also see the definitive Guantánamo habeas list, the full military commissions list, and the chronological list of all Andy’s articles.

Please also consider joining the “Close Guantánamo” campaign, and, if you appreciate Andy’s work, feel free to make a donation.

Abdul Rahman Shalabi, Hunger Striker Since 2005, Asks Review Board to Approve His Release from Guantánamo

[image error]I wrote the following article for the “Close Guantánamo” website, which I established in January 2012 with US attorney Tom Wilner. Please join us — just an email address is required to be counted amongst those opposed to the ongoing existence of Guantánamo, and to receive updates of our activities by email. 

Last Tuesday, April 21, Abdul Rahman Shalabi became the 14th “forever prisoner” at Guantánamo to have his case reviewed by a Periodic Review Board. The PRBs — which consist of representatives of the Departments of State, Defense, Justice and Homeland Security, as well as the office of the Director of National Intelligence and the Office of the Joint Chiefs of Staff — were established in 2013 to review the cases of prisoners who had neither been approved for release by the high-level, multi-agency Guantánamo Review Task Force that President Obama established shortly after first taking office in 2009, nor had been put forward for trials.

At the time of the PRBs’ creation, 71 men were deemed to be eligible for reviews, but, according to my records, five of these men have been released, one other accepted a plea deal in the military commissions, and another was charged, leaving 50 more prisoners eligible for the process.

Progress has been slow, but, of the 13 cases so far decided, nine have ended with the boards approving the release of the prisoners in question, and just four have been approved for ongoing imprisonment.

A caveat is that only two of these nine have been freed — a Saudi and a Kuwaiti — while the rest have joined the 50 other men approved for release by the task force but still held. 43 of these 50 men are Yemenis, who are still held because of fears regarding the security situation in Yemen, and six of the seven men approved for release through the PRB process are also Yemenis.

In the last six months, however, a dozen Yemenis have been released in third countries, so there is, finally, some hope for these 49 men, although the Obama administration needs to show renewed vigor in finding new homes for them if their ongoing imprisonment is not to become a cruel joke.

Shalabi, 39, is a Saudi, which may make it easier for him to be released if the board decides in his favor, although that is by no means certain, as the authorities identify him as a bodyguard for Osama bin Laden. It is by no means certain, however, that there is any accuracy to this claim. Shalabi is described as one of the “Dirty Thirty,” captured crossing from Afghanistan to Pakistan in December 2001, who were all initially described as bin Laden bodyguards, but that has never seemed likely, as the men in question were generally young, and had not been in Afghanistan for long prior to their capture.

Shalabi had been there slightly longer, having apparently arrived in Afghanistan in the late 1990s, but there is no independent verification of his supposed status. The authorities noted that he has “denied any involvement with al-Qa’ida,” but claimed that “several other detainees — including senior al-Qa’ida figures and other former bodyguards — have separately identified him as a Bin Ladin [sic] bodyguard,” claims that, again, are problematical, because there is no guarantee that those witnesses gave reliable information freely, and were not tortured or otherwise abused.

The authorities also noted that Shalabi has generally been “noncompliant with the guard staff,” although this seems to be based primarily on the fact that he is a long-term hunger striker, and not because he has been particularly disruptive while refusing food. In fact, as his lawyer, Julia Tarver Mason-Wood explained, “He has been on a peaceful but long-term hunger strike since 2005.” She also described him as the prison’s longest-running hunger striker.

In addition, two personal representatives assigned to represent him (who are members of the US military), stated, “Although it is looked upon as a negative factor in the overall issue relating to compliance, it’s important to emphasize that hunger striking is not an illegal act, but rather a non-violent and peaceful means of protesting camp conditions and continued detainment. Abdul Rahman has stated on multiple occasions that if hunger striking was illegal, he would have immediately ceased such protest.”

As I explained in an article in October 2010:

Shalabi … weighed 124 pounds when he arrived at Guantánamo in January 2002, but has rarely weighed more than 110 pounds since he began his hunger strike in August 2005, as part of the largest hunger strike in the prison’s history. At one point, in November 2005, he weighed just 100 pounds (PDF), and when the authorities took harsh steps to bring the strike under control in January 2006, importing a number of restraint chairs to make sure that it “wasn’t convenient” for the strikers to continue (as Gen. Bantz J. Craddock, the head of the US Southern Command, explained to the New York Times), Shalabi, Tarek Baada, a Yemeni, and another Saudi, Ahmed Zuhair (who was released [in June 2009]), refused to give up.

In September 2009, after four years of being force-fed daily, Shalabi weighed just 108 pounds, and wrote a distressing letter to his lawyers, in which he stated, “I am a human who is being treated like an animal.” In November 2009, when his letter was included in a court submission, one of his lawyers, Julia Tarver Mason, stated, “He’s two pounds away from organ failure and death.”

At the time of my 2010 article, Shalabi had, according to the authorities, eaten solid food on several occasions, although, in their court submission, the authorities “conceded that Shalabi weighed only 101 pounds — just two-thirds of his ‘ideal body weight’ — in September [2010], and also noted that doctors had diagnosed him with gastroparesis, a condition which slows the digestive system.”

According to Navy Capt. Monte Bible, who commanded the Joint Medical Group at Guantánamo at the time, gastroparesis “causes constipation, bloating and abdominal pain,” and “was apparently caused by a weakening of his abdominal muscles” as a result of his hunger strike.

For his PRB, the personal representatives noted Shalabi’s “plans and desires to become fully re-integrated into society as a productive member,” which, they added, “includes reuniting with his family back home in Saudi Arabia, joining his siblings to help run a well-established business, taking care of his ailing mother, and getting married and having children.”

Despite their apparent misgivings about him, the authorities acknowledged that he “has not expressed intent to reengage in terrorism and does not appear to be in contact with any extremists outside of Guantánamo.” In addition, he is the uncle of a former Guantánamo prisoner, Sultan al-Uwaydha (ISN 059), who “was repatriated to Saudi Arabia in 2006 [actually 2007] and who does not appear to have reengaged in extremist activities.”

Noting his desire to return to Saudi Arabia, the authorities also acknowledged that he “is aware of and probably would be open to participating in the Kingdom’s rehabilitation program, particularly as it would entail the participation of his family members, with whom he is close,” adding, “His family has no known ties to extremism and he has expressed interest in business opportunities.”

Reporting on his review, the Miami Herald noted that he “appeared slim in a video feed of the proceedings,” and that he “had a full beard and wore a white tunic top and skullcap,” according to a Pentagon official who watched part of the hearing.

As his lawyer, Julia Tarver Mason (now Julia Tarver Mason-Wood) noted, Shalabi “is committed to spending his remaining days in peace with his family,” adding that, although his nephew was successfully repatriated in 2007, rejoining the family, which “has a real estate and construction firm.” Returning home would be his “first choice,” Mason-Wood added, although she noted that he “is open to being resettled in another country if that would expedite his transfer out of Guantánamo.”

Moreover, Mason-Wood stated that Shalabi “has largely cooperated with the enteral feedings he has been provided on a daily basis over the last nine years.” For the Miami Herald, Carol Rosenberg noted that this was “something prison staff have at times confirmed to the Miami Herald through the years,” adding “Even at the height of the prison’s long-running hunger strike, according to various military sources, Shalabi would voluntarily submit to shackling for escort to a restraint chair and sometime chug a can of Ensure nutritional supplement rather than receive it through a tube snaked up his nose and into his stomach.”

What Shalabi said to the board, and what they asked him, has not been made public, but I hope you will find useful the transcript of his personal representatives’ opening statement, which is posted below:

Periodic Review Board, 21 April 2015

Abdul Shalabi, ISN 042

Opening Statement of Personal Representative

Good morning, ladies and gentlemen of the board. We are the personal representatives for Abdul Shalabi, who prefers to be called Abdul Rahman. Also in attendance today is Abdul Rahman’s private counsel, Ms. Julia Tarver Mason-Wood. During the past three months we had the opportunity to meet with Abdul Rahman on multiple occasions, while each time gaining a better insight into his character, and future plans and desires to become fully re-integrated into society as a productive member. This future includes reuniting with his family back home in Saudi Arabia, joining his siblings to help run a well-established business, taking care of his ailing mother, and getting married and having children.

Abdul Rahman left behind his mother, two brothers and three sisters, with whom he is very close. Each of his immediate family members, with the exception of his oldest sister who cannot read or write, has written letters to the board in support of his release. Both of his brothers are very successful within their own respective career fields ranging from real estate to business contracting, and are eager to have Abdul Rahman join their business. Prior to his detention, Abdul Rahman was one semester short of obtaining his university degree and if given the opportunity, he is very much looking forward to completing his final semester. Abdul Rahman’s family is eagerly awaiting his return. His brothers have already arranged for all the necessary amenities and set up an apartment for him [redacted]. Additionally, Abdul Rahman’s mother and sisters are dedicated to finding a suitable partner for him to marry.

Abdul Rahman is very optimistic and sincere about participating in the many prospects that await him in his home country. The government of Saudi Arabia has long been known to provide all the necessary tools and support for a successful rehabilitation and reintegration program for detainees transferred home, including appropriate security and humane treatment assurances to facilitate the transfer of detainees. Abdul Rahman is very eager and willing to participate in this rehabilitative process if permitted to do so. Pursuant to these assurances, the United States has transferred over 100 detainees to Saudi Arabia, including Abdul Rahman’s nephew who has successfully reintegrated into society and started a family, all with the support of Abdul Rahman’s family.

I would also be remiss if I don’t take this opportunity to speak on behalf of Abdul Rahman regarding his long term hunger striking. According to his unclassified dossier, Abdul Rahman would be characterized as noncompliant. Although it is looked upon as a negative factor in the overall issue relating to compliance, it’s important to emphasize that hunger striking is not an illegal act, but rather a non-violent and peaceful means of protesting camp conditions and continued detainment. Abdul Rahman has stated on multiple occasions that if hunger striking was illegal, he would have immediately ceased such protest.

During our over 30 plus hours of meeting, Abdul Rahman has demonstrated nothing short of sincerity, professionalism, and intent to forget the past and look forward. Abdul Rahman has never exhibited any aggressive or violent behavior, or any animosity towards the United States or non-Muslims. As a teacher of Islam, Abdul Rahman believes Islam is a peaceful religion and he does not support terrorism or any groups that kill innocent people in the name of Islam. For these reasons, we fully support Abdul Rahman and wholeheartedly believe that he does not pose a significant and continued threat to the security of the United States.

We understand the board has been presented with historical data leading up to Abdul Rahman’s detention. However, given an opportunity to review our submissions while being able to see him face to face and ask the tough questions, we hope you will consider the whole picture and realize that Abdul Rahman is a compassionate and deserving man of a second chance in life. He should no longer be negatively characterized as a significant and continued threat to the United States. We ask that you approve Abdul Rahman for transfer so that he may spend the remainder of his days in peace and in the security of his mother, brothers, and sisters. We thank you for this opportunity and are standing by to address any questions or concerns you may have.

Andy Worthington is a freelance investigative journalist, activist, author, photographer, film-maker and singer-songwriter. He is the co-founder of the “Close Guantánamo” campaign, the co-director of “We Stand With Shaker,” calling for the immediate release from Guantánamo of Shaker Aamer, the last British resident in the prison, and the author of The Guantánamo Files: The Stories of the 774 Detainees in America’s Illegal Prison (published by Pluto Press, distributed by the University of Chicago Press in the US, and available from Amazon, including a Kindle edition — click on the following for the US and the UK) and of two other books: Stonehenge: Celebration and Subversion and The Battle of the Beanfield. He is also the co-director (with Polly Nash) of the documentary film, “Outside the Law: Stories from Guantánamo” (available on DVD here — or here for the US).

To receive new articles in your inbox, please subscribe to Andy’s RSS feed — and he can also be found on Facebook (and here), Twitter, Flickr and YouTube. Also see the six-part definitive Guantánamo prisoner list, and “The Complete Guantánamo Files,” an ongoing, 70-part, million-word series drawing on files released by WikiLeaks in April 2011. Also see the definitive Guantánamo habeas list, the full military commissions list, and the chronological list of all Andy’s articles.

Please also consider joining the “Close Guantánamo” campaign, and, if you appreciate Andy’s work, feel free to make a donation.

Cliff Sloan, Former Envoy for Guantánamo Closure, On Why Cleared Prisoners, Including Shaker Aamer, Must Be Freed

Last Wednesday, the Washington Post reawakened discussions about the future of Guantánamo, in an article entitled “Facing threat in Congress, Pentagon races to resettle Guantánamo inmates.” As I described it in my analysis of the article, the Post aired “the suggestion … that all the men approved for release in Guantánamo — 57 out of the 122 men still held — will be freed by the end of the year, and, if Congress proves obstructive, the Obama administration might close the facility before the end of Obama’s presidency by unilaterally moving the remaining prisoners to the US mainland.”

I was at pains to point out that, “[r]ealistically … it might be wisest to view these suggestions as the administration stating its best-case scenario,” but I found it convincing that, “[a]s a first step, officials plan to send up to 10 prisoners overseas, possibly in June,” and that one of these prisoners is Shaker Aamer, the last British resident in Guantánamo, and I was reassured when a journalist friend explained that a source within the administration had told her that there was “cautious optimism” that these releases will indeed take place.

Following up on the story, Ian Woods of Sky News interviewed Cliff Sloan, the former State Department envoy for the closure of Guantánamo, who was appointed by President Obama in 2013. A veteran diplomat, Sloan left his job at the end of last year, but has continued to discuss Guantánamo, and the need for the prison’s closure, ever since. See his op-ed in the New York Times in January, for example.

Below is the transcript of Ian Woods’ interview with Cliff Sloan, in which he very openly talked about the necessity for men approved for release to be freed, and how this evidently includes Shaker Aamer.

Cliff Sloan: It [the continued existence of the Guantánamo prison] frays our alliances with close allies on counter-terrorism, it’s wildly expensive and one thing that is very important, of the 122 individuals at Guantánamo right now, 57 have been approved for transfer after a very rigorous process, and those 57 should be moved absolutely as soon as possible for all the reasons on moving forward on closing Guantánamo, and in fairness to those individuals.

Ian Woods: We are talking about people who’ve been approved for a number of years; in Shaker Aamer’s case it’s 2007 and 2009. What’s the hold-up?

Cliff Sloan: I can’t speak about individual cases, but I will say for those approved for transfer, for every individual who is approved for transfer, I am absolutely of the view that they should be moved with urgency. They should be moved just as promptly as possible. We are talking about people who have been at Guantánamo for 12 or 13 years, people who have been approved for transfer for more than five years and they should not be having to spend a day longer than necessary in Guantánamo.

Ian Woods: If the person wants to go, if a country is willing to accept that person, what can the hold-up be?

Cliff Sloan: Well, again, I can’t get into specifics, there is an extensive process within the US government, but I would just say from our own perspective I very strongly believe that, if he has been approved for transfer, and you have a country  that is willing to accept the person in whom the US government has confidence about their security capabilities, and there’s not an issue about humane treatment of the individual, then there is no sound reason for delay.

Ian Woods: So if that person was going back to the United Kingdom, one of your allies that you were presumably satisfied with the security situation there, there is no reason for that person to be kept in Guantánamo.

Cliff Sloan: Obviously, the United Kingdom is perhaps our closest ally on counter-terrorism and is a very, very strong and valued ally on counter-terrorism.

Ian Woods: A lot of campaigners question British commitment to this, and how hard they have been pushing for his release.

Cliff Sloan: I think the British government has made very clear their desire to have Shaker Aamer returned to the UK.

In his Sky News feature, Ian Woods also mentioned how Ian Moss, a State Department official with responsibility for Guantánamo releases, told him, “We recognize the importance the UK government has placed on resolving Mr. Aamer’s case in a timely manner, and we have made his case a priority.”

Woods also explained that, “Even though there have been reports that the Pentagon would prefer to send him to Saudi Arabia, Sky News understands that is unlikely to happen.”

He added, “Leaked Pentagon files from a decade ago suggested Shaker Aamer had links to al-Qaeda. I’m told US officials now accept those claims have been discredited and he is not deemed a security threat.”

Woods also noted that “Intelligence officials, Homeland Security, the Justice Department, State Department and White House all have to sign off on transfers, along with the Pentagon, and it is understood that it is the Department of Defence which has been causing the delay.”

This seems to be a fair assessment, even though, after the Washington Post published its story, the Miami Herald claimed that Shaker’s “potentially pending transfer … has yet to clear a Principals Committee of Cabinet-level national security and intelligence secretaries, a hurdle that would come before it reaches Carter for his signature … Only once the Principals Committee agrees to change his status from eligible for Saudi repatriation to approved for UK resettlement could Carter then evaluate whether to sign off on it, according to people familiar with the process.”

I’m inclined to believe that the stumbling block is indeed the Pentagon, as Guantánamo attorney Wells Dixon (of the Center for Constitutional Rights) recently stated, and as CCR also explained in response to the Post‘s article:

We are encouraged by the Obama administration’s restated commitment to closing the prison before the president leaves office, but are concerned that the Pentagon is working against closure and that the White House is being too slow to respond.

The Pentagon is doing just barely enough to look busy but not enough to achieve actual closure as ordered by the president. Transfers arranged long ago reportedly sit on desks at the Pentagon gathering dust; officials there were supposed to pick up the pace of the Periodic Review Boards that determine whether the remaining men can be cleared and transferred, yet the next PRB isn’t scheduled until June.

The White House must wake up to what is happening and keep pressure on the DOD to ensure momentum on transfers.

CCR added that a replacement for Cliff Sloan should also be appointed, which I think is a sensible suggestion, and also noted — in a passage that would surely be echoed by all the men approved for transfer — that it is “increasingly difficult to give our clients — including Fahd Ghazy, Ghaleb Al-Bihani, Mohammed Al-Hamiri, and Tariq Ba Odah, all of whom have been cleared for transfer, some for years — real hope that they will ever be released.”

In conclusion, I can only express my hope that there is enough impetus within the administration for Shaker Aamer’s release that this additional — though obviously unjustifiable — review proceeds swiftly, and that the new defense secretary Ashton Carter, who has to sign off on any proposed Guantánamo releases, will take to heart Cliff Sloan’s analysis of the importance of freeing men approved for transfer, and will sign off on the release of some of the 57 Guantánamo prisoners approved for transfer out of the prison as swiftly as possible.

Andy Worthington is a freelance investigative journalist, activist, author, photographer, film-maker and singer-songwriter. He is the co-founder of the “Close Guantánamo” campaign, the co-director of “We Stand With Shaker,” calling for the immediate release from Guantánamo of Shaker Aamer, the last British resident in the prison, and the author of The Guantánamo Files: The Stories of the 774 Detainees in America’s Illegal Prison (published by Pluto Press, distributed by the University of Chicago Press in the US, and available from Amazon, including a Kindle edition — click on the following for the US and the UK) and of two other books: Stonehenge: Celebration and Subversion and The Battle of the Beanfield. He is also the co-director (with Polly Nash) of the documentary film, “Outside the Law: Stories from Guantánamo” (available on DVD here — or here for the US).

To receive new articles in your inbox, please subscribe to Andy’s RSS feed — and he can also be found on Facebook (and here), Twitter, Flickr and YouTube. Also see the six-part definitive Guantánamo prisoner list, and “The Complete Guantánamo Files,” an ongoing, 70-part, million-word series drawing on files released by WikiLeaks in April 2011. Also see the definitive Guantánamo habeas list, the full military commissions list, and the chronological list of all Andy’s articles.

Please also consider joining the “Close Guantánamo” campaign, and, if you appreciate Andy’s work, feel free to make a donation.

Canadian Judge Grants Bail to Former Guantánamo Prisoner Omar Khadr

Over two and a half years since Canadian citizen and former child prisoner Omar Khadr returned to Canada from Guantánamo, a judge in Alberta, Justice June Ross, has granted his application for bail that was argued in Edmonton last month.

“He has a 12½ year track record as a model prisoner, and a release plan supported by educators, mental health professionals, and his lawyers,” Ross wrote in her opinion. Omar has an appeal ongoing in the US against his conviction, following a number of successful appeals by other prisoners convicted in Guantánamo’s deeply flawed military commissions process, and, as the BBC described it, Justice Ross “said the appeal was likely to succeed and keeping him in jail was not in the public interest.”

I cannot express sufficiently how heartening it is to hear that Omar’s bail application has been granted, after nearly 13 years in which he has been treated appallingly by both the US authorities and his own government.

Omar was seized after a firefight in Afghanistan when he was just 15 years old, but was never treated as a juvenile prisoner should have been treated, which is to be rehabilitated rather than punished. Abused in US custody, and having had his hopes of justice dashed by the Canadian agents who visited him at Guantánamo, he finally agreed to a plea deal in October 2010, in a trial by military commission that should never have happened, as the only method by which he could guarantee his release.

In exchange for accepting that he threw a grenade that killed a US soldier, which appears to have been untrue, he received an eight-year sentence, with one year to be served in Guantánamo, and the rest to be served back home in Canada.

However, it took nearly two years for the Canadian government to get him back, and when they did they imprisoned him in a maximum-security prison, and resisted all attempts to downgrade his status so that he could apply for bail. That disgraceful situation only came to an end in February 2014, when he was moved to a medium-security facility, which made him eligible for bail.

At his bail hearing last month, his model behaviour throughout his long imprisonment, and the norms of Canadian law were set against the government’s claims that Canada’s agreement with the US regarding Omar took precedence.

As the Toronto Star described it:

“Neither side is suggesting Mr. Khadr is a threat to anyone and I would suggest that’s a very, very important factor,” Khadr’s lawyer Nathan Whitling told Alberta Justice June Ross …

But what Department of Justice lawyers are arguing in contesting Khadr’s bail application is that Ross doesn’t have the jurisdiction to grant Khadr bail without violating an international treaty and jeopardizing relations with the United States.

“It’s critically important that Canada meet its international obligations,” lawyer Bruce Hughson told the court.

Canada’s duty under the International Transfers of Offenders Act is to enforce Khadr’s US sentence in Canada. There is no provision for bail. But … Whitling argued that Ottawa’s obligation under the act is to enforce the sentence in accordance with Canada’s laws. And Canada’s law respects the right to bail during an appeal, and the fundamental principle of habeas corpus, which gives prisoners the right to challenge the legality of their detention.

Khadr should be treated “no differently than any other prisoner in Canada,” Whitling said. If Ottawa is denying Khadr’s habeas rights then, Whitling argued, “it’s very much like we’re back in Guantánamo.”

On Friday, Justice Ross agreed with Omar’s lawyers, concluding that the “right to seek bail pending appeal is a principle of fundamental justice,” and that Omar’s right to seek bail was guaranteed under Canada’s Charter of Rights and Freedoms. She refused to accept the government’s argument that, as the Toronto Star put it, “granting Khadr bail would jeopardize Canada’s diplomatic relationship with the United States.”

As the Toronto Star also explained, looking at what the judge’s ruling means, Omar’s other longtime Canadian lawyer, Dennis Edney, along with his wife Patricia, “has offered to have Khadr live with them and provide whatever community supervision he may require.”

In addition, “A large community group in Edmonton — from imams and medical professionals, to professors at a Christian university where Khadr has been offered admission — has rallied around the 28-year-old.”

Dennis Edney and Nathan Whitling argued the bail application, and both men “said they were delighted by the news,” as the Star described it. Whitling said, “Omar is fortunate to be back in Canada where we have real courts and real laws,” and Edney added, “It has been a long time coming.”

Nevertheless, the Canadian government has said it intends to appeal the ruling, and, as the Star explained, the government “could argue that Khadr must remain in custody until that appeal is heard.” If that doesn’t happen, then a hearing scheduled for May 5 will set the conditions of Omar’s bail.

The Canadian government should drop its intention to appeal, and should accept that its demonization of Omar must now come to an end, but if that doesn’t happen it is to be hoped that the appeals court will recognize that it time for Omar to be freed to resume his life, and not to continue being used as a pawn in a racist game by the Canadian government.

Omar has spent almost half his life in prison for something he almost certainly didn’t do, and for which he should not, in any case, have been punished. It is time for this festering injustice to be brought to an end.

Andy Worthington is a freelance investigative journalist, activist, author, photographer, film-maker and singer-songwriter. He is the co-founder of the “Close Guantánamo” campaign, the co-director of “We Stand With Shaker,” calling for the immediate release from Guantánamo of Shaker Aamer, the last British resident in the prison, and the author of The Guantánamo Files: The Stories of the 774 Detainees in America’s Illegal Prison (published by Pluto Press, distributed by the University of Chicago Press in the US, and available from Amazon, including a Kindle edition — click on the following for the US and the UK) and of two other books: Stonehenge: Celebration and Subversion and The Battle of the Beanfield. He is also the co-director (with Polly Nash) of the documentary film, “Outside the Law: Stories from Guantánamo” (available on DVD here — or here for the US).

To receive new articles in your inbox, please subscribe to Andy’s RSS feed — and he can also be found on Facebook (and here), Twitter, Flickr and YouTube. Also see the six-part definitive Guantánamo prisoner list, and “The Complete Guantánamo Files,” an ongoing, 70-part, million-word series drawing on files released by WikiLeaks in April 2011. Also see the definitive Guantánamo habeas list, the full military commissions list, and the chronological list of all Andy’s articles.

Please also consider joining the “Close Guantánamo” campaign, and, if you appreciate Andy’s work, feel free to make a donation.

Obama to Release Ten Guantánamo Prisoners Including Shaker Aamer, Says Washington Post

The media is suddenly buzzing with the suggestion, first aired in the Washington Post, that all the men approved for release in Guantánamo — 57 out of the 122 men still held — will be freed by the end of the year, and, if Congress proves obstructive, the Obama administration might close the facility before the end of Obama’s presidency by unilaterally moving the remaining prisoners to the US mainland.

Realistically, however, it might be wisest to view these suggestions as the administration stating its best-case scenario.

It is certainly true that the release of prisoners is likely to resume soon, with willingness on the part of the administration, and with the new defense secretary, Ashton Carter, imminently to be presented with a number of cases to sign off on. According to US law, implemented in the last few years, Congress must be notified of intended releases 30 days before they happen, but this is not a process that involves significant roadblocks.

More problematic, for the administration, is finding new homes for the majority of the released prisoners, who, for the most part, cannot be safely repatriated. 49 of the 57 men approved for release are Yemenis, and the entire US establishment is unwilling to repatriate them, because of the unstable security situation in Yemen.

However, as the officials who spoke to the Washington Post made clear, other prisoners — and a handful of the Yemenis — can probably be released within the next few months. The article stated, “As a first step, officials plan to send up to 10 prisoners overseas, possibly in June.”

The release of Shaker Aamer?

One of these men is Shaker Aamer, the last British resident in the prison, who has been the subject of formidable campaigning in the UK, by activists and by MPs. A long-standing campaign I have been involved in is the Save Shaker Aamer Campaign, and in November I co-founded another campaign, We Stand With Shaker, with the activist Joanne MacInnes, which concentrated on securing high-level support from celebrities and MPs, with significant success. Of huge importance has been the work of MPs in the Shaker Aamer Parliamentary Group, chaired by John McDonnell MP, a tireless campaigner for justice, who pushed for a Parliamentary debate last month that ended up with the government endorsing the call for Shaker’s return to his family in the UK.

Murmurs over the years have suggested that elements within the US establishments — and perhaps the UK too — wanted Shaker sent to Saudi Arabia, the country of his birth, where he would not be at liberty to talk about all he has seen and knows about after 13 years as one of the most vocal opponents of Guantánamo inside the prison. That, however, was never a practical option — although it may well have contributed to his ongoing imprisonment — because vocal and often influential campaigners, lawyers, MPs and journalists in the UK have long been aware that the British government has an inescapable responsibility to secure his return to the UK, and not to allow him to be sent elsewhere.

In its article, the Washington Post noted that Shaker “may be resettled as early as this summer.” It was also noted that he was “an accused al-Qaeda plotter,” whom British officials “have lobbied Washington to release,” although it is unhelpful to air claims about his alleged actions when, to be blunt, they have proven groundless. Guantánamo, essentially, is a place where lies told by prisoners subjected to torture or other forms of abuse, or bribed or worn down, are brandished as “evidence,” when they are no such thing, and, as with so many other prisoners, the allegations against Shaker have proven to be groundless.

In its most important paragraph, with regard to Shaker, the Post noted, “A decision to send Aamer, one of the highest profile prisoners who could be moved out of Guantánamo Bay, to Britain would be an important signal that the White House is willing to go ahead with transfers despite some officials’ fears about detainees’ future actions.”

The article proceeded to note that some US officials have expressed concerns about Shaker because he was “described in military files as an experienced al-Qaeda operative,” and fear what he “might do once he is released.” However, I find these claims to be both weak — and indicative of a tendency to exaggeration and fearfulness in the defense community — as well as a transparent effort to hide the real truth: that Shaker has  a lot of knowledge that could embarrass his former captors.

The Post also explained how, “after Prime Minister David Cameron pressed Obama to release Aamer during a visit to Washington in January, Obama promised to prioritize the review of his case,” and quoted a spokesperson for the British Embassy in Washington, who said, “We are confident that the US government understands the seriousness of the UK’s request for Mr. Aamer’s release.”

Other imminent releases?

In addition, the Post noted that administration officials had explained to them that Defense Secretary Ashton Carter, “who has not approved any transfers since he took office in February, will sign off in coming weeks on the repatriation of inmates to Morocco and Mauritania, and the transfer of six Yemeni prisoners to a third country.”

This, the Post added, “will pose a test for Carter,” a longtime Pentagon official who replaced Chuck Hagel, “whose reluctance to approve” releases “caused friction with the White House before he abruptly announced his resignation last year.”

At his confirmation hearing, Carter promised that he would play it “absolutely straight” in assessing the Guantánamo cases, but he “must navigate eagerness at the White House to reduce the prison’s population, worries among many uniformed officers about militants returning to the fight and opposition from many lawmakers to freeing inmates,” as the Post described it.

As one official put it, “He understands that he has to transfer people and that he wants to do ‘safe transfers.’ So he’s trying to define what a safe transfer is.”

After noting that “debates about the safety of releasing detainees have held up transfers for years,” the Post pointed out that one of the men intended for imminent release, Ahmed Ould Abdel Aziz, a Mauritanian who is “expected to be repatriated as early as June,” is a case in point. Although he was “scheduled for release in late 2009,” just last year Chuck Hagel refused to approve his release, even though all the other relevant US agencies had “concurred that he should be transferred.”

One official, speaking anonymously, said, “Everybody said he should go back to Mauritania, including the intelligence community. The Pentagon has sat on it. The Pentagon raised concerns already addressed in an effort to forestall transfers.”

“Sometimes,” the Post noted, “officials raise flags about potential transfers during final evaluations that take place once a country has agreed to take in a prisoner. Aziz may have been one of those cases.” Paul Lewis, the special envoy for closing Guantánamo, appointed by President Obama in 2013, said, “We take very seriously the responsibility to ensure transfers are conducted safely and responsibly.”

John Holland, one of Aziz’s attorneys, told the Post that “news of his client’s release was long awaited,” as the newspaper described it “We hope to God it is true,” Holland said.

Another prisoner, who, according to the Post, is “expected to be repatriated in June,” is Younis Abdurrahman Chekkouri (aka Younus Chekhouri), a Moroccan who, like Aziz, was cleared for release in January 2010 by the high-level, inter-agency Guantánamo Review Task Force that President Obama established shortly after taking office in 2009. The Post noted how Chekhouri was described by US officials as “a close associate of Osama bin Laden and a co-founder of the Moroccan Islamic Fighting Group,” in the classified military files released by WikiLeaks in 2011. These claims have long been discredited by his lawyers — and by writers like myself, and it has also long been evident that the US authorities eventually concluded that their supposed evidence was untrustworthy. However, it was, nevertheless, reassuring to see the Post reporting that “officials have said that much of the information in some detainees’ files was inaccurate.”

It is troubling that the administration seems intent on repatriating Chekkouri to Morocco, where, he has said, he “would be tortured by the security services,” but his release is certainly long overdue, and it looks, unfortunately, as though it can only be hoped that his fears are unfounded.

The longer view

As for whether all 57 prisoners approved for release “will be resettled by the end of 2015,” as the officials who spoke to the Post suggested, those same officials also acknowledged that it “would require ‘large muscle movements’ by at least two countries.” The officials said they hope these two countries “will each agree to take in 10 to 20 Yemeni detainees.”

A defense official said, “I am aware of the clock ticking. It’s going to take high-level leadership, and it’s going to take some big asks to some countries.”

As for the other prisoners — ten facing trials, and 55 others, all scheduled to have their cases reviewed by Periodic Review Boards — the question of what to do with them “looms over a White House that is facing the end of Obama’s second term in 2017.” The 55 were either regarded as “too dangerous to release” by Obama’s task force, even though the task force also acknowledged that insufficient evidence existed to put them on trial, or were recommended for prosecution, but saw those proposals crumble as judges delivered a series of devastating rulings undermining the claimed legitimacy of the military commissions.

As the Post noted, “The biggest challenge to Obama’s plan lies in Congress, where skeptical lawmakers are moving to tighten restrictions on sending prisoners overseas. In the Senate, Kelly Ayotte (R-N.H.) is sponsoring a bill that would extend the ban on bringing detainees to the United States and would effectively bar future transfers to third countries.”

In response, the White House is “drafting a plan that officials hope will receive the support of Sen. John McCain (R-Ariz.), the chairman of the Senate Armed Services Committee, as an alternate to Ayotte’s measure,” on the basis that McCain “has previously expressed openness to shutting the prison.” Even if McCain can be persuaded, however, it’s “far from certain” that “lawmakers would fall in behind the White House’s plan, which would allow detainees to be brought to the United States for trial or detention and would enable the continued transfer of others to foreign nations,” as the Post described it.

Rep. Adam Smith (Wash.), the ranking Democrat on the House Armed Services Committee, and, as the Post described it, “a leading advocate for allowing prisoners to be brought to the United States,” said, “It’s looking very difficult. I don’t see what changes minds or persuades people at this point, but that’s what [the White House] is attempting to do.”

However, if Congress “does pass legislation that would freeze Guantánamo Bay’s population,” White House officials are “exploring options for the unilateral closure of the prison and moving detainees into the United States,” as the Post put it, adding, accurately, that this is “an action that Congress has opposed from the president’s first months in office.”

For now, the safest course of action for those who seek the closure of Guantánamo is to focus on the proposed releases in the near future, including Shaker Aamer, Ahmed Ould Abdel Aziz and Younus Chekhouri. As a journalist friend told me on Wednesday, after speaking to a contact within the administration, there is “cautious optimism” that they can secure the releases planned for June. I hope that leads to further releases, and eventually to the closure of the prison, before the end of Obama’s presidency, but with Guantánamo it is wise, after 13 years, not to get too many hopes up all at once.

Andy Worthington is a freelance investigative journalist, activist, author, photographer, film-maker and singer-songwriter. He is the co-founder of the “Close Guantánamo” campaign, the co-director of “We Stand With Shaker,” calling for the immediate release from Guantánamo of Shaker Aamer, the last British resident in the prison, and the author of The Guantánamo Files: The Stories of the 774 Detainees in America’s Illegal Prison (published by Pluto Press, distributed by the University of Chicago Press in the US, and available from Amazon, including a Kindle edition — click on the following for the US and the UK) and of two other books: Stonehenge: Celebration and Subversion and The Battle of the Beanfield. He is also the co-director (with Polly Nash) of the documentary film, “Outside the Law: Stories from Guantánamo” (available on DVD here — or here for the US).

To receive new articles in your inbox, please subscribe to Andy’s RSS feed — and he can also be found on Facebook (and here), Twitter, Flickr and YouTube. Also see the six-part definitive Guantánamo prisoner list, and “The Complete Guantánamo Files,” an ongoing, 70-part, million-word series drawing on files released by WikiLeaks in April 2011. Also see the definitive Guantánamo habeas list, the full military commissions list, and the chronological list of all Andy’s articles.

Please also consider joining the “Close Guantánamo” campaign, and, if you appreciate Andy’s work, feel free to make a donation.